Andy DevaneyFive Iron Golf London has decided the traditional pre-match pint could use a seven-iron.
Its new 90 + 90 package at Broadgate gives groups 90 minutes in a Trackman simulator before the bay becomes a private screen for 90 minutes of Premier League football, with food and a pint folded into the £60-per-person price.
A different sort of pre-match warm-up
The idea is simple enough to explain without a tactics board. Groups of at least three take over one of the venue’s simulator bays, play virtual rounds or contests across more than 300 courses, then stop swinging when the football starts. At kick-off, the same screen carries the match.
For a venue that only opened its first UK site in July, it is a canny bit of programming. Five Iron is not trying to persuade London to abandon the pub; that would be a heroic misuse of corporate optimism. It is trying to stretch matchday into a longer social occasion and make the golf bay part of the ritual.
A pizza or NYC smash burger and an ice-cold pint are included for each guest. There is also a cheaper Bay, Burger, Beer option at £40 per person, covering an hour in a simulator, a burger and a pint, with the match shown on screens elsewhere around the venue.
Golf without the dress-code anxiety
Five Iron’s proposition works because the golf is deliberately casual. Complimentary Callaway clubs are provided, while Trackman technology gives players access to more than 300 courses.
The result is something closer to competitive socialising than a solemn examination of one’s handicap. Nobody is being asked to produce a club tie or explain the subtleties of bounce angle before being allowed through the door.
UK CEO Eric Parker said:“Matchday has always been about getting your friends together, and we wanted to create a new way to spend that time together that starts well before kick-off.
“Five Iron is built around making golf social, accessible and fun, whether you play every week or have never picked up a club. 90 + 90 brings that idea to football fans; you can compete with your friends, have some food and drinks and then settle in for the match, all in the same place.
“It’s a completely different alternative to heading straight to the pub, and you definitely don’t need to be a golfer to enjoy it. In fact, half the fun might be finding out which of your mates is absolutely terrible at it!”
Broadgate gives Five Iron a useful address
The 6,900-square-foot venue sits at 1 Finsbury Avenue in Broadgate, moments from Liverpool Street Station. It houses eight Trackman simulators alongside a full-service bar and restaurant, with screens carrying live sport including Premier League football and Formula 1.
That location matters. Indoor golf works rather better as an easy addition to an evening than as a logistical expedition, and Liverpool Street puts Five Iron in reach of office workers, commuters and groups already looking for somewhere to gather in central London.
Football provides the hook
The 90 + 90 launch is timed to the Premier League’s return, with reigning champions Arsenal taking on newly promoted Coventry City in the opening game of the new season.
It would be Coventry’s first Premier League match in 25 years and would also bring manager Frank Lampard, the former Chelsea and England midfielder, back into the top flight.
Football gives Five Iron an obvious appointment around which to build the offer, but the business logic stretches beyond a single fixture.
Five Iron’s UK ambitions extend beyond golfers
Five Iron began in New York in 2017 and has grown to more than 40 locations internationally. London is its first UK venue and the opening move in plans for 10 Five Iron Golf locations across the country.
That expansion rather depends on simulator golf escaping the gravitational pull of committed players. Packages such as 90 + 90 make the bays useful to a wider crowd without disguising the golf itself.
At £60 a head, it is not being sold as the cheapest possible way to watch football. It is selling a fuller occasion: private space, competition before kick-off, food, drink and the useful possibility of discovering that the loudest sporting authority in the group cannot persuade a virtual golf ball to travel in anything resembling a straight line.
The football supplies the appointment. The golf supplies tomorrow morning’s argument.
