Inside DFW’s Experience Economy: How the Virtual Is Now Evolving the Real

I recently found myself staring at an hourglass and watching the sand drop by grain. Once the sand filled the bottom, I flipped it over. Hourglass is the perfect metaphor for what’s happening in the Dallas and Fort Worth Experiences in his economy, where he was one of the pioneers of sports-centric “eatertainment” (entertainment venues that serve food and drink). You’re turning things upside down. I am going around for the first time.

The experience economy took off in the 1990s when companies realized that consumers were spending more money on experiences than things. Over the past 30 years, companies have built billion-dollar companies by blending sports and technology with entertainment and food and beverages. DFW has many such concepts. But without the underlying sport itself, the venue wouldn’t exist. No Golf, no Top Golf, no Drive Shack. Without pickleballs, there is no chicken and pickles. Without baseballs, there is no BatBox. There would be no Toca Social without football. Sport is, and has always been, the lower vessel of the hourglass, the upper vessel that pours its sands (purposes, goals, principles, innovations) into the experience economy.

Player introduction:

In 2022, Dallas-based Topgolf reported revenue of $1.5 billion. Top Golf, which was acquired by Callaway in 2021 for his $2.6 billion stake, already accounts for his 39% of the company’s total revenue, and Top Golf CEO Artie Starrs said he expects to have more than $1 million in the next few years. We expect it to be the majority of the portfolio’s returns. But the trickle-down effect that Top Golf brings to traditional golf is a groundbreaking inversion of the hourglass.

In 2022, Callaway announced that 10% of all golfers in the U.S. started playing golf thanks to TopGolf. According to the National Golf Foundation, in 2022, 25.6 million Americans will have played traditional golf at least once. That means more than 2.5 million golfers have started playing golf with his Topgolf.

And Topgolf only scratches the surface. We currently operate 78 venues across the United States, with a goal of opening at least 11 venues annually in the near future. According to Starrs, each venue opens the door to his 300,000 unique Topgolfers. According to the NGF, 75% of non-golfers visiting Topgolf said they would be interested in playing on-course golf. “The economic impact we have on our communities keeps our golf courses viable and thriving,” says Stars.

With approximately $325 million in revenue in 2020 and 2022, Drive Shack Inc. is moving its headquarters from New York to Dallas and opening Puttery, its flagship 21+ mini golf concept, at The Colony. bottom. “DFW is filled with people who spend more money on experiences than things,” says former CEO Hana Khouri, who stepped down as CEO of the company in early May. At Drive Shack venues, less than 10 percent of her customers are avid golfers, she says. But for the 54 golf courses owned, managed, or leased under DSI’s American Golf brand (which will account for her 84% of the company’s 2021 revenue), the reversal of the hourglass will have an impact on internal growth. I am giving “[Drive Shack Inc.] is a period in which more entertainment golfers are seen than traditional golfers, and the gap is widening. [Drive Shack] is working to bring entertainment golfers onto the course,” she says.

Larry Leon, a seasoned retail expert and partner at RetailUnion, believes Dallas is a hotbed of restaurants, and the technology that drives these stores is advancing. “If the concept wants to grow into markets like Houston, San Antonio, Austin, El Paso, Dallas is an easy starting point,” he says. “The computing power behind these concepts will only increase, leading to very novel, interesting and fresh concepts.”

Adds “Football’s Top Golf” Toca Social, which has raised $100 million as of 2022, to the list of companies using Dallas as a launching point in the United States. The European concept, which uses immersive gamified screens for games such as target practice and penalty kick competition, is set to open in the Dallas Design District in 2023 and create up to 175 local jobs. Mexico-based BatBox, an eatertainment concept built around a baseball simulator, will also open its first U.S. store in North Texas by early 2024.

“We needed a state with cheap land. There were no long discussions about where to go first,” says BatBox founder Jose Vargas. “Dallas was easy.”

Chicken N Pickle, a pickleball court and restaurant venue capitalizing on the pickleball boom in the United States, has been a success in DFW, with Grapevine being the best performing venue. “When we launched in 2016, most of my days were spent explaining to people what a pickleball was,” said the managing director who oversees DFW’s locations and openings. partner, he says, Kelli Alldredge. But now there are an estimated 36.5 million pickleball players in America, up from 2.8 million when Chicken N Pickle opened its first store. “We were pioneers,” she says.

Historically, most people have been drawn to sports by watching them on television. For today’s consumers, entry points, and even re-entry points, are no longer observational. It is due to immersion and gamification.

BatBox’s Vargas said: Starrs said, “If a venue can provide customers with a sense of euphoria, like Topgolf does when they hit the perfect shot, they can go crazy no matter what sport they’re playing.” will increase significantly,” he said.