This article is part of a seven-chapter story following Jack on their journey to start a Golf Simulator Business.
Inspired by the guide 37 Tips for Starting a Golf Simulator Business, the series blends practical steps with storytelling to show what starting a business really feels like.
Starting a Golf Simulator Business – Jack’s First Steps
What Does “Being My Own Boss” Really Mean?
The best business ideas hit you when you’re not looking for them—mine arrives on a Thursday morning while I’m helping a drunk guest find his room key at 2 AM.
I stand in the hotel lobby, watching this guy fumble through his pockets for the third time, and something shifts. Twenty-eight years in hospitality, and I’m still cleaning up other people’s messes.
My knees ache from the marble floors. My back protests every time I bend to retrieve another dropped keycard. In a few months, I’ll hit retirement age, and then what? More of this? Or worse—nothing at all?
The thought of retirement terrifies me more than any belligerent guest ever could. I’ve seen too many colleagues retire to their recliners, their days shrinking to doctor visits and daytime TV. That’s not me. I need something to build, something that’s mine.
Three weeks later, I’m at the driving range with my buddy Tom when the real idea strikes. We’re complaining about the November drizzle cutting our season short—again—when Tom mentions his nephew just opened some kind of indoor golf place in Phoenix.
“Year-round golf,” he says, taking a practice swing. “Kids love it, corporates book it for events. The tech tracks everything—spin rate, launch angle, the works.”
The club nearly slips from my hands. Indoor golf with hospitality elements? That’s my wheelhouse wrapped around my passion.
I spend that night researching until my eyes blur. Golf simulators aren’t just fancy toys anymore—they’re legitimate businesses. The technology has evolved from pixelated screens to virtual courses so realistic you can see individual blades of grass.
More importantly, people are hungry for this. They want to play Pebble Beach without the plane ticket. They want to practice their swing in January. They want somewhere to take clients that isn’t another steakhouse.
Why Golf? Why Now? Why Me?
Here’s what I know after three decades of watching people spend money on experiences: they’re not buying the thing itself. They’re buying the feeling it gives them.
In hotels, they buy comfort and escape. In restaurants, they buy atmosphere and connection. In golf? They buy improvement, competition, and those rare moments of perfection when everything clicks.
I’ve got the hospitality part down cold. I know how to read a room, how to make people comfortable, how to turn complainers into regulars. I understand staffing schedules, inventory management, vendor negotiations.
I’ve handled everything from kitchen fires to wedding disasters. Running my own place can’t be harder than managing a 200-room hotel through a pandemic.
But running your own business means something different. No corporate safety net. No IT department to call when the system crashes.
No regional manager to blame when things go sideways. Every decision lands on my desk. Every problem needs my solution. Every dollar spent comes from my account.
The weight of it settles on my shoulders like a familiar coat—heavy but somehow right.
What Would This Business Actually Look Like?
I sketch it out on a legal pad, the vision crystallizing with each line. Not just golf—that’s thinking too small. I see an indoor golf center where pros can fine-tune their game with tour-level data. Where beginners can learn without the intimidation of a real course.
Where companies can host team events that don’t involve trust falls or escape rooms. Add a bar and grill because people golf better with beer, and they definitely spend more.
The more I research, the more the model makes sense. Indoor golf centers solve real problems. Weather ruins half the golf season in most states. Traditional courses intimidate beginners.
Practice ranges offer no data, no feedback beyond “that felt good” or “that went left.” My place would offer year-round play, professional coaching, and instant feedback on every shot.
I start categorizing potential customers in my head—a habit from years of market segmentation meetings. League players seeking winter competition. Parents looking for family activities that don’t involve screens (ironic, given the giant screens involved).
Corporate groups tired of the same old happy hours. Serious golfers obsessed with shaving strokes. Each group needs something different, but they all need what I’m planning to build.
Time to Get Real: Field Research
Research starts with a simple Google search: “indoor golf simulator business for sale.” Not because I want to buy one—yet—but because sellers talk.
They share numbers, reveal problems, explain what works. Within two days, I’m on the phone with Mike, who’s selling his four-bay operation outside Cleveland.
“I’m not your competition,” I tell him upfront. “I’m three states away and trying to decide between buying existing or starting fresh. I’ll pay for your time.”
Mike laughs. “Save your money. I’ll talk your ear off for free. Just promise to learn from my mistakes.”
For ninety minutes, Mike downloads everything. He started five years ago with two bays, expanded to four, wishes he’d started with six.
His biggest surprise? “Corporate events,” he says. “I thought it’d be all golfers. But Tuesday afternoon team-builders pay the bills through winter.”
“My biggest mistake was assuming hospitality would be simple—serve some beers and chips and you’re set. Not so. Food and beverage is where you make real money, but only if you do it right: proper equipment, trained staff, and the right permits. Don’t cut corners like I did.”
The call ends with Mike offering to share his actual P&L statements. “NDAs and all that,” he says. “But real numbers beat projections every time.”
Next, I reach out to Tammy, who sold her simulator business last year. Found her through a franchise forum where she’s surprisingly active.
She agrees to coffee when she’s in town next month, but gives me one piece of gold over text: “Whatever budget you have, add 40%. Everything costs more than you think, especially the build-out.”
The real education comes from a podcast—”The Indoor Golf Revolution”—featuring three successful owners. I listen while driving, while walking, while pretending to watch TV with my wife.
Each owner echoes similar themes: technology matters but service matters more. Leagues create community. Food and beverage drives margin. Location can make or break you.
The Decision That Changes Everything
Sunday morning, I sit with my wife at our kitchen table. Spreadsheets cover the surface—startup costs, revenue projections, competitor analysis. She sips her coffee, studying the numbers with the same intensity she once reviewed our mortgage papers.
“The money’s there,” she finally says. “Between savings and a business loan, we can do this. But that’s not what you’re really asking, is it?”
She’s right. I’m not asking about money. I’m asking if I should trade my comfortable decline toward retirement for the chaos of starting over. If I should risk our nest egg on simulators and software. If I have one more mountain left to climb.
“You’ve been managing other people’s dreams for thirty years,” she continues. “Maybe it’s time to manage your own.”
The doubt creeps in anyway.
- What if nobody comes?
- What if the technology fails?
- What if I’m too old to learn new tricks?
But then I remember every hotel crisis I’ve navigated, every impossible guest I’ve satisfied, every staff mutiny I’ve prevented. This isn’t about age—it’s about experience. And I’ve got three decades of it.
That night, I dream about my simulator business for the first time. Not the nightmare version where everything fails, but the real version—where the register rings, where leagues fill up, where someone sinks a virtual putt at Augusta and the whole place erupts.
I wake up knowing what Mike meant when he said, “You’ll know when you know.”
Moving From Dream to Plan
Monday morning, I create a new folder on my laptop: “Jack’s Indoor Golf Center.” The name will change—needs to—but the commitment won’t.
Inside, I start organizing everything: market research, competitor analysis, technology options, startup costs. Each document raises new questions. How many bays? What simulator technology? Food service or just snacks? Beer and wine or full bar?
I reach back out to Mike with specific questions about his operation. He sends photos of his layout, his biggest week’s revenue report, even his employee handbook. “Serial entrepreneur syndrome,” he explains. “Once you’ve built one, you want to help others build theirs.”
His P&L reveals the truth about indoor golf: it’s not really about golf. Golf is the hook, but success comes from everything around it.
His simulator revenue covers overhead. Food and beverage creates profit. Events and leagues drive growth. Private lessons and club fitting add margin. It’s four businesses in one, each supporting the others.
I call three commercial real estate agents, just to see what’s available. Not ready to sign anything, just testing the waters.
They all mention the same trend: landlords want experiential tenants now. Restaurants, fitness concepts, entertainment venues—anything that drives foot traffic and can’t be replaced by Amazon. An indoor golf center checks every box.
The third agent mentions a space that’s been vacant for eight months. Former sporting goods store, 8,000 square feet, plenty of parking, visible from the highway. “Landlord’s motivated,” she says. “Might contribute to build-out for the right concept.”
I drive by that night. The location sits between a thriving shopping center and three office parks. A Planet Fitness glows two doors down.
A Buffalo Wild Wings anchors the other end. The parking lot stays busy even at 9 PM. I sit in my car, visualizing my sign above the door, watching potential customers drive past.
What It Really Means
People romanticize entrepreneurship. They picture freedom, flexibility, being your own boss.
They don’t picture standing in an empty building at midnight, calculating whether you can afford both the good simulators and decent HVAC.
They don’t imagine lying awake wondering if you’ve just made the expensive mistake of your life.
But they also don’t picture the moment when your vision starts becoming real. When the architect’s drawings match the image in your head. When the first league signup comes through. When a customer says, “This is exactly what we’ve been looking for.”
I think about my dad, who worked the same factory job for forty years and died eight months after retirement. He never got his chance to build something.
I think about my hotel colleagues who talk about their dreams but never act. I think about myself in five years—do I want to wonder what if, or do I want to know for certain?
The answer comes with surprising clarity. I’d rather fail at my own dream than succeed at managing someone else’s.
The Commitment
That evening, I tell my wife I’m doing it. Not thinking about it, not researching it—doing it. She nods like she’s been waiting for me to catch up to what she already knew.
“Three conditions,” she says. “One, we set a hard limit on the investment—if it goes over, we stop and reassess. Two, you still take some version of retirement from the hotel, even if it’s just dropping to part-time initially.
Three, we take that Hawaii vacation we’ve been postponing before the build-out starts.”
All reasonable. All doable. All proof that she’s thought this through more than I realized.
I spend the next hour writing out what this business will be. Not the nuts and bolts—that comes later—but the heart of it. A place where golf meets hospitality. Where technology enhances rather than replaces the human element.
Where a sixteen-year-old learning to drive and a sixty-year-old protecting their back can both find their game. Where “indoor golf” means more than just golf that happens to be inside.
The mission crystallizes: Create the premier indoor golf experience that combines cutting-edge technology with exceptional hospitality, serving everyone from beginners to scratch golfers.
It sounds corporate, polished. But underneath, it means something simpler: Build the place I’d want to spend my time. Run it the way I’ve always thought businesses should be run. Prove that experience and passion can still build something new.
Three Things to Lock Down
Before bed, I write three questions on a sticky note and put it on my bathroom mirror:
- Can you handle the financial risk if this fails?
- Will you commit full-time once it launches?
- Do you have the energy for one more mountain?
The first two are easy. We’ve run the numbers. The loan plus savings won’t bankrupt us if everything goes wrong. And full-time isn’t a question—half-measures don’t build businesses.
The third question is harder. But then I remember this morning’s 2 AM keycard incident and realize
I’m already tired.
- Tired of making other people rich.
- Tired of implementing strategies I didn’t create.
- Tired of pretending retirement sounds appealing when it actually sounds like surrender.
I check all three boxes.
Tomorrow, I’ll tell my boss I’m planning to leave. I’ll call Mike again with technical questions. I’ll schedule meetings with three banks about small business loans. I’ll start the long, complex process of turning this idea into reality.
But tonight, I sit on my back deck with a beer, listening to the rain that’s already ended the outdoor golf season, and I allow myself one moment of pure possibility.
In my mind, I can hear it—the solid crack of club meeting ball, the cheers when someone holes out at virtual St. Andrews, the hum of a business that’s exactly what its community needed.
It sounds like my future. And for the first time in years, that future sounds worth chasing.
See the guide Jack used: 37 Tips for Starting a Golf Simulator Business
You’ve just finished Chapter 1. Curious what happens next? In Chapter 2, Jack starts making key decisions, Deciding on the Business Model and Location.