⛳️ Links Enters Into Exclusivity Agreement to Purchase Spey Bay Golf Course in Scotland

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Good morning and welcome back to a special edition of The Mulligan. 

454 Days Since Launch

Highlights

Links Enters Into Exclusivity Agreement to Purchase Spey Bay Golf Club in Scotland

Yes, you read the headline correctly. Tell your friends. Tell your family. Tell every single golfer you know that March 16th, 2023 is the day Links, a community of golfers from around the world, entered into an agreement to purchase Spey Bay Golf Club in Scotland.

Just 454 days ago, on December 17th, 2021, the idea of Links didn't exist. Holiday season was fully underway. Bitcoin was trading at $46,202. LIV Golf wasn't a thing. Tom Brady was your reigning Super Bowl Champion. ConstitutionDAO had just failed to acquire a copy of the U.S. Constitution... and Mike Dudas was tweeting about how it'd be interesting to see what a group of people could achieve when applying the DAO model to golf. A couple of days later a Discord was spun up, the infamous Google Doc was created, golfers from around the world took notice and Links was off and running.

It's been an incredible journey up to this point. This announcement is the culmination of hours and hours and hours (and hours and hours) of hard, diligent work over the past 15 months from the core team, community team, contributors and Links membership at large. None of what we've accomplished thus far, or what we plan to accomplish in the future, would be possible without the initial energy at the onset of this project. It's truly a special group, which is why the team waited until a truly special opportunity came to their attention.

That special opportunity turned out to be Spey Bay Golf Club. Spey Bay is one of 247 true links courses located on the Moray coast of Scotland that came on the market in early February. The course was designed by legendary Scottish golfer Ben Sayers and opened its gates in 1907. 12 of its holes are situated right along the ocean.

Links courses in Scotland don't come on the market very often, and with the strict environmental regulations that the country employs, they aren't built from scratch very often either. Within days of becoming aware the team was on the phone with KemperSports, operator of Bandon Dunes and our course acquisition advisor, the R&A, top architects & agronomists, Links members located in Scotland, real estate agents, U.K. lawyers and other relevant parties. It quickly became clear that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to acquire a property deeply embedded in the fabric of the game we know and love.

Fast forward to a month later, March 16th, and Spey Bay is (pending the deal closing) ours. The first Links course has been added to our portfolio. Yes, you also read that correctly, the first Links course. On the Twitter Spaces announcement our CEO Jim Daily said that "we'd love to grow our Links courses to 10 by 2030."

Jim also said that he and Adam Besvinick, our Head of Course Acquisition, are heading over to Spey Bay this weekend to meet with the current owners, head greenskeepers, and a few of our potential architects, agronomists and partners. Keep an eye out for the next edition of The Mulligan, we'll have you covered with all the details of their trip.

United States Course Acquisition Update

What about the U.S. course acquisition process, what're the updates on that?

If we had a penny for every time that question has been asked over the past couple of months we could buy St. Andrews! Seriously though, the concern that the purchase of Spey Bay will affect our stateside acquisition efforts is completely valid. Below is an overview of what the team has done over the last 14 months on the U.S. front:

• Evaluated 90+ courses. An evaluation includes basic diligence to understand the scale of the course, the current condition of the course and what expenditures would be required

• Visited 10 sites in person, including one last week, ranging from turn-key courses to properties that need tons of work to a complete rebuilds

• Submitted formal offers on 3 courses, each of which was rebuffed in the latter stages of the deal process

Lastly, there are 25 courses in our current deal funnel. 7 of these are under active due diligence by the core team. Quality was voted the #1 attribute in Proposal 14 by a considerable margin, so we can assure you that the United States course that we ultimately acquire will be equally as special as Spey Bay.

New Membership Tier

Links Announces More Accessible Third Membership Tier Coming Soon

To date Links has definitely outpunched its weight class. Raising $11M at mint, attracting attention from the top architects and players in the game, donating $50,000 to charitable causes, signing with Callaway and KemperSports... you know, the whole resume spiel. That has all been possible due to the incredible group of 5,400 members who hold the Founding Membership passes. Without this supportive, thoughtful community made up of golfers from 48 of the 50 U.S. states and 40+ countries around the world Links would not exist.

But we're still an unfinished product. Capturing the immense amount of momentum we've built up over the past 15 months is critically important to reaching our ultimate goal: to give everybody their place in the game of golf. The best of what golf has to offer should be available to everyone.

With that in mind, we're excited to announce that Links is launching a third, more accessible membership tier positioned below Global and Leisure Founding Membership passes. This tier will enjoy entry-level access to the Links ecosystem of perks, benefits and community without all of the bells and whistles that the current passes include. It will also be able to be purchased by credit card and crypto!

The core team is hard at work ironing out the details of this membership. You can expect details to be released over the next couple of weeks as the golf calendar approaches The Masters.

In the meantime, we need your help!

Links Referral Rewards Program

To generate as much awareness as possible for the launch of our third membership tier, we need you to head over to links.golf, enter your email, generate a referral link and share it with all of your golf friends and family! You'll notice that once you enter your email a leaderboard will pop up... what's it for?

Once someone clicks on your link and signs up, you'll receive a point. Before the membership goes live, members who are on the leaderboard will be eligible to receive the below unbelievable prizes:

• All-Expenses Paid Trip to our First Course

• Callaway Shopping Spree

• Golfbreaks by PGA Vacation Package

• Round at Pebble Beach Golf Links

• Bettinardi Putter

• Links Vessel Bag

• Links Pro Shop Shopping Spree

• PGA Event Tickets

• Rounds at Top Courses with Links Team Members

• Free Initiation/Dues

• Free Greens Fees

and much more, so get sharing!

Throwback to the infamous Google Doc.

Partnerships

Introducing Links Private Access Powered By WORLDvantage®

Golf is a game known for its exclusivity, and with the boom the sport has experienced over the past three years this problem is only being more exacerbated. Months or even years-long waitlists to join a private club have become the standard these days. A certain subset of private clubs, i.e. Pine Valley and Cypress Point, have even elevated themselves to a tier above exclusive, where getting an opportunity to play is all-but-impossible.

That's why we're extremely excited to reveal one of our most important perks to date... Links Private Access powered by WORLDvantage®. Through this partnership, Links Global pass holders have access to WORLDvantage®'s network of more than 450 courses spread across North America, after they complete the application process, for just a greens fee.

Add Links Private Access to The Global Golf Association, our member-to-member reciprocity platform, and IMG, our other esteemed course access partner, and Links Global pass holders now have a pool of more than 600 courses to choose from this upcoming season! For more information, please read the Medium article here and head over to our Clubhouse to complete the signup process.

Subscribe here.