Page 181 - One Thousand Ways to Make $1000

about five miles off and I went over to see what they were doing, but they
weren’t doing much either. I talked to the owner. ‘Don’t worry,’ he advised,
‘they come in bunches. When they see one or two people practicing on your
course, a number will stop. The idea is to keep someone practicing as much
as possible.’

Attracting Customers

“I agreed with that, thinking of our first day’s experience. I felt the trick was
to get the first motorist to stop and practice. When I got back, I talked the
matter over with Martin, who said: ‘Why not decoy them, like hunters decoy
ducks? Get someone to hang around and practice when we have no
customers. Then when people are passing they might stop.’ We tried to get
someone, but everyone we invited told us we’d have to pay them a salary. As
we couldn’t do that we took turns swinging at the balls ourselves. First I
would swing for an hour, and then Martin would have a go at it. Whether this
brought the customers or not, I can’t exactly say, but business began to pick
up. Women, out for a drive afternoons during the week, drove up and
practiced for a little while. Many came regularly every day. Meanwhile
Martin and I were learning things about driving, and how to take a good
stance and get that little extra snap in the drive that gives added power. Soon
we were making fairly long drives, and began to attract attention from
motorists. A golf professional, formerly with a small golf club came to see us
one day. He told us he was out of a job, and would like to give driving
lessons. We arranged to let him use our place on a fifty-fifty split, and put up
a sign. He charged two dollars an hour, and helped Martin’s form and mine,
while he was around. When he got another job, a month later, we left the sign
up which offered instruction and collected the two dollars hourly ourselves
for teaching. Sunday is our big day. On a sunny Sunday afternoon we took in
as high as thirty dollars from the practice range, and from the lessons. Week
days ran about eighteen dollars on an average. Of course, there was no
business at all when it rained.”

A couple of hundred golf balls, a few clubs, a stand, and a good-sized lot
along a highway is all the equipment needed for a driving course. Side lines
such as cold soft drinks, sandwiches, and ice cream, coffee, cigarettes and bar