Golf club owners' skills are above par

Running the golf course doesn't leave much time to play it. Gregg Hemann and Ray Mundy can count on one hand the number of times they have played Jones Creek Golf Club in the last year -- and they own the 24-year-old Evans course.

"Working a lot of hours and too many weekends is the trade-off for having a job you don't hate," Mr. Hemann said.

He and Mr. Mundy have been running Jones Creek for more than a year, having taken over after a court evicted the previous operators for not transferring the money to buy the course. Mr. Hemann and Mr. Mundy got their financing together, with some other partners, and bought the course through the financial arm of Textron, the company that runs E-Z-Go.

The golf car fleet used at the course is from Club Car, however. That's "spreading the love," Mr. Mundy said.

Jones Creek now has about 300 members, up from the 237 that were signed on when they took over the course.

"We've been aggressive in the decision to add more benefits to being a member here. That's the direction we're going here, consequently, our membership is growing," Mr. Hemann said.

Both men have their own history with Jones Creek. Mr. Mundy was on the first roster of employees when the course opened in 1985. Mr. Hemann came on board five years later, wanting a career in golf after ending his attempts to compete on the PGA's top tour.

Their roles are simple: one out front and one behind the scenes.

"Gregg is great with managing and working with the customers, helping the people," Mr. Mundy said. "Attitude and environment are so important in a golf club."

Mr. Hemann is the visible day-to-day manager, focused on giving the golfer a good experience at the club, Mr. Mundy said. "He is very good at that side of the business."

Mr. Mundy has many skills that are needed in running a course.

"Ray is one of the unique people that I know that can (be) the computer geek, the bean-counter accountant or the visionary or the manager type of person. That's what makes him so effective," Mr. Hemann said. "I've never known anyone else that can switch gears like he can."

"But I can't shoot even par," Mr. Mundy replied with a smile.

Ray Mundy

Mr. Mundy was born in 1965 in Augusta.

He didn't start playing golf until he was 15, being introduced to the game by a family member.

"I was an average golfer at best and my family wasn't a member anywhere. I realized that if I was going to play, I needed to find a place where I could work and play for free," Mr. Mundy said.

At age 16, he went to work at West Lake Country Club, cutting grass with the maintenance crew.

While attending Augusta College (now Augusta State University) to study accounting and management, he worked at Augusta Country Club.

He had a love greater than golf, though. Music. He dropped out to play keyboard in a rock band.

"I realized quickly that's a lifestyle that could be 'iffy' at best," he said.

In 1985, he had started working part time at Jones Creek. The 18-hole, $2.4 million golf course had just opened. The part-time job allowed him to keep his toe in the golf world while traveling with the band.

Mr. Mundy started to focus on his golf career in 1989.

"I realized I didn't have the talent to become a superstar player, so I might as well find a way to use what I knew, which was accounting and computers," he said.

"Another story he could tell you," Mr. Hemann said. It involved the Jones Creek pro and others who had trouble understanding a computer program. Mr. Mundy made an off-hand comment and they asked him to figure it out.

"He took the book home and read it. He knew more about it than they did," Mr. Hemann said. They let him run the computer.

Not only was Jones Creek the genesis of what would become his career in golf software, but it would give Mr. Mundy other important moments in his life.

He married Melissa in 1991, having met her at the golf course.

"She came home from UGA to work one summer. They hired her for the beverage cart, I was one of the assistants here," Mr. Mundy said. "We met working here, we got married here, had our reception here."

Now they are rearing three daughters.

Mr. Mundy also became a Class A PGA professional in 1991.

"Spent thousands of dollars to learn which way to point a scoreboard, but they've gotten better at teaching more business-related skills," he said.

In 1994, a split between the course owners and the management company created an opportunity for Mr. Mundy to manage a course, Cedar Creek in Aiken, which was owned by the same people who had Jones Creek. Mr. Hemann was promoted to run Jones Creek.

"It was our jobs from 1994 to 1996 to position the clubs to be sold," Mr. Mundy said. "Much of the plan was going on behind the scenes and the employees didn't know."

Mr. Mundy started looking into software. Seeing what was available in computer programs to run golf courses during the 1996 PGA Show convinced him that better software could be created.

That software was created at Jones Creek at a time when computers were going through a revolution with the Windows 95 operating systems. It was bankrolled by the golf course's owner, the Crescent Co. in Chicago.

The software debuted at the PGA Show in 1997, and then Jones Creek was sold off.

Mr. Mundy spent the next five years on the road selling and installing the golf course management software. It handled back-room operations such as payroll and accounting in addition to tee times.

Of the 300 systems sold, Mr. Mundy put in 175 of them, logging 100,000 miles a year in travel.

He sold his shares in Crescent, although he still feels like a mentor to the company, and created his own golf course management venture, MyClub Solutions, in October 2007.

"I got to go out and see golf course management in a very different way," he said. "There were clubs out there without good business principles."

The mission was to assist golf clubs in making the transition to different technology -- and perhaps to eventually own a club.

He had a partner in Oregon, started an office in Evans and hired Mr. Hemann in January 2008. The first ownership opportunity soon came, when they were asked to manage Jones Creek with the option to buy.

Gregg Hemann

"I started out in the front yard with a little club and then my dad took me out on the course when I was 9," Mr. Hemann said. He wasn't allowed to golf without adult supervision until age 12. "I remember those milestones because I grew up playing."

Born in 1961 in Augusta, he grew up an athlete, playing all the major sports. At 14, he went from being the best player to barely making the team.

"Wanting to still compete, I fell in love with golf when the other sports shut me down," Mr. Hemann said.

After graduating from Westside High School, he attended Augusta College for a year. He said he majored in golf.

He and his wife, Donna, married in 1987 -- they had met through mutual friends -- and three months later he was playing professionally in Florida, starting his quest to make it to the elite status of playing on the PGA Tour.

"It was the Spalding Space Coast Tour back then," he said. "I played for a living for four years. Didn't work at anything but playing."

Mr. Hemann said he finished seventh on the money list his first year. Everyone in the top 10 on the Space Coast Tour -- except him -- went on to play the PGA Tour, he said.

The money he made playing golf didn't cover his living and travel expenses.

"Now you can be on the second-tier tour and make a living. Back then, you were keeping your game sharp and competing. If you were good, you could break even," he explained. "It was a testing ground, not a place to make money."

The second stage of tour school was once held at Jones Creek. Had he won, he would have gotten on the higher-tier Hogan Tour. He missed by three shots.

"When I had my chance to play professionally, I wasn't quite good enough," Mr. Hemann said. "I had my chance.

''I might have been good enough after I came back here in the '90s. I got even better. But I was committed to working and making a career out of the golf business."

Mr. Hemann came back to Augusta and went to work at Jones Creek in 1990.

"I was married, had a 6-month-old baby and I was ready to quit and start another career. I didn't want to wake up 35 years old still bouncing around trying to make a living playing golf," he said.

Like Mr. Mundy, he obtained his Class A PGA professional designation, achieving that in 1996.

"The golf pros that were here were a diverse group with unique talents," he said. "The front end were full of players that couldn't wait to get done with their shift and then go play. Ray was in the back doing the actual computer work, accounting, papers to keep the place operating.

''I stuck close to Ray to learn that business stuff."

Mr. Hemann ran Jones Creek from 1994-97, when it was sold. He was in disagreement with the new owners, left the club for a short time and returned to work for different owners from 2001-05.

In the interim, Mr. Hemann taught golf and competed in PGA events held in Georgia.

"Golf is the one sport that you can compete at any age. I haven't competed in eight years, but I still want to. It is a sport for a lifetime," he said.

Mr. Hemann has a love for music, but his is a more recent development. He said playing guitar is his stress relief.

Though Mr. Hemann has the edge in a head-to-head match against Mr. Mundy on the golf course, Mr. Mundy has the upper hand in music.

"He's good. I'm a couch player, not even worth mentioning," Mr. Hemann said.

Mr. Hemann and his wife have three children. Despite long hours at the golf course, he sees his children often.

His daughter, Amanda, is in college, but she works the beverage cart when she is home on break. His sons, David and Ryan, play golf.

"This is a second home," he said. "I get to see my family here quite a bit."

A family course

Golfer Mike Davis is an original member of the club -- he got to play it before it officially opened.

He thinks the new owners are honest men who will turn Jones Creek into a good golf course for members.

"I think the world of Ray. I think he's got a good business mind. That is something that is highly needed," Mr. Davis said. "He plays, so he understands enough of that. We haven't had someone like that except for the guy who started it, Brooks Simmons.

"Gregg is a good player. I hear he is a good teacher. Hopefully, his playing can get the course set up for players."

Jones Creek, once a course difficult enough to play to be a second-stage testing ground for professional golfers, was made easier to accommodate members.

It isn't going back to becoming PGA quality.

It isn't going to be an exclusive country club.

"We're trying to appeal to everyone, the families, the couples, the low-handicap player. A lot of juniors are playing out here now," Mr. Hemann said. Each hole has six sets of tees to accommodate juniors, women and those seeking a challenge. "We want to be a true golfer's facility."

To meet that commitment, Jones Creek sells, fixes and adjusts golf clubs and has a room with a launch monitor to use as a teaching tool or to fit clubs.

"Golf is a game that takes a lot of commitment. You have to make the environment that people don't have to sacrifice time with family to play golf. We want them to bring the family and enjoy being part of the game," Mr. Mundy said. "The demands of a home life make it tough to justify going to hit some balls, leaving them behind."

Changing the perception of the course and rebranding it into the vision they see shouldn't be difficult. It isn't hard to listen to what people want, Mr. Hemann said.

"When we've been asked for concessions by the people spending their money, it has always been things that we ourselves would want," he said. "It is easy to be nice to people. It takes effort to be unfriendly."

Atmosphere and attitude play an important role in the success of a golf club, Mr. Mundy said. That's why it is a philosophy of the owners to say hello to a patron before the patron has a chance to say it first.

"The second people think you're trying to get rid of them and don't want to talk to them, you've hurt yourself with that person forever. We're in the people business," Mr. Hemann said.

Jones Creek has had an identity crisis since 1997, Mr. Hemann said.

"Each group that's come in has had an idea of making it something that it wasn't," he said. "It was an abused business that needed some tender loving care and people that wanted to see it succeed long-term."

Mr. Hemann said he plans to stay with Jones Creek until he is ready to quit working.

"There's people who have an emotional connection to the place," Mr. Mundy explained. "There are 600 homeowners out here. There are a lot of kids in the working world who grew up here. Members are reaching retiring age and playing a lot of golf now.

"They have an emotional commitment to the success of Jones Creek, almost as much as we do."

Reach Tim Rausch at (706) 823-3352 or timothy.rausch@augustachronicle.com.