“We wouldn’t do the same business without being members of the BPG Buying Group,” says Pierre-Luc Bergeron, joint professional at Levis Golf Club in Quebec City, alongside Maxime Beaulieu.
Also co-owner/operators of the area’s first year-round indoor golf club (“B2 Golf”) and four different golf academies, they’ve been serious innovators on the Quebec golf scene.
Similarly, they find BPG offers several inventive tools, which make it, “very easy to run the pro shop”. Its centralized electronic billing system means they can spend less time on accounting, and more time with their members, while BPG’s strength in numbers, early buying discounts, and rebates definitely help their bottom line.
“We have benefited from BPG expanding across the country,” Beaulieu relates. “All the financials are good. Everybody can collect more money.”
Then, there’s the information sharing between BPG’s crew of 150 PGA of Canada Class A professionals.
“We have a different market in Quebec City,” he adds. “Sometimes, I learn something from a member in Montreal. And if we have a problem, it’s really good to work with the team as a shareholder. It’s the knowledge inside the group.”
Bergeron earned his Class A credentials in 2003, and soon gravitated to the teaching side of the industry, serving as a Quebec regional coach since 2012. Levis Golf Club’s (B2Golf-affilliated) Junior Academy was the first in Quebec to be accredited as a junior development centre by Golf Canada, PGA of Canada, and Golf Quebec.
He views teaching as instrumental to growing the game.
“There are a lot of people who don’t know how to start. They go to the range and hit drivers,” he comments. “I’m working on a program to teach people the right way to learn — from the short game out, and then you can go grow the swing.”
At Levis, he now takes members out on the par 3s for a one-hour clinic to work on their chipping and putting.
Beaulieu turned professional in 2011. But with a retail background in men’s clothing, he emerged as pro shop manager when he and Bergeron took over at Levis Golf Club in 2011.
Meanwhile, situated 20 minutes away, B2Golf has grown into an 8,000-square-foot facility offering lessons, golf simulators, technical advice, equipment, repairs, a boutique, supervised golf trips, and boot camps. It has 350 members, a staff of a dozen professionals, and oversees the operations at Levis, and four other Quebec City area clubs.
B2Golf’s maxim: “Have consistency in your equipment, and your game”, carries over to the Levis pro shop, where they offer invaluable outdoor club fittings during the summer season.
“We’re always focusing on the personalized service of the customer,” Beaulieu adds. “They’re going to pay a little more, but if the customer has the right equipment, they’re going to be satisfied, and they will be really passionate about golf. We share that passion with our customers.”
