Ace in the hole for agents and event sponsors National Hole-in-One Association: 25 years of joyful payouts, enriched charities and agents serving By Dave Willis Get two or three dozen really good golfers. Set them up on a 168-yard par three. Then crowd a couple of thousand people around them. It changes their whole perspective. The pressure is intense, and balls are flying everywhere. That’s how Craig Ankeney, president of Compass Insurance Agency’s Schaefer, Smith & Ankeney Division, describes the scene when golfers come together to vie for a top prize—up to a million bucks, depending on the event—in a hole-in-one competition. Ankeney, based in Phoenix, has been involved in his share of such competitions. He actually writes insurance on the events, through the National Hole-in-One Association (NHIOA), a self-described pioneer of the hole-in-one insurance concept. The organization was founded in 1981 by John Everhart, who, as president of his local country club’s men’s golf association, was looking for hole-in-one coverage for a golf tournament he helped set up. Filling a need According to NHIOA President Doug Burkert, Everhart researched the market and found only a couple of sources. “One was Lloyd’s of London, which was price prohibitive,” Burkert says. “The other was someone who was basically operating out of his hip pocket. As a result of that experience, John determined it would be an interesting line of business, and set out to see if he could find a hole-in-one market at reasonable pricing.”
That’s how the Dallas, Texas-based National Hole-In-One Association was born. In its quarter century of existence, the organization has provided hole-in-one prize coverage to civic groups, car dealers, country clubs, resorts, businesses, radio and TV stations and thousands of charitable organizations. Over the years, the business has grown along with the event promotion industry itself. “We’ve been involved in Internet contests, basketball shots, hockey shots, envelope draws, fishing derbies, steer roping contests and a host of other promotions,” Burkert says. Along with its affiliates, NHIOA has covered more than 300,000 events worldwide—and paid out more than $40 million in cash and prizes. This includes a handful of million- dollar winners, not the least of whom is Lee Trevino, who is 13th in the PGA Champions Tour All-Time Career Money List and who aced the 138-yard 7th hole at Treetops Resort in Gaylord, Michigan, during a hole-in-one contest. “Trevino made a million-dollar hole in one at an ESPN event back in 2001,” Burkert recalls. “We understand he donated half of his prize to Saint Jude’s Children’s Hospital.” Ankeney also was involved in a contest with a million-dollar winner. “We had one hit here in Arizona,” he says. “The event was held in conjunction with The Fiesta Bowl.” It pitted nearly three dozen finalists against each other in a 150-some yard par-three shootout. The winner—a 30-plus-year golfer who had made his first-ever hole in one just four days earlier—said he was “numb” when he heard the crowd roar and realized he’d repeated the feat when it mattered most. The winner called his wife to give her the million-dollar news, and she reportedly didn’t believe him at first. The insurance from NHOIA allowed the Fiesta Bowl event organizers to raise $80,000 for scholarship money that year through the golf shootout alone. It’s successes like this that attract many agents to the business. “It’s a way for agents and brokers to provide an additional service and benefit to their clients,” Ankeney says. An ace for agents According to Burkert, the process for an agent to request hole-in-one coverage is quite simple. “We need to know the date the contest is to be held, the value of the prize, the number of golfers who will be participating and the distance or hole number that the prize is to be offered on,” he says. For a straightforward submission where this information is known, a quote can be turned around in as little as four minutes over the phone, and delivered by e-mail directly to the broker, he adds. “Technology has simplified the process,” Burkert notes. With its golf course library, NHIOA can identify holes and distances at golf courses throughout the country and can work up a number of alternatives to simplify the quoting process. “If someone is unsure of the number of golfers or prize values, we can quickly prepare complete quotes with any number of ‘what if’ scenarios, so the broker can create a program that suits the client’s needs,” Burkert explains. In addition, he says, e-mail has been a tremendous boost to the business in the speed of delivering documents. “Plus, we can take and bind coverage over the phone using a credit card or faxed check,” he adds. All of NHIOA’s hole-in-one packages are offered with bonus prizes on other par-three holes, as well as signs that help make the tournament sponsor look good. Strong track record Ankeney warns agents to be wary of imitators. “The thing agents need to remember is, over the years, there have been a lot of people selling this product, and a lot of them really weren’t insurance companies,” he says. “They were a group of guys that said, ‘Hey, let’s figure out the odds and we’ll just book it ourselves.’ Then somebody hits one, and they can’t come up with the money.” Ankeney cautions agents to make sure they have a credible insurance company backing up the coverage. Over the years, NHIOA has worked with St. Paul, Southern Insurance Company and Aetna. “We’ve been with the Republic Underwriters and Southern of the Republic Group of Companies since 1994,” Burkert says. “Additionally, we represent Lloyd’s of London and Sirius International Insurance Corporation, through our London office and worldwide.” Through the years, NHIOA has become adept at understanding and placing the risks. All are very similar in their essential underwriting components, Burkert notes—knowing the value of the prize, the probability of a prize being won, and how many attempts will be taken to win the prize. However, each event has its own operational issues that must be evaluated so they can be under-written appropriately. “Sometimes it involves security issues over verification of entries; sometimes it’s the selection of contestants or the makeup of the contestant pool; and sometimes it requires dealing with difficult venues,” he explains. Difficult venues might include indoor arenas or outdoor facilities where greens have been constructed or altered specifically to conduct a hole-in-one contest. Selection challenges occur when many rounds of contestant qualification result in different players being qualified to vie for different prize values. But NHIOA welcomes the challenges. “We like to undertake these in creating fun and exciting promotions to boost fans’ interest and to involve the audience in the festivities,” Burkert says. “And we always work to properly promote the sponsor.” Benefits beyond the buck Burkert’s organization has been involved in many events. “Among the most satisfying are those we’ve taken part in for dozens of years, such as The Fiesta Bowl, Youth Automotive Training Center of Broward, Inc., and, of course, the thousands of other charity events,” he says. “We try to do our very best for every event we participate in.” Benefits extend to agents, too, although not always in immediate or direct financial terms. But that’s just fine. “Many retail agents will use us for their own personal sponsorships and for reaching the golfing target market,” Burkert says. “The golf business offers great potential to agents, and as a sponsor at events they not only support a local charity but get great visibility to a great market.” Also, many agents use NHIOA as a critical component of their service to promotionally minded clients. Ankeney agrees. “Our clients are involved in charitable golf tourneys all the time,” he says. “And each event is designed to raise money. So they always need some type of hole-in-one prize.” With nonprofit clients, Ankeney says, his firm sometimes offers the coverage net of any commissions in exchange for a little publicity. “It’s a nice advertising tool for us, and it makes our clients feel good about the service we give them,” he adds. Building on success Burkert says National Hole-In-One plans to continue to be the premier hole-in-one prize source. “Our primary focus is to continue developing additional value for both tournament sponsors and golfers through excellent signage, banners, valuable coupon promotions, and working on making every golf tournament we participate in bigger and better year in, year out. “Through our Grand Prize Promotions affiliate, which offers other contest and promotions insurance, we hope to achieve the same status in the prize promotion industry,” he adds. Beyond that, the firm is working with underwriters to develop weather and event cancellation programs. In the end, NHIOA plans to keep winning by making more and more winners out of agents, clients and participants. * The author |
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