On Dec. 13, 2024, Topgolf opened its 107th venue along Airport Boulevard and the Bayshore Freeway. With many international locations, the company’s niche is combining sports and leisure to provide what could be described as a golf-party hybrid experience. Topgolf’s fusion of traditional golf with technology represents the further modernization of the sport as a way to create a unique environment and attract players of all skill levels.
The Burlingame venue was Topgolf’s most expensive to date, according to City Mayor Donna Colson. The facility has three floors of golf simulators, an extended driving range, and bars featuring refreshments and music. Additionally, the golfing simulators have integrated games that correlate real shots to on-screen events, referencing popular video games like Angry Birds and Sonic the Hedgehog.
Colson expects the new Topgolf venue to provide the city of Burlingame with additional revenue, jobs, and tourism.
“The first is that they are paying us for a master lease … So the city will be receiving that capital, and that money can help diversify our budget. Secondly, it will create jobs. … Finally, it creates a destination. People who want to come and stay in Burlingame will stay in our hotels … and increasing the number of people that stay in our hotels helps us increase our transient occupancy tax, which flows straight to the city,” Colson said.
Topgolf prioritizes attracting a large audience, embracing the idea that its focus is both “golf” and “not golf” in the sense that it can be useful for experienced players but not unwelcoming to newcomers. In that sense, the new location — which is less than a 10-minute drive from Burlingame High School — offers potential benefits for the Panthers’ golf team, whose season starts in early February. Because the team doesn’t have a local home golf course, they’ve instead practiced at public facilities such as Mariner’s Point and the Crystal Springs Golf Course, which operate on a first-come first-serve basis.
“We really are at the mercy of these golf courses and them supporting us with discounted tee times. A lot of our public courses have been great about trying to get us out there, but it’s certainly gotten harder and harder, just because [golf] keeps on growing, and … without actual facilities and your own golf course that you [can] use on a regular basis, you’re always going to compete [with] other high schools around the area,” boys’ varsity golf coach Jon Ramirez said.
Topgolf offers free play to high school teams through the Youth Play It Forward initiative. While the conditions at Topgolf don’t perfectly match those of a real golf course, the added option will benefit the consistency of practices, and help the team work on accuracy and adjusting to different environments, according to Ramirez.
“Nothing can compare to being on the actual golf course because you’re hitting off real grass … [you] may dictate the lie you have on grass … and [you can] really work on all aspects of your game, not just full swing,” Ramirez said. “Topgolf certainly has its advantages: targets that they can hit, and also range balls — balls they use [that] are not the same as your traditional golf ball.”
There are also many student employees working at Burlingame’s new Topgolf facility. In early November, the business visited Burlingame High School to recruit workers, and by mid-November, at least a dozen students were eligible to attend a month-long training program to qualify for employment.
Despite the extended training, according to senior Lucie Jaunich, the process had fun and interactive elements to help people learn and form connections — just as they would need to do in a real working environment.
“A lot of the training wasn’t online or like the default training that you’d expect. It was more like team bonding and getting to know your coworkers, and then learning about safety and everything that could potentially go on,” Jaunich said.
Jaunich works as a server for food and drinks, a job restricted to students over the age of 18. Similarly, Junior Samson Einhorn works as a tee-liner to check people in and get them situated, and he had to be board-certified in order to deliver food to people. For Einhorn, regularly meeting and interacting with new people is a highlight of the job.
“I’ve never really worked in the service industry [before], so I really enjoy being face to face with people and interacting. Actually talking to people, especially at the check-in desk, is super fun,” Einhorn said.
Jaunich agrees that interacting with other people — employees and customers alike — is one of the best parts of working at Topgolf. She also appreciates Topgolf’s focus on cultivating a fun and unique atmosphere. Sophomore Rain Yang, who has visited Topgolf five times since it opened, believes that the environment creates an interesting contrast with the actual sport, making for a distinct — and not necessarily golf-centric — experience.
“The games [are] about what you’d expect: hit a ball to this goal, hit a ball accurately, hit a ball here. They’re not the most innovative games ever, but they’re enjoyable enough to make the experience fun,” Yang said. “Again, [though], once you go there a few times, you kind of get [bored] of it, and you go there more to just hang out.”
Compared to other Topgolf locations Yang had been to, the main difference was the polish. In alignment with the record-high budget, the architecture and hardware of the Burlingame venue felt more modern, according to Yang. That said, the core of the experience is pretty similar between venues.
“I feel like Top Golf is one of the locations where if you think you’ll like it, you’ll probably like it; [and] if you think you won’t, you probably won’t like it,” Yang said. “Don’t expect it to be a big sports event. Think of it more as a place to hang out and relax and have fun.”