The clubhouse is where the claims actually happen.
A golf course spreads risk over 150 acres of grass. The clubhouse concentrates it into one building with a commercial kitchen, a liquor license, a retail shop, a banquet calendar, and everyone's credit card on file. It deserves to be underwritten as the hospitality business it is.
What we cover
Coverage is built around your operation — these are the pieces we most often place.
Building & Contents
The clubhouse structure, kitchen build-out, walk-ins, HVAC, furnishings, locker rooms, and member storage. Replacement cost on the building, and values reviewed against what construction actually costs now.
Liquor Liability
Clubhouse bar, beverage cart, banquet service, and tournament hospitality. Dram-shop statutes vary sharply by state and several are unforgiving. This is the single most under-limited line we see at golf clubs.
Commercial Kitchen / Fire
Grease fires are the most common severe property loss in the whole operation. Carriers will want to see hood suppression, duct cleaning frequency, and fryer safety — and they'll credit you for it.
Business Income & Extra Expense
If the clubhouse burns in April, you lose a season of F&B, events, and outings while play may continue. Golf's seasonality means the indemnity period needs real thought, not a default twelve months.
Food Spoilage & Equipment Breakdown
Walk-in failure, refrigeration loss, and mechanical breakdown of kitchen and HVAC equipment. Cheap to add, routinely omitted, and it pays out more often than most lines on the policy.
Special Events & Weddings
Clubs that host weddings, corporate outings, and banquets take on host-liquor, vendor, and contractual exposure. Venue contracts usually require specific limits and additional-insured wording — we make sure the policy can actually deliver them.
Pro Shop Retail
Inventory of clubs, apparel, and equipment, plus products liability on what you sell and demo. Club-fitting and repair operations add a service exposure most retail forms don't contemplate.
Cyber & Payment Data
POS terminals, member account charging, tee-time and event booking platforms, and stored card credentials. A club holds an unusually affluent roster of personal data, which raises both the target value and the claim severity.
Crime & Employee Dishonesty
Cash handling at the bar and pro shop, member dues, and event deposits. Boards increasingly require this as a fiduciary matter, and carriers will ask about your internal controls.
Employment Practices (EPLI)
Tipped F&B staff, seasonal turnover, and a service culture that generates harassment and wage-hour claims. The clubhouse, not the course, is where nearly all of these originate.
Pool, Fitness & Amenities
If the club runs a pool, tennis courts, or a fitness room, each carries its own liability profile — supervision requirements, waiver enforceability, and in the case of pools, a materially different rate.
Lodging & Cottages
Resort courses and clubs with on-site rooms take on innkeeper's liability and guest property exposure that a pure golf form does not include.
What underwriters ask
Golf markets weigh these very differently from one another — which is the whole reason to shop more than one.
- Clubhouse square footage, construction type, age, and sprinkler and alarm protection
- Annual food and beverage receipts, split between alcohol and food
- Whether the kitchen has hood suppression and how often the ducts are cleaned
- Number of outside events per year — weddings, corporate outings, charity tournaments
- Whether alcohol is served by club staff or an outside licensed caterer
- Server training programs (TIPS or equivalent) and documented service policies
- Pro shop inventory values and whether club fitting or repair is performed on site
- Payment systems in use, and whether card data is stored or tokenized
- Amenities beyond golf — pool, tennis, fitness, lodging, childcare
- Employee count and turnover in F&B versus year-round staff
- Prior fire, water, or liquor-related losses on the property
- State dram-shop law, which drives both the limit you need and the price you'll pay
Frequently asked
Isn't the clubhouse already covered by my golf course policy?
Partly, and that's the problem. Most golf packages include the clubhouse building, but the hospitality exposures inside it — liquor limits, event liability, spoilage, business income tuned to a seasonal operation, and cyber — are frequently thin or missing. We price the clubhouse as its own operation inside the program rather than as a line item.
How much liquor liability does a golf club need?
It depends heavily on your state's dram-shop statute and your alcohol receipts, but $1M per occurrence as a floor with the umbrella sitting over it is a common structure, and clubs with significant banquet business often need materially more. States with strict dram-shop liability and no damage caps deserve a serious conversation rather than a default limit.
We host weddings. Does that change our insurance?
Yes, and it's one of the more common places we find a mismatch. Wedding and banquet business adds host-liquor, vendor, and contractual liability, and the couple's venue contract will typically demand specific limits and additional-insured status. Some golf forms handle this cleanly; others need an events endorsement or a separate placement.
Do we need coverage for the pro shop separately?
Usually not separately, but the inventory values need to be scheduled accurately and the products liability needs to contemplate what you actually do — selling clubs is different from fitting, regripping, and repairing them, and only the latter creates a service exposure.
What's the most common clubhouse claim you see?
Kitchen fire for severity, and water damage from frozen or failed pipes for frequency — the latter especially at clubs in cold climates that reduce heat during the off-season. Both are heavily influenced by controls a carrier will credit you for having.
Can you insure a clubhouse that's operated by a management company?
Yes. It changes who the named insured is and how the contractual risk transfer between the ownership entity and the operator should be structured. Getting that wrong leaves one party paying for coverage the other actually needs — we review the management agreement as part of the placement.
Get a clubhouse quote
Tell us about the operation and we'll come back with real markets — not a lead form sold three times over.