Augusta, Georgia — a metropolis with solely about 200,000 individuals and no billionaire residents, Michelin-starred eating places, or five-star lodges — will not be usually related to the uberwealthy. However on the primary full week in April every year, that adjustments.
That is because of the Masters Event, the primary in an annual run of main skilled golf championships and a favourite of the superrich.
An enormous a part of the enchantment for the ultra-high-net-worthers is that the event is held at Augusta’s Nationwide Golf Membership. Whereas the record of its 300 or so members is prime secret, a number of billionaires — together with Warren Buffett, Invoice Gates, Dirk Ziff, and Stanley Druckenmiller — belong to the membership, based on a 2015 Bloomberg report.
And getting in is difficult. Membership is by invitation and capped, that means individuals can solely be part of when an present member leaves or dies. All of it provides to the cachet.
“They’ve gotten to some extent the place they nearly like refusing individuals as a result of it makes them look, you already know, that rather more unique,” Barnabas Carrega, the CEO of luxurious journey and planning agency GR8 Expertise, informed Enterprise Insider over e-mail.
“It has nothing to do with whether or not you’ll be able to afford a membership or not. Most members have inherited their membership via generations,” Carrega continued.
Timothy A. Clary/AFP through Getty Photos
Girls are now allowed to hitch — however weren’t admitted earlier than 2012. One of many first ladies admitted was Darla Dee Moore, the spouse of the late billionaire Richard Rainwater. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has additionally joined.
“It is principally not possible to play there when you’re not a member,” Carrega stated. “It does not matter who you might be — you will be president of the US. However when you’re not a member, you are not invited by a member, you are not getting on Augusta Nationwide.”
Meaning the closest most golf followers will get to the pristine greens is watching the Masters on TV.
Augusta Nationwide’s well-known jackets
Like a lot of the world’s most unique golf equipment — literal or metaphorical — there are standing symbols concerned with membership, particularly Augusta Nationwide’s coveted inexperienced jackets. Solely members and Masters winners can put on them, and so they should be saved on the premises (although winners can take them house and sport them at accepted occasions for 12 months earlier than they have to return them to the membership’s grounds.)
Even with the rules, the sports activities coat is taken into account probably the most prestigious trophy within the sport.
“I do not care about that,” Billy Casper, the champion of the 1970 event, as soon as stated when requested how a lot cash he would take house from the event. “The inexperienced coat is sufficient for me.”
Nonetheless, the merchandise is price some huge cash. In 2013, earlier than Augusta enacted strict guidelines round promoting the blazers, a inexperienced jacket belonging to Horton Smith, the event’s 1934 winner, was auctioned off for $682,000.
Jamie Squire/Getty Photos
Non-public jets and patron badges: How billionaires attend the Masters
Whereas they might not be capable to achieve a spot on the membership’s unique roster, loads of billionaires who aren’t identified members of Augusta Nationwide do attend the Masters Event.
Final yr, a whole lot of personal plane landed at Augusta Regional Airport and different close by hubs, based on data from the aircraft-tracking web site JetSpy.
The jet of Phil Knight — the Nike CEO who’s price $38 billion and who’s a frequent attendee — was among the many pack, based on the JetSpy information. Planes belonging to different billionaires, together with hotelier Robert Rowling, investor Herbert Allen Jr., software program titan David Duffield, Carvana founder Ernest Garcia, and personal fairness investor Greg Mondre, additionally touched down.
Celebrities like Garth Brooks and Luke Bryan, in addition to prime golfers like Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods (a billionaire in his personal proper), registered planes that landed close by, too.
Getting a ticket, although, will not be easy. The membership conducts a lottery for tickets every year; final yr, one-day passes went for $140 final yr — comparatively low-cost by many individuals’s requirements.
However then there are patron badges, which, like almost every thing else at Augusta, are veiled in secrecy. Nobody exterior the membership is aware of what number of exist, however as soon as you might be supplied one, you’ll be able to entry tickets for all times. (Patrons nonetheless need to pay yearly to attend; final yr, a four-day go price $450.)
And as with every thing at Augusta Nationwide, there are strict guidelines round reselling Masters tickets. Nonetheless, websites like StubHub and Ticketmaster have a handful of four-day passes obtainable for upwards of $10,000.
Discovering a spot to sleep will be robust — regardless of who you might be
Whereas some billionaires hire native houses for tens of 1000’s of {dollars}, there aren’t all that many choices obtainable. Most lodges promote out of rooms far earlier than the event or cost many instances the everyday nightly charge.
In equity, that is not restricted to this event. Legend has it that years in the past, Invoice Gates did not reserve a membership room forward of the Jamboree — Augusta Nationwide’s members-only event that happens a couple of weeks earlier than the Masters. The tech mogul needed to slum it at a neighborhood Crimson Roof Inn.
However the one factor billionaires — and common Masters goers — can lower your expenses is on meals. The event has famously saved its concessions costs low.
That signifies that, regardless of being served at one of many ritziest golf equipment on the planet, you would nonetheless purchase a sandwich for $1.50 final yr.
