Course-management software locates carts stolen from Ontario golf courses

Kennesaw, Ga. (Dec. 2, 2024) – Tagmarshal has impacted its 600-plus partner golf courses in countless ways: improving pace of play, increasing revenue, reallocating resources, and using data to pinpoint other ways of optimizing on-course operations. 

Now it seems Tagmarshal software has another role: Crime buster.

In late September, Pheasant Run Golf Club in Sharon, Ontario, Canada, used the GPS tracking functionality that’s part of every Tagmarshal system to locate 18 golf carts stolen in the middle of the night—by accessing their live locations in just half an hour!

“When I arrived at the course at 6 a.m. on September 27th, I saw cart tracks by the main entrance,” reports Graeme McCarrel, Director of Golf at the 27-hole public facility in central Ontario, about 35 miles north of Toronto. “I sped up to the club and saw that 18 carts were missing. I called my general manager and the police and used my phone to take photographs of the tracks in the dew.”

At 6:30 a.m., McCarrel sat down at his computer in the pro shop and opened the Tagmarshal system that the course had been using since the beginning of the year. “I knew which carts were missing, looked on the computer, and saw from GPS tracking that they were about 20 minutes down the road. I knew instantly where they were!”

He passed on the carts’ location to the police, who sent a squad car that sat watching the location—a chicken coop—until 4 in the afternoon when a search warrant was executed. The police entered the coop, and found all 18 carts, but no suspects.

He had 17 of the carts back the same day; the 18th was severely damaged and will be repaired in the offseason. Even so, he figures the savings to him, his insurance, and TurfCare, his cart supplier, at $180,000 Canadian–$10,000 a cart.

“We were having a tournament that same day, so I needed more carts. I called TurfCare at 7 a.m. and learned they’d had carts stolen the week before. By the way, they were able to get me carts for the tournament by 8:30 a.m.” 

The theft at Pheasant Run was just one of many in the province last summer that were the focus of an ongoing police investigation. In mid-October, four men were arrested while raids on both homes and storage facilities in the province located another 18 golf carts, other stolen property, $100,000 worth Pokemon cards, and both cannabis and cocaine.

“At first I thought the thieves must have been pretty smart, as they were able to circumvent the cameras we have all over the place,” McCarrel added. “But then I realized that they weren’t smart enough to stop and check the carts for GPS units. We don’t have screens in our carts, just the tracker underneath, so maybe they thought ‘No screen, no GPS.’”

McCarrel is already working with Tagmarshal to set up further geo-fencing to his system, which, he says, would have alerted him as soon as the carts were taken off the property. But that’s for next season. Right now, he’s on a delayed honeymoon, having gotten married in June.

“This is our first year with Tagmarshal and we’re counting our blessings. Thanks to Tagmarshal we got our carts back.”

While Pheasant Run purchased Tagmarshal to help optimize their operation’s performance leading to enhanced player experiences, increased efficiency, and additional revenue – saving their carts from theft was the cherry on top!

Read the full article in The First Call.