Just more than 12 months ago, Rich River Golf Club at Moama on the Murray signed the R&A Women in Golf Charter, a document that is changing the face of the sport right throughout the world.

Looking back, it is clear that this was a transformative moment for the club.

Susan Hull, the club president, believes it has shown Rich River the way forward.

“We’re evolving the R&A Charter but it’s our driving force,” said Hull, a 25-year building industry executive who joined the board in 2020.

“We’ve set our targets, they’ve given us the information. We’ve got to take it to the next level and grow the participation of women in golf.

“Without the charter we’d be floating around ideas. The charter gives us targets, it’s given us a clear direction for where we want to go and that we’re not alone in this.”

Hull says that when the board worked through the process of signing the charter with Golf NSW, Golf Australia and club CEO Shane Gloury early in 2023, there was a perception that the club was overly “blokey”.

Installing a woman as president helped with that perception, as did the removal of the old women’s committee and the formation of a single board with two other women – businesswoman Denise Ferrier and lawyer Carly James.

Hull is the first female president in club history and Jody Fleming, the head teaching professional, is also the first woman to hold that post. Fleming is profoundly respected across the gender barrier for ability to instruct the game.

Rich River also changed the format of its women’s club championships from the old-school mid-week format to three rounds that include a Saturday and huge celebration of all the club’s champions – of both genders – on a Sunday.

The club also has male and female co-captains.

Change is never easy but the results are forthcoming.

With Fleming’s relentless and popular women’s and girls clinics, a chip n’ sip group for women and the introduction of the Australian Golf Foundation’s girls scholarship program, the numbers are already increasing.

The junior program has 167 participants this year, against 82 last year, with credit also going to PGA associate Jayden Dixon. And long-standing member and PGA member Alan Eacott.

GolfNSW Regional Manager, Cade Webb continues to work with Rich River and other clubs along the Murray to make positive changes for each and the overall game for women and girls.

Rich River has increased its number of female members to 380, representing 21 percent of the membership.

According to Steve Gloury, the club’s target is 550 female members, an increase of 45 percent, in five years from now.

Susan Hull acknowledges that the club has much work to do.

“We see some scary statistics that women in golf is still on the decline in some areas,” she said. “But we also see it as a huge opportunity in a market that we’re not tapping into enough. We’re taking the other tack and saying ‘how can we tap into it a bit more’.”

In the broader sense, Rich River – which by nature is a club that relies heavily on stay-and-play golfers – has plans to rebuild its 40-year-old accommodation, and utilizing some adjacent land to create a seniors village on site, initiatives that the board believes can “set the club up for 100 years”.

Susan Hull says the club is opening its doors to the community.

“We realise that once they walk around the course and see how beautiful it is, they’ll want to get into it,” she said. “Sometimes when you play golf you don’t stop and smell the roses.

“We’ve realised that it’s important to get our local community into this fantastic facility we have got and be part of that community. We’re tossing around the idea of walking groups, get them to come out and see what we’ve got which, if you’re not a member, you don’t get to see.

“We understand that in a smaller community, football and netball are very strong. We don’t want to take them away because they enjoy it. But we understand that if we can get them to play a game of golf, they might go and play their other sports, but maybe they’ll come back to golf.

“It’s a really long-term strategy that we’ve got. We want to get the women and girls involved at different levels and we hope that they’ll make golf their sport of choice when they finish their netball.”

More than 100 clubs and facilities across Australia have signed the R&A Women in Golf Charter. For information about the charter, click here

For information about Rich River Golf Club click here