Matt Considine (00:03.406)
Welcome to the New Club Bag Drop Untold Stories in Golf. I'm your host, Matt Considine here without the professor this week. He sends his love. It's school season. It's fall. He's got a myriad of excuses from students that he's allowed to use for this show, and he cashed one in today. But I am replacing him with not one, but two very special guests. Colton Craig.
Colton Craig (00:28.322)
Thank
Matt Considine (00:29.122)
golf course designer and Nick Jorgensen, the CEO of Jorgensen Land and Cattle Farm are on the show today. We'll be talking about something I've been pretty excited about and trying to keep my ear to the ground on and it's their vision and the creation of a place called Lazy J Sporting Club in ideal South Dakota. So for all you golf nuts, architecture and adventure alike,
it's gonna be a really fun conversation because I've gotten to know both these guys a little bit over the last few months and They're working on something pretty cool The fun fact of the week and we'll take a break the professor I've tried to incorporate my own facts when the professor is out and They stink I'm told from our listening audience. So we're gonna stick to our lane. We're gonna let the professor own that domain I do have
some exciting new club happenings for all the new club members listening and a little perk for those that may not be new club members. The Ryder Cup is obviously just around the corner. We're all getting amped to watch some match play from the world's best. But I'm sure if you're like me, you get a little bummed you're not playing a match of your own. Well, I'm pleased to announce that we have procured more availability at at Pinehurst.
golf resort in Pinehurst, North Carolina for our fall Founders Cup. So last I looked at the time of this recording, we had two single occupancy spots and four double occupancy spots available. get yourself right, get yourself some match play, dive into the app if you're listening. It's November 2nd through the fifth, perfect conditions in my opinion for heading down to Pinehurst, the sand dunes in North Carolina.
are, they're bouncy, they're firm. Things play well this time of year in Piners. So join us by directly signing up in the app. And if you're not a member of New Club, we're to try something different here. If you're not a member of New Club, feel free to email events at newclub.golf for this one. went and got extra ones. We want some folks that are maybe considering being a part of New Club or just want to check it out or need an excuse to get to Piners to join us. So if you're an avid listener of the bag drop and you also
Colton Craig (02:37.206)
That's right.
Matt Considine (02:48.546)
want to play some fall match play, inquire at events at newclub.golf. Send us an email, mention the Founders Cup, mention the backdrop. We'll see if we can get you involved. Thanks as always, before we dive into the show, thanks to our partners at Titleist. My all new T-Series irons and I are vibing. It's about the three Ds, distance control, dispersion control, and descent angle.
I got fitted through the bag with the T100s. Most people don't and 85%, 85%, I was kind of shocked by that number, 85 % of tour pros also have a hybrid set of T100s, T150s and yes, T250s. I saw a couple tour players up in the six, five and four that are playing the T250s, which I found surprising until I actually hit them and their look and feel.
Colton Craig (03:32.524)
Thank
Matt Considine (03:45.28)
aren't that dissimilar from what I'm playing in my T100, but you get that forgiveness, you get more consistency. And if the real nerdy part about the T series this year for me is the sound. The sound is something, it's a step. I just feel like it always instills confidence in me when I hear my turf interaction with my T series, irons, the music to my ears when I strike the ball somewhere around that sweet spot.
Find your nearest fitter over at tidalys.com. And without further ado, let's get on to the show.
Matt Considine (04:24.15)
Nick Colton, welcome to the Bag Drop.
Nick Jorgensen (04:27.814)
Thanks, Matt. Happy to be here.
Colton Craig (04:29.984)
Yeah, thanks for having us on, Matt. This is fun.
Matt Considine (04:30.286)
Super excited to talk about this, to share some of the stuff that you guys have let me in on here with our listeners and others that love this game. I got to start with Colton. I'll never forget the first time we met. was probably an internet introduction, but then you invited me to just go walk around Downers Grove Golf Club, which was a place I already loved.
Colton Craig (04:40.962)
you
Matt Considine (04:59.438)
But I'm like, what's this guy, this golf course architect, what's his interest in this place? I know it's got some history and whatnot, but Downers Grove is now called Belmont Golf Club for those listening in Chicago. And I was immediately blown away by your passion for this game, your enthusiasm for it, your appreciation, and I'll call it promotion. You made me a believer in Perry Maxwell. I didn't know much about the man, but.
Walking nine very brisk holes. I think you had somewhere to be it was more of a sprint but Are you still as deeply in love with Perry Maxwell and his work as as you were eight years ago when we met?
Colton Craig (05:31.51)
Yeah.
Colton Craig (05:38.634)
Yes, yes. So the first thing I did when I started this firm, I didn't have any clients. So day one, I had nothing really to do. And Tom Coyne, who we're now in business with, had just announced his course called America Tour.
And I was like, oh, that's interesting. He's going to go play all these golf courses, all the US Open venues and everything else in between. And I kind of had the inspiration from that to go visit every Perry Maxwell course. And so there's a, what is now an 18 holder, but originally a nine-hole Perry Maxwell outside of Chicago in Rochelle. So that's why I was in the area. And so I basically took the first three weeks of starting my business was to
go travel to every Perry Maxwell golf course. And we compiled it into a book and of our journals and research and all that good stuff and maps we found and all that. initially it was just a three ring binder that we kind of gave to friends and family. But actually I'm glad you brought it up because in 26 we have a very nice coffee table golf publishing book coming out.
And so I'll let you know more details on that, but we just got the dust cover on it and looks like things are moving forward on it. So really excited about that. And, you know, a lot of the people I met along that way are a lot of the people I'm still interacting with today in my, and our firm. And you're a perfect example of that. Perfect example of that.
Matt Considine (07:24.076)
Yeah, it's, I did not know that. And it makes this large, vast golf universe very small sometimes. but I, I played a, the first time I met Tom coin now part of, Smire's coin and Craig. And I, I, played a match with him at Belmont golf club, formerly Downers Grove. So you probably had something to do with that as well. Like, Hey, you should go check out the original Chicago golf. Cause
I invited him and I wasn't sure if he'd say yes based on how busy his schedule was writing a course called America, but man, he was there that afternoon and we had a hell of a match that actually made its way into the book, which was kind of cool. Small, small world. Nick, welcome to the show, man. I have enjoyed our discussion so far. I got a million questions for you here that we'll probably get into, but I'd love for those, maybe just an intro to your golf.
Colton Craig (08:06.656)
Nice.
Nick Jorgensen (08:11.002)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (08:22.158)
How did you get introduced to this game and how do you find yourself now building an anticipated golf course and a club? Give us a short version of that.
Nick Jorgensen (08:28.068)
Yeah.
Nick Jorgensen (08:33.587)
I gotta tell you, so I'll start off with I'm not a golfer. Very much not so. And just to be honest with you, I'm an extremely competitive person. I suck at golf. I don't like doing things I suck at, right? I mean, that's always been my excuse. I should say, now, you know, I've got that and I've got five kids. And so I'm not at a time in my life when it makes a lot of sense, but not a golfer sitting here listening to you, you know, do the introduction to the podcast and you and Colton talk it really.
kind of makes me realize how much not a golfer I am, right? Because you said a lot of stuff there that I don't understand. But that's okay, right? Because, go ahead, Colton.
Colton Craig (09:08.588)
But the name is not.
I got to say, sometimes the non-golfer clients are the best clients.
Matt Considine (09:19.746)
Well, I was going to say the non-golfer guests of this podcast are some of our most downloaded, listened to and enjoyed because sometimes we get in our echo chambers and we say dumb shit that needs to be called out. I, I, something strikes me, Nick, that you're the kind of guy from our conversations that you're not afraid to call things out.
Colton Craig (09:20.96)
And this is the case.
Nick Jorgensen (09:40.445)
Well, you know, for me, it's just, I find it really interesting, right? Because of this path that we're on is introducing me and our family to a lot of folks like you, right? And you just realize, you know, we're, and I'll get into this in a minute, but we're in the cattle business, have been in the cattle business a long time, and we've got a lot of passion there. And it's, you know, it's just, it's really interesting to see a group of folks, like just an example, like you two that are passionate about this sport, right? Because you could sit on a podcast we do about drugs and saline and cattle and say the same, what the hell are you guys talking?
But I think what would be evident is that we give a damn. You know what I mean? And I think what's really evident here is that just even just you two, mean, you just, that the passion for the sport is, is definitely there. And so I'm honored to be here on a podcast that has that passion. I'm honored to be working with an individual like Colton, who I see the passion just like you do, Matt. And that just, it's, I'm excited about what we have going. So if you'd like, I can go in and talk a little bit about, you know, just our family business, because I'm an outsider to golf and what we do is completely not that.
Matt Considine (10:35.638)
I do want to.
Yeah
Nick Jorgensen (10:40.728)
So, go ahead.
Matt Considine (10:41.538)
Yeah. But for, before we get there too, I think I just want to comment on the timing of this. Like we've had on a golf course and club developers and people that are building things. And it's usually after most of the work has been done and we're kind of like looking back. I think, and I want to thank you guys just before we even get started of coming on where you're currently at. And, and I think that's exciting for.
Nick Jorgensen (10:59.91)
Mm-hmm.
Matt Considine (11:11.298)
the passionate nerds like me who we want to know like, what's that like? Like, how do you take something from, nothing into existence? And, and so we'll get into that, but yeah, I want to start with, start the family business and I, have been a part of, of in different ways, businesses, some
in families, some not, but I know the stats and generational family businesses, they're not great. I just got to ask being part of a fifth generation family business and having the success for five generations, what does that mean to you personally?
Nick Jorgensen (11:50.927)
Yeah, well, it's it's it really is. It means everything to us. mean, you know, frankly, it's it's the thing that at the end of the day, I think all of our ownership is striving for is, you can you can say fifth generation. But, know, my goal when I talk through this with people is there's not a number there as an end state, right? It's the end generation. Because, you know, the goal here isn't to time this thing out. What we're doing, you know, it's.
I'm the CEO of Jorgensen Landing Cattle, our family-owned farm and ranch in South Dakota, South Central South Dakota. I'm a fourth generation Jorgensen. It was started by my great grandfather, who he and his wife homesteaded in Tripp County in 1909, which is the year Tripp County opened up for settlement in South Dakota. So they moved here and the family has more or less, well, they have, they've lived here ever since.
The businesses looked a lot different over the years, but really what I think ultimately we're grounded in is the cattle business. My grandfather started raising black Angus cattle in the late 1950s, made a really big name for himself through the 1960s and 1970s. And, you know, not to get into the, the cattle nerdy stuff, but that was a, there was a point in the, in the cattle industry where in up to the 1950s, the
the way people bred cattle was they went to shows, right? So you went to a show, you showed your bull in a ring, you showed your heifers in a ring, and whoever's looked the best were the ones that made the most money and what people used. Well, my grandfather kind of questioned that and said, well, yeah, looks are one thing, but performance is another, right? You know, we need calves that wean more pounds and ultimately create more beef, and that doesn't always correlate with how good they look. And so he kind of went rogue and decided, well, with a group of people and said, we're gonna start measuring performance. And that was kind of what
What gave him the name was that all of sudden he was breeding cattle that performance was off the charts good. And actually if you look today, but it's really in our herd, it's two things. It's what the calves weigh when you wean them off the cow, right? So they generally, they're going to stay on the cow till they're, you let's just say six months old or so. And a big metric is what those calves weigh when they come off the cow.
Matt Considine (13:54.722)
What are the metrics for performance? Like, what is that?
Nick Jorgensen (14:15.26)
right, because ultimately that's what you're going for is more pounds to wean. The other one is what those calves weigh at a year of age, because that's really close to slaughter time and you get a sense of how much beef you're going to produce. it's all about pounds, It's how many pounds of beef we can raise on the acre that we're running these cattle on. And he found some bulls and cows that were extremely good at it. And so, you know, it's actually, were so good that if you look at
American Angus Association, which is the breed association for the Angus breed, know, similar to like the American Kennel Club or things like that. It's the go-to pedigree place for the Angus breed. 93 % of all registered Angus cattle today will have a pedigree that touches our ranch somewhat.
Matt Considine (15:02.734)
Wow. Wow.
Nick Jorgensen (15:03.674)
So the influence in the breed is huge. And that's actually, was that kind of, legacy that was built, you know, starting in the 1950s, really kind of through the 1980s that propelled us to where we are today. And so just kind of a snapshot of Jorgensland and cattle of the day. We're a large farm and ranch. And our calling card is that we're the world's largest seed stock producer, which means that we raise and sell.
more breeding bulls than any other business in the world. This year we'll send over 6,300 bulls out to breed cows in the United States, which is equivalent to about a quarter million beef calves that make it into the beef supply that are sired by our single biggest genetic footprint you're going to find in the beef industry in the world. And that's really kind of our calling card. And then everything we do around
Matt Considine (15:56.686)
Cheers.
Nick Jorgensen (15:59.077)
supports that. have a large farming operation that supports raising feed for those animals. We've got a large cow calf herd that produces those bulls. And we've got a big team as well. We've got about 57 employees here in Northern Chip County. I'm the CEO. My dad runs the farming side of the operation. My cousin Cody runs the livestock side of the operation. And then, you know, I'll just go back to you mentioned the stats on generational businesses.
Right? So the stat in, I don't know if it's agriculture or just generational businesses in general, but only 7 % make it to the third.
Matt Considine (16:39.182)
Yeah, that's the stat I saw.
Nick Jorgensen (16:41.5)
7 % make it to the third and then the number just gets smaller going to the fourth and into the fifth. So we're really, we're proud of that legacy. And our calling card is we're the largest C-Soc producer in the United States. But what's important to us is that this is a family business, right? And whatever we're doing, however well we're doing it, it's all in the name of, this is a Jorgensen family business. And I want...
my sons and my daughter had to have an opportunity if they so choose to come here. And I want that to be for their children and their children's children, right? So like I said before, I don't look at this as, look, we made it to five. That's great. Let's, you know, let's cash out of this thing. That's not the goal at all. And honestly, it kind of plays into, you know, why we're having this conversation today about the Lazy J Sporting Club. if you don't mind, I could, you know, certainly just kind of segue right into, you know, why we're even doing this in the first place.
Matt Considine (17:38.05)
Yeah, I actually do, I think, well, here's what's funny is when I'm introduced to you, I don't know many cattle and land farmers. I'll just be honest. is not my personal network. And after being introduced to you, just, it's funny the things you see. It's like when you get it, got to go to get your car fixed. start seeing all the mechanics on the side of the I was on a plane and
Nick Jorgensen (17:38.234)
Unless you've got some questions about the business, Yeah.
Matt Considine (18:06.442)
I was sitting next to a guy from North Carolina who was, I've never heard of this, but he's into horse cutting. they, horse cutting is kind of the herding of cattle, I suppose, is a competitive sport. And it was just fascinating, but then it got into this cattle world. We were talking on the plane. I was thinking about you the whole time. And then the very next weekend, I'm at a fifth five-year-old's birthday party and I meet
a woman from three hours away, an aunt of the birthday, the birthday girl who is raising heifers for state farms. That's what she's done her like whole life. It's in the family. But where I'm going with this is I enjoyed both those conversations so much. And, and it made me obviously think about you and your family and, and, but then I connected it to golf in this way. Some of the places I've gone that have this, call it the values of farming, family farming and,
All my favorite golf kind of follows that recipe a little bit as well. Sometimes it's because it's remote and it's away from, you know, city life and suburb life and all these kinds of things. But it also is like about hard work and appreciation and contentment and like so many things that I think we lose. But it's actually one of the things I think it makes you perfect to be a golf course developer. And and so I just wanted to say that.
Last thing before we move on to like why, why you're doing this, set the, put us in a place like, are you an ideal today? Is that where you are? Can you tell us a little bit about like life, tell us about like life in, in ideal South Dakota and maybe how that's helped shape your business or your vision for, for this.
Nick Jorgensen (19:44.421)
Yeah.
Nick Jorgensen (19:51.719)
For sure. Yeah. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna, first thing I'll say is I'm actually for this podcast. I am, I am at the Lazy J Sporting Club. I'm in our lodge, which will someday be our clubhouse. This business as well as Jorgensen Landing Cattle is located about 20 miles, 15 to 20 miles, depending on which site you're at, north of Winter, South Dakota, which Tripp County, South Dakota has a total of 5,000 people. 3,000 of them live in Winter and work.
20 miles from there. we really, mean, I'm not gonna say we're like desert Wyoming remote, we're remote out here. And actually just, you know, just an interesting story you talk about like, you know, the hard work and the grit. When homesteaders settled in Tripp County in 1909, there was no groundwater. We don't have wells here. So like, I kid you not, these people didn't have water to drink. The way they drank water was they put cisterns in their house.
And they drove 15 miles with their horses to winter and carted water back to their homes because we don't have wells here. We don't have wells. We don't have trees. So you couldn't build a damn house. this is hot houses. were, they were there for a reason. There were no trees to build houses with. Right. So you had to go to winter to get lumber. You had to go to winter to get water. And so like to want to stay here, I often say like, man, wouldn't you just pack your shit up and keep going west?
Colton Craig (21:16.949)
you
Nick Jorgensen (21:17.084)
You know, I can't drink anything. Yeah, and just keep going. But they didn't, right? And they, they toughed it out. And, you know, the, families that are still here are the ones that, you know, that got through those hard times and, know, through the settlement times and through the thirties. But, you know, I guess living out here now is different. We've got all the things. We've got water. We've got great cell phone service. We're 15 miles from town. That's got a good hospital and a good school.
Matt Considine (21:17.262)
Or we're trail it, just keep going.
Nick Jorgensen (21:42.961)
You know, we've got a good group of people that come from the surrounding area to work for us. And so, you know, there's no place frankly that I would rather be. And I don't, there's not a place I'd rather be in business either doing what we're doing. And especially when you consider what we're going to try to do with this club and maybe a little bit of like the ethos behind it. Where we're at is an extremely important piece of it. It's an extremely important piece of it.
Matt Considine (22:07.523)
Yeah.
Colton Craig (22:09.826)
And I want to add that any first time guests to their lodge, it's not an ask, it's a requirement that you go through a tour of their cattle operations, which is awesome. It's like there's the sea of bulls you're riding through and it's about as interesting of an initiation experience as you can get.
Matt Considine (22:10.168)
Yeah, and
Colton Craig (22:38.344)
And I think a lot of golfers are going to enjoy that.
Matt Considine (22:39.246)
That's cool.
Nick Jorgensen (22:41.21)
Yeah, so, you know, we'll talk about why that, you know, why there's obviously, there's some obvious reasons, but when we hunt pheasants, which is a big part of what we're doing today, one of the areas we've hunted is right around our main headquarters. And so it's a natural good fit. We finish up the pheasant hunt, we crack open a few beers and we take the bus through and just, you know, tell that family history, show them what we do. Because, I mean, let's be honest, like Matt and Colton, most people in the United States today are at least one or two degrees separated from agriculture.
And I'm gonna guess probably both of you are as well. And it's just not something you get exposed to every day. And so, we just take the opportunity to, it's to show people what we do, but we view it as telling our family story, promoting the industry just a little bit. And those folks that walk out of that tour, most of them will come out of there saying, hey, I learned something I didn't know today that was really interesting. And that's that it just connects them closer to what we're doing.
Matt Considine (23:13.699)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (23:37.762)
You know, it's, it's, you're right. So many of us are removed from it. And I recently made the decision and consciously talked to my wife about this is like, were kind of lying to our kids for a little while of like what they're eating just to get them to eat. Like any parent, you got five, right? Like, you know, the struggles of whatever got out of the kitchen table, they don't want. And you're like, shit. Well, what do we get? So anyways, you just tell them it's, yeah, that's whatever you were gonna eat.
We're like, no, what are we doing? And I don't know where this came from. I think it was actually out of a, like a cooking recipe or something, just mentioned something about this, but making sure your kids know that beef is from cattle and cows. and, this is a nugget or whatever chicken nugget is a chicken, or hopefully it is, depending where you're buying it from, or if you're making it home and, and, and we've started doing that. And honestly, it's kind of funny how it's like,
They're young but they're capable of that, you know, that they should know that yeah, someone has to raise it. Someone's gotta Slaughter it they got to process it and and I don't know if kids are still going on tours of that But but as adults we need that too. That's what's kind of sad. I think of maybe where we're at
Nick Jorgensen (24:49.7)
Yeah. Well, you're right. you'd be amazed, Matt, even like in our community, winter South Dakota, which Tripp County, South Dakota is an egg state. Tripp County is an egg county. You'd be amazed at the amount of kids, even though there's not very many of them, that don't know even here, you know, how their food is produced. And I guess I always look at it, you know, and we in agriculture don't do ourselves favors because on a lot of times we get on the wrong side of public opinion on about food. Right? We do.
And it's because we don't talk about it enough. And in my opinion there frankly is, I've learned in my short career that a lot of times lack of knowledge breeds distrust, right? Lack of familiarity. When there's a knowledge gap that creates distrust and concern. It's not like Americans just know all the stuff and still, you know, don't feel good about their food. It's because they don't know. It's in my opinion, nine times out of 10, it's because they don't know, hey, how is beef produced? Where did it come from?
And our goal is just to close that knowledge gap because knowing where your beef comes from just naturally creates more trust in it and just your food in general. That's really the goal. So I appreciate what you're doing because it's the right thing. But we have failed in agriculture, frankly, just in telling our story well enough to keep people comfortable with the good products we're making here in the US.
Colton Craig (26:11.286)
Hey Nick, by the way, golf's in the same category. I think about every other movie I watch, there's a crooked business deal that goes down on a golf course. Golf has an image problem too that we're working on.
Matt Considine (26:13.453)
Let's get it.
Nick Jorgensen (26:20.902)
Yep.
Matt Considine (26:25.838)
Yeah, it's funny. And my head also went to superintendents, right? Not telling their own story about what it does for the environment versus, you know, the, the constant tale of what it pesticide use, herbicide use and how that's actually, it's, it's very comparable. Another, another reason that you're the guy to be in the seat of, of adding golf to, what you guys do. So, uh, so let's go to that. Let's go to that. Was there a aha moment for you guys that you're like, all right, we're setting aside.
Nick Jorgensen (26:39.63)
Mm-hmm. Very similar.
Matt Considine (26:55.854)
land for, for golf.
Nick Jorgensen (26:58.576)
Yeah, well, I'm going to take you back. I talked about what we do at Juergens Land and Cattle, but one thing I didn't mention was the Lazy J Sporting Club, which is actually, open today.
Colton Craig (26:58.626)
you
Nick Jorgensen (27:12.092)
Strip County, South Dakota, and really South Central part of South Dakota is known as one of the premier upland bird hunting, pheasant hunting destinations in the world. And we live right there. And so for years and years, we own and operate on a lot of property and have a lot of pheasants around. And so for years, probably 30 years at this point, we've been offering pheasant hunting in some way, or form on our operation. In 2012,
We made a really conscious decision the year before we had purchased a decent amount of property, about 2,500 acres from a doctor from Virginia that in our area that had it, he was running this acreage and he had a hunting business. had a lodge, was a double wide trailer with some bunk beds. He had a cook shack. mean, it was a hunting outfit. We purchased that from him with the goal of kind of taking our business to the next level from a hunting perspective. Ran that setup for one year and didn't like it.
professional enough for. So in 2012, we built the Lazy J Grand Lodge, which I'm sitting in today. It's a 22 bedroom hunting lodge, 16, 17,000 square foot facility. We can sleep 42 hunters here today. We've got two bars on property or liquor license facility. We're a licensed restaurant. It's an all inclusive hunting resort today. So we get guests from all over the United States that come and hunt on our property.
We fully guide them. We provide the dogs. We do the bird cleaning. We do all the meals, all the alcohol, everything. You come here and you come to the Lazy J Grand Lodge and get everything that you want out of a trip to South Dakota to hunt pheasants. Right? And it's a beautiful facility in our opinion. And generally as our customers say, it's a wonderful site. We've got a really, really good team. The aha moment that you asked about, Matt, was, I would never say it was necessarily an aha moment.
Maybe I had one, but for our family, what we realized is that we'd invested a lot of money in this facility. We had invested a lot in the property. We'd invested a lot in the people that were there. And we're really only getting use out of it about 90 days out of the year. The hunting season in South Dakota for us opens up September 1st and closes on March 31st. But if you've ever been to South Dakota, you don't want to be here in January, February, March. It sucks, right? So you're not hunting pheasants. So really we're hunting pheasants.
Nick Jorgensen (29:37.425)
September, October, November, and a little bit into December. So let's just call it about 90 days of hunting. We've got this facility that sits here year round. And so like since its inception, maybe two or three years after we built it, we started saying, what more can we do to get, you know, basically efficiency out of this facility? How do we get people to come stay here in June? How do we get them to come stay here in March? What do we have to do? And we danced around, you know, like, can you put a walking trail in? You could do tours, you could do bird watching, but
What I mentioned before, we're 20 miles from winter South Dakota. You're not coming to Northern Tripp County, South Dakota. And you're not driving through ideal South Dakota without a really damn good reason. Right? And we have that reason 90 days out of the year. You could come here to hunt pheasants. You don't have a good reason unless maybe you've got a family member that's getting married out here or you're coming to look at cattle. You don't have a good reason to come to the Lazy J Grand Lodge in June today. The only...
Matt Considine (30:20.364)
Yep.
Nick Jorgensen (30:36.09)
viable thing that could attract people is golf. And we knew that. a golf course could potentially be in a tractor. And we just had that in our heads for years. And we had a hunting clients that said, man, you could do golf here. This would be great. But we never took it super seriously.
I went on a trip to Sutton Bay, North of Pier. This would have been three years ago now. And I'm not a golfer, but if you've been there before, I ran to the course. It's a mile from the lodge. I took a run in the morning to the course, which I would not recommend doing because you have to go down a huge hill and up a huge hill. That run sucked. But I got to the top of this hill and I looked at this course and I stood around and I realized, you know what? There's not a single reason we couldn't do something
Matt Considine (31:14.732)
You
Nick Jorgensen (31:22.786)
similar at our property. The land's different, but it's equally as beautiful in a different way. We've got a facility that is on caliber with what they have. I'm like, well, okay, why don't we get serious about investigating this? you know, took it to the family and they're like, well, yeah, guess if you want to start doing a little work, go right ahead. so Cody and I did some work and through a roundabout way, we got in touch with Landscapes Unlimited and Colton Craig kind of at the same time. And
had them out in, I believe it was November of 2023. I think that's when it was called when you and John and all those folks came out. And when we asked them to come out, get here. What we told them was we've got this hunting lodge, we've got this hunting business. It's doing well, but we're just trying to figure out ways to make it more attractive to get people to come here on a year round basis. And we've got this beautiful piece of property. So can we see if golf is feasible?
And they came out and I guess Colton, you know, I don't want to paraphrase what you said, but the answer was a resounding, my God, yes. You guys have a good spot here, right? Colton.
Colton Craig (32:31.947)
It's the best site we've been on, Virgin Ground. Yeah, no doubt. No doubt.
Nick Jorgensen (32:36.4)
Yeah. And I won't get into the details of why, because Colton tells a better story there about what's so special about it. But once they confirmed that, hey, look, you guys got good ground for golf. You know, we asked him, right? Well, help us figure out a business model because none of us, Cody is a golfer, my cousin. None of us are like, see, he's not, he's a golfer. He's not a serious, serious golfer. None of us know anything about golf, right? And the last thing we want to do is go figure out, now we're going to manage this golf course ourselves, manage this club. We don't know shit about it.
So we're not going to do that. So that was why we wanted to find a partner like landscapes and an architect like Colton and his firm. And, what we asked was, Hey, look, this property is beautiful. Please don't screw it up. Like what we don't want to do here is manufacture golf that doesn't already exist. And so that was kind of the idea of it. So this, this course that Colton designed for us sits on 440 acres, which is big, right? I mean, in my understanding in the golf world, that's, that's it. That's a fairly sizable chunk.
The reason we leverage that much property was we wanted Colton to find the golf, not to make it. You know, so take all the space you need, go find it, and let's leverage just the natural beauty. the course is actually behind me. You see the windows, you can't see out of them, but the course is back there. There's going to be back there.
Colton Craig (33:54.04)
Hey Nick, if we can find 50 more of you, we're gonna have such a good career.
Matt Considine (33:59.532)
We're to have such a better landscape in the game of golf, aren't we? mean, that's, I do want to take us back to that, that point of you're on that run and you're like, well, yeah, we, we got land that's different, but beautiful. And, I think that's a moment, a lot of golf nerds like myself, I can't drive down the right area of a state or doesn't matter where I'm always looking at golf.
Colton Craig (34:03.221)
Yeah.
Nick Jorgensen (34:03.726)
Yeah. Go ahead.
Matt Considine (34:26.914)
golf holes that don't exist yet. And I know Colton's on a whole nother level with that because it's his profession to design and build them. But, why don't we go to just Colton, your first. Well, one, think there that that shows vision, Nick. I think that definitely is, if you think I'll go back to old Tom and the origination of the game, I mean, he was laying holes out and, it wasn't necessarily, you know, forcing a certain template or.
Nick Jorgensen (34:54.812)
Mm-hmm.
Matt Considine (34:55.49)
Manufacturing that he was what is the way you walk this place? What is the way you explore it and its beauty and and laying them out and and we've golf has just evolved from that but and we end up with With Colton, but yeah, call it your first experience seeing that land
Colton Craig (35:06.467)
So Matt, I have a-
Colton Craig (35:11.767)
Well, I have a little bit of a hot take on why I think golf is the greatest game in the world objectively. And it's a little, it's a little bit what you're talking about right now. And I believe you can say golf is the, is the greatest game in the world, greatest sport in the world, because the playing field is not defined. I think if you, if you take it down to first principles as to what makes golf great, I think that's the base principle and.
Matt Considine (35:19.884)
Let's do it. I want to it.
Colton Craig (35:40.802)
that also encourages you to travel to go play other playing fields, right? And then that encourages you to meet people. So a lot of people say, the people are great in golf. It's like, yes, they are, but how do you get to meet them? It's because you have to travel to go play a different playing field. And so I think a lot of people need to hit the road more and play more golf. And I think that has a lot to do with New Club and your business.
Anyways, just had to get that sound bite out, but...
Matt Considine (36:12.166)
I, I, well, you just got me with the profound thought of the day. That is it. It starts right there, my friend. And, gosh, okay. Go to see in the land. Cause I'm going to have another podcast now needed for that very thought you just shared, the first time you saw this like property, what did you think?
Colton Craig (36:26.605)
Yeah.
Yeah. So I will go back just a little bit, just like about 60 days prior to that initial meeting on site. I was at a relatively popular lunch place here in Oklahoma city, which is where we office out of and the Saturn grill and give them a shout out. And there was someone there wearing a, and I have it now, the Lido
the new Lido golf hat. And, you know, I've known as a stranger to me. So someone wearing architecturally interesting golf logo, I'm going to say hi and introduce myself. We also happened to be building a golf course in Oklahoma city at the time, which I actually moved my residence to and now live on, which has been quite a treat. But we were under construction at that period. And I said, Hey, if you'd ever like to
come see what we're doing. We're doing something kind of within the same, you know, within the same taste as the lead out. And anyways, a few weeks went by. I saw him at a concert like a week later, just unknowingly just run into him. Still wearing the hat. I ran into him at a print shop. And then I think I even ran into him a third time. So we like ran into each other four times.
in a very short period of time. And I was like, dude, you gotta come out to my construction site. The world wants us to be together. And about halfway through that construction site, was that anyone on my side of the business knows that when you get people on a construction site, they start getting really excited. And one of the first things he said about halfway through our walk on that construction site was, you know, I have a friend in South Dakota that I'd love for you to introduce you to.
Colton Craig (38:28.107)
And so he made a group text with me, Nick and Nick's cousin, Cody. And then, you know, probably 30 days after that, we were scheduling a visit with landscapes to come up and see the property. So that's the, so somehow some way Mike Kaiser is responsible for this. His fingerprints are everywhere. So.
Nick Jorgensen (38:31.75)
coding.
Matt Considine (38:47.246)
His, his fingerprints are everywhere, right?
Colton Craig (38:55.243)
Yeah, so we come out and see the property immediately blown away. Well, you know, it's in an area that we call a Goldilocks zone as far as the land goes. It's very dramatic land. There's an awesome creek that runs through it called Thunder Creek. Hopefully the Oklahoma City Thunder pick up a corporate membership because of that. But yeah, and so there's a creek that runs through awesome rolling hills.
and
And it's why we call it the Goldilocks zone is it sure is dramatic, but it's not too dramatic towards like, okay, now we're gonna have to go move a ton of dirt to even make this playable. Because a lot of people look out their window on road trips and say, wow, that's such great land for golf. And I'm like, that's not even close to build, that's not even close to buildable unless you move the world. So that's one thing we're really excited about. That is our philosophy in design is,
sort of this, let the land dictate it, not manufacture it. And very glad that, you this is literally sacred land to the Jorgensen family. And that kind of brings me to my next point is beyond the land, makes our firm so excited about working on this job is their family. They are a very, very special family. It's not an act. Cody, I don't think I've ever seen Cody without a cowboy hat on.
I mean, they are real life cowboys and they're the best in the world at what they do. And so, and we're gonna try to build a golf course that's one of the best in the world. And I think we have a really good shot at that. And we're gonna do it in a very resourceful way. You we're not gonna, you hear about a lot of projects right now that are 25, even $50 million projects. And we can't wait to tell people what the final.
Colton Craig (40:55.587)
price tago is on this job because it's gonna be substantially lower than that. And that gives the Jorgensen family, you know, to make a club that isn't just a retreat for the wealthy. It allows them to properly vet and, you know, have the membership and culture they want to have. And that's something that is extremely special to me.
as far as building a golf course that has a great culture around it.
Nick Jorgensen (41:29.628)
So Colton,
What's interesting about the piece of property that we selected more or less is it's not good for a whole lot else. We're big farmers. It's not farmable ground. It's too rough for that because of thundercrick that runs through it. We're big ranchers. We can't really graze it because what is farmable, we put hunting strips on and we hunt pheasants on and cattle and hunting strips don't mix together.
Matt Considine (41:59.458)
Got it.
Nick Jorgensen (42:08.23)
because you don't have a hunting strip anymore when cattle are around. Plus it's right by our lodge and cricks are never fun to fence out. And so to be honest with you, since we've owned this property for the last 13 years, we've gotten almost no production value out of the property where the golf course is gonna sit. And so you always talk, know, like in any business, right? It's the highest and best use of the resource you have at your disposal, right? The highest and best use of the resource we have at our disposal on this piece of property is golf.
without a doubt, it's golf. And so, you know, for us, it's just, it's beautiful as it is, don't screw it up, but let's make use of it the way that it should be used, right? And then, yeah, go ahead.
Colton Craig (42:49.247)
Nick, what's awesome about what you're saying right now, and I don't even know if you realize it, but that's the origin of the game of golf, is that it was built on land that wasn't farmable. That's the origin of the game of golf. So here we are 500, 600 years later having the same conversation, you know, so that's awesome.
Matt Considine (42:50.19)
That's awesome.
Nick Jorgensen (43:11.494)
Yeah, I think, go ahead, Matt.
Matt Considine (43:11.542)
And I'll further it because one of my many passions is really the way the game, we've just diverted a bit from the way the game originated. And if we're trying to win a little bit of that origin back and just the core things that make us love this game. I think what Colton said earlier about
accessibility and travel and going and seeing different places. That's definitely part of it, but another one. And we actually have an episode coming up where we're going to dig a little deeper into this and you guys will be, one of the examples is there are areas of our country that aren't coastal, that aren't like what everybody has said is great golf, which probably, you know, the views kind of take away that that is just screaming at us to have golf.
Uh, maybe in subtle ways sometimes, but I, yeah, I actually think you're part of a movement, Nick. I, I do. I think this is going to be the next wave of, uh, great golf architecture is not forcing golf upon land. That doesn't make sense. It's saying, no, this land is, is almost set aside in all these natural ways to say it does belong here. Um, and then, and then the whole model works better.
And the last thing I'll say before moving on is that to hear the minimalist philosophy combined with the price of what it'll take for you guys to build a world-class golf course, those downstream effects, we don't talk about it enough in golf. This is what golf doesn't do a good service about. If golf will be affordable 50 years from now, those inputs, those decisions, all that stuff has to be a focus so that
We still have it available to us for, you know, not just the elite of the elite who can afford it. So kudos for the whole direction of this guys. think it's one of the biggest things that gets me excited about Lays of J.
Nick Jorgensen (45:11.482)
Mm-hmm.
Colton Craig (45:20.611)
So kind of to that in the spirit of that, Matt, something that's exciting about the Lazy J Sporting Club is they've partnered with one of our other clients, which is Sullivan County Golf Club as a sister club. so which Sullivan County is a very rural, very public, very affordable night whole golf course. You know, Lazy J is going to be a nice place for deep privacy to
Matt Considine (45:35.896)
nice.
Colton Craig (45:50.48)
go recreate an outdoor sport. But the, situation we've, we've, the, the lazy J sporting club and Sullivan County have made is if you have a membership or a season pass at Sullivan County, you, can have access to come play the golf course at, at, at lazy J. So it's, it's a, it's a nice, it's a nice gesture that, you know, again, this just isn't, this isn't just another retreat for the wealthy.
Nick Jorgensen (46:12.998)
next year.
Matt Considine (46:13.646)
That's incredible.
Colton Craig (46:20.181)
Sure, there's a private airport basically on campus. And I know a decent amount of their clients today at their hunting lodge utilize that. But still, we want people that just have a high moral character. And that's what this family is all about.
Nick Jorgensen (46:37.84)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (46:40.15)
Hey, and, and, and I got friends who can, they fly private into St. Andrews and play the old course, but I can still snag a tee time in the ballot. like those things aren't mutually exclusive. Do you know what I mean? It's like, yeah, yeah, that's awesome.
Nick Jorgensen (46:51.13)
Yep, that's right.
Nick Jorgensen (46:56.412)
So Colton, since you mentioned Sullivan County, you need to talk about your experience yesterday.
Colton Craig (47:02.019)
I did have a once in a lifetime experience, lottery type moment. So Bill Murray is one of the owners of Sullivan County and I typically caddy. So we have a tradition where on opening day, I caddy. So my first job in golf was caddying. And that's actually how I met Tom Coyne was I caddied for him during his course called America tour.
And on opening day, I'll caddy for the client on the last round as opposed to play with him. But I ended up playing in Bill's group this time, or it was a scramble. So I really only hit like three, four shots all day. I was mostly just kind of watching there in carts. So there's no need for me to carry a bag. But on the sixth hole, which is one of the brand new holes we built, aced it and just threw it in the hole.
Mr. Murray gave me a big hug and it was the 100 year celebration of the club too. I mean, just like, it sounds like folklore, but it happened. It happened yesterday. So kind of insane moment. Bill signed a poster and wrote a short story as to what happened. so that poster needs to find a place in this office somewhere, but really, really.
Matt Considine (48:09.87)
You
Matt Considine (48:25.038)
I always feel, wait, hold on one second. Bill Murray, mean, one of the biggest walking legends amongst us. And we got a ton of Chicago listeners who I feel like everyone in Chicago has their own, their own Bill Murray story. In that situation, did he, I always feel like he does what you don't expect. What did he do? Like the moment the ball goes in the hole.
Colton Craig (48:48.993)
He gave me, it was like a grandfatherly embrace. Everyone else was like high-fiving and we were yelling and everyone on the course said they could hear it. There was a roar. Yeah, so everyone heard it throughout the whole hundred acres, but everyone was high-fiving and Bill is sitting there just with his arms open and just come give me a hug. And so that was awesome. He was really good company.
Matt Considine (49:13.474)
That's awesome.
Colton Craig (49:17.953)
really good company and the night before there was a celebration and he was in full character, took over the microphone of the band and had a cowbell solo and all that good stuff. Interesting enough, he was talking about during his round table at the end of the event, he attributed catting to a lot of his education and humor. And so I thought that was interesting how he,
He also compared Tom Coyne to John Belushi, which I did not see coming, but it was something about how he's a leader and brings people with him and does these crazy things and brings people with him. So yeah, crazy story. Definitely sending that ball back to the club with a frame in it and all that good stuff.
Matt Considine (50:02.646)
He definitely does. Definitely does.
Matt Considine (50:12.814)
Well, that's a congrats on the life milestone. First days, that's a huge deal. Bringing it back to Lazy J, what's the next milestone for you guys? And is it too soon to talk about dates? we like all that jazz grand openings? When is Colton caddying for you Nick? When is that?
Nick Jorgensen (50:28.344)
No. Yeah, that's...
So, you know, I'd like to start with, you know, that the Lazy J Sporting Club itself is open today. Like we're offering pheasant hunts. We've got a sporting clays course that the facility itself is open. Where we're at with the golf course itself is we're currently in the phase of accepting applications for equity and non-equity members. The equity piece is really important to us today because this is a model where we're selling ownership in the club.
And, before we start construction, we've, we've got to have the equity members online. Right. And I like to tell people, you know, as far as dates, there's a really, really good chance that we're golfing sometime in, 2027. But if it's, if it's not then, because you know, the, the, equity raise takes longer, right. I think that's okay. Cause I think what's really important as it relates to, to, this business.
It goes back to something Colton mentioned. First and foremost is I use the analogy. We're not having a baby here to save the marriage. Like this, the Lazy J Sporting Club works really well without golf. Profitable business. Our family could do this forever, but we want to do golf because we think it just, it makes the experience better. But it gives us the flexibility of time.
Matt Considine (51:45.568)
Yeah
Nick Jorgensen (52:00.027)
Right. To find the right people, to go back to what Colton said about setting that culture. Right. We've been talking for an hour here. You and I have talked quite a bit, Matt, if you've gotten any sense at all of the type of people we are, there's no pretentiousness here at all. Right. Colton said it, we're cowboys, we're farmers and ranchers, we're business people. And that's the kind of people that we're surrounded by as clientele today at the Lazy J Sporting Club with our hunters. Right. This is very much a friendly setting. We come in.
have drinks, groups can mingle together. Everyone enjoys each other's time. It's a relaxed environment and we want to keep it that way, which gives us the flexibility of being choiceful about who we bring in on the project. Right. And so we're hoping for 2027, Matt, where we've got opening golf, but if it's 2028, that's okay with us because it meant that we took more time to find the right partners. Right. So go ahead.
Matt Considine (52:42.68)
Yeah.
Matt Considine (52:54.424)
Yeah. And you can set. And you can know, can tell Nick I'm a golf sicko. So I always jumped to like, all right, when can I play this golf course? Cause the pictures look sick and I can't wait to, you know, everything. But, of the, today's lazy J sporting club and, and, know, that ain't going anywhere. And obviously the hunting and pheasant shooting. What is the thing that you think of, of what you guys offer that a golfer is going to be like enamored with the most?
because I'll be the first to admit, sometimes when I start playing in my golf, kind of, it becomes so, so focused on like, have I got another chance to play the course again? I'm going to do it. I'm going to do 36 full days. I'm going to kill myself. But culturally, it sounds like you got to go hunt when you're there. What do you think is one of those things that's going to really appeal to golfers?
Nick Jorgensen (53:46.363)
Well, to my knowledge, there aren't a ton of clubs in the United States that cater to both a golfer and a hunter. I know they're there. Sutton Bay is one of them. I know there's several more, but there's not very many. Right? So I think that's a pretty unique offering in and of itself is that you can come here and get world-class pheasant hunting and world-class golf. And you can do it in the same day if you really are so inclined. I think the other thing that Colton said the word deep privacy, I want to make it abundantly clear.
Hole 10 on this course as it's laid out today is kind of in the center of the course. Up on a hill, you can see the whole thing. You could stand on hole 10 all day long and you may not see another vehicle or another person.
Right. And cell phone service is marginal. There, there's no one around. So you go stand in a whole tent at night and you have a full unencumbered, no light polluted view of the sky. It's quiet. It's wide open. is absolutely gorgeous. And I think that's another bit of appeal is that you're coming to a spot that it's evident that you are away, which is kind of the idea, right. And destination golf. mean, that's, that's kind of what we're, trying to do.
Matt Considine (54:33.304)
You're out there.
Colton Craig (54:37.955)
you
Nick Jorgensen (55:03.536)
Right? Is, is give them this experience that you're not going to get in Chicago or you're not going to get in Oklahoma city. You're not going to get it in Houston. What's, what's really cool about that though, is we can offer deep privacy and for folks that, that have the means to fly private, you can be on your plane in 10 minutes. You can be on your plane in 10 minutes. You can come in and out. we are quite a bit away, it's further from a commercial airport. Closest one would be pier. It's about an hour and 10 minutes, closest.
Major would be Sioux Falls, which is about two and a half hours. So it takes a little bit to get here. But once again, the idea there is that you're making the choice. You're traveling in. Once you get here, you're going to stay for a couple of days and enjoy a really beautiful experience where you don't have to be bothered by people. Your phone doesn't have to ring, right? That's just kind of the idea. And you're surrounded by good folks, good food, good golf, good hunting. If you're a shooter, we've got
extreme long range shooting. We actually got a range where you can shoot out to two miles today, which is bonkers. Like the three of us on this call anything over probably 800 yards is unattainable, right? And we're talking about 4,000 yards that we can shoot out to. But that's why we call it a sporting club too, man. It's like, you know, it's not a golf club because there's more than golf. It's not a hunting club because there's more than hunting. You've got golf, you've got hunting, you've got long range shooting, you've got sporting clays.
there's ponds on the property to fish and we're 20 minutes from the Missouri River. And so it kind of a sportsman's paradise. You make the choice to come here. Anything sportsman's related, can do while you're here, depending on the season of the year. And there's actually a season, September and early to mid October, where you can do all of those things at the same time. All of
Colton Craig (56:44.675)
Go hunting in the morning, golf in the afternoon, and college football at night over a big old steak. So Matt, what you were saying, what both of y'all were saying made me think, you know, what's gonna make this place a different offering for golfers is hopefully one that the golf course is spectacular, right? If we don't do that, none of this works, right? Kind of what Nick said earlier is looks is one thing, performance is another.
Matt Considine (56:49.646)
Sounds like a pretty good day.
Nick Jorgensen (56:50.256)
Yep, big old steak and a nice drink.
Colton Craig (57:13.815)
the golf course has got to perform. Our senior partner and our mentor, Steve Smires, always says, you want to have substance over style. so that kind of, but to the style and to kind of the ornamental stuff around, that will be really unique that you don't see anywhere else. One thing that Nick just said about the long range sniper shooting, whenever I was out there laying out this golf course,
I saw these signs, but I didn't know what they were, but I saw bullet holes in them. And they're basically these lean two with sheet of metal, and there are bullet holes in them. And kind of to the style of the golf course, those are gonna be our T signs. So we're gonna tinsel whole numbers on them. our whole signage will have bullet holes in them. Also, we're talking about maybe having some staged bulls.
that you actually walk through their pens from the basically the caddy dwellings or the cart area to the first tee. So you almost walk through instead of Roy McRoy walking through a gallery at Augusta, it's you walking through a gallery of 10 bulls you walk through before you get to the first tee.
Matt Considine (58:33.442)
That'll add at least 10 yards in adrenaline off the first, right?
Colton Craig (58:37.411)
Yeah. And last kind of point on this whole storytelling elements that I think is going to be neat about this property too, is that we're going to have the best bag tag in golf. So when we designed this golf course, came out to, and we never sued out for yardage. We always say yardage is just, it's like putting a price tag on a bottle of wine. If you're a wine connoisseur, if you just go buy a bottle of wine based on a price tag, you know.
That's, but we don't necessarily look for yardage when we're designing golf course, but we came out to 7206 and they're famous. Then Nick can say this better, but they're famous bull or cow right here. Uh, 7209. So you bet your ass we found a way to find three more yards. So the course is 7209. It's the mother load cow. Uh,
Nick Jorgensen (59:19.345)
Ciao.
Nick Jorgensen (59:26.992)
Murray Yards.
Colton Craig (59:33.411)
and that's going to be the bag tag is going to be their ear tag. So we're going to have the best in golf, we're going to have the best bag tag in golf and hopefully have a pretty good golf course to match it. But those are just kind of the things that think will, you know, the sense of arrival will be fantastic and just the family atmosphere. You're basically in someone's living room.
Matt Considine (59:37.569)
Wow.
Matt Considine (59:57.414)
I think that the thing that's sticking with me, like even those finer details and from all the conversations that you guys, as the project continues, it feels like it's almost having obviously the legacy of your family, the cattle business, along with the hunting and the pheasant shooting and golf clubs. we've, again, we've had a lot of...
different folks, developers on the show to talk about these things that we all aspire and dream about going to. They're trying to set a culture, but our expectations are always so based in what golf clubs are, right? Golf is, and it almost feels to me that you guys, it's a unique opportunity to just define your own. You know, you don't, you and as a person thinking about it and, you know, we'll be visitor of Lazy J, it's almost like I'll be forced.
Colton Craig (01:00:46.499)
I it.
Matt Considine (01:00:54.87)
out of my expectations almost immediately just with the idea of, Hey, this is a sporting club. there will be, there will be shooting. There will be, you want to see some, what we really do well. We'll show you some heifers. We'll show you some cattle. And I think that's, I think that's really unique. I think you guys have just an awesome opportunity for your own culture.
Nick Jorgensen (01:01:13.851)
here.
Colton Craig (01:01:16.727)
There will also be a short course at some point in the planning that is 12 holes specifically because they have 12 grandchildren. And so the short course, know, the thing to do in golf now is to have a cool name for your short course. Their short course will be called the grandchildren's course. So just continuing that storytelling of family, ranching, multi-generational.
Nick Jorgensen (01:01:16.86)
Yeah, and I
Colton Craig (01:01:46.027)
all that good stuff. It's all here.
Nick Jorgensen (01:01:48.721)
I, and you know, Matt, you make a really good point about, you know, kind of setting our own culture and forcing it. But I think what underpins that is the experience has got to be stellar. Right? I mean, if, if, if it's, if it's average at best golf and average is best hunting, can't, you don't have the flexibility to do that. Right. But if it's, if it's phenomenal hunting and phenomenal golf, gives you the, and you know, phenomenal experience, good food, good place to stay, good amenities, all that.
gives you that flexibility. And that's why I just want to round out my comments. That's why I want to give just another big shout out to Landscapes and all just to Colton and his firm, right? Because it's picking those two partners that make this thing. Cause if it was just us, it wouldn't happen. It wouldn't happen. Right? And we've told, we've said that many a time. If we were going about this ourselves or frankly, if this thing that I'm sitting in didn't exist today, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Right? There's already a foundation there. That's good.
It's bringing on partners that can just make it better. And you you made a comment about Colton and the ability to see golf. I blew my mind now because the property behind us, I've looked at for 12 or 15 years and man, it's beautiful. But you have Colton take you out to hole three and you go, holy shit. I've seen this spot a hundred times and never once did I realize that there was an unbelievable golf hole.
right here with Colton, literally no dirt work at all. It's there. All it's gonna take is different grass and manicuring it the right way and you have a golf hole and it's unbelievable. credit to people that have the natural ability there because I don't. I don't at all.
Colton Craig (01:03:10.499)
you
Colton Craig (01:03:25.355)
Thank you. So one thing that's very Matt right now is they had a little bit of a promotion going on, if you want to call it that, where, you know, that one thing that's great about this project is it's not just great land. They have all of their resources there. And one thing they have is this massive mower and they've already bought the lazy J flags. And so they've mowed out the routing they have.
Matt Considine (01:03:27.34)
Yeah, and I'm learning this.
Colton Craig (01:03:54.564)
put the flags in the ground. And so we're calling it round zero or the mo out. And, um, you know, so come out to the lazy J and you can play it now and you play it off mats like you would in the winter and St. Andrews and, you know, you don't really putt, but you can go experience the golf course now and stay at the lodge and all that good stuff.
Nick Jorgensen (01:04:16.156)
Cody actually did that with just a couple weekends ago. He and his wife and one of our investors was in town and they went out and they played three or four holes out there. And it's mowed, it's beautiful right now actually. We've gotten some rain. And so when our hunters come this fall and for anyone for that matter that wants to come see the place, you can see the golf course is probably 80 % of the way there now.
Matt Considine (01:04:27.67)
I
Colton Craig (01:04:34.605)
New call, the one seven hundred.
Matt Considine (01:04:38.35)
Sometimes we don't even need a flag. If you tell us there's a general hole out there, we'll come find it. And that speaks to the roots of the game. And I think it's actually not surprising the more I get in this conversation that if my hope of golf returning to its origins, getting a little bit closer to the commonalities we all share, it's not surprising at all that it's gonna take people that actually don't golf, don't come from.
Nick Jorgensen (01:04:42.694)
Yep. Yep.
Matt Considine (01:05:08.46)
Because Nick, the things that matter to you are the things that actually matter to all of us. We've just gotten a little bit confused, you know, over time with, with this game and, just thank you guys. I think this is going to be such a cool course, such a cool experience. and, all the, all the best, you know, moving towards it, cause it's going to be, be a, quite a journey. know that. question, actually I'll round out, let you guys finish this out here.
I've done this from time to time, in 50 years, when you're standing up on that ridge, I think you said 10 has that long view. 50 years from now, Nick, you're up there. 50 years from now, Colton, you're there. And you're looking out. What do you hope?
Lazy J Sporting Club stands for, what do you hope people say in 50 years?
Nick Jorgensen (01:06:07.15)
you go ahead first.
Colton Craig (01:06:09.195)
Yeah, that's a heavy one, Matt. I don't know how to digest-
Matt Considine (01:06:11.854)
I like to get deep man, I like it.
Colton Craig (01:06:14.923)
You know, at the core of who I believe I am is I'm an entertainer. And so I just hope that this brings people together to have fun and they smile or, you know, maybe it's a way for father and son to go on a trip and, you know, have memories that way.
That's really the hope I have is just how many people can you give positive experiences to and that's what it's all about. And golf and travel, know, get off social media, stop looking at all the overly filtered golf holes and go experience them and meet people, meet positive people, try to avoid the negative ones if you can.
And so yeah, that's the goal for me for Lazy J is just to have a place out there for people to come enjoy and make a bunch of memories, a of positive memories with good people. I've talked to Cody at one point actually, kind of jokingly, kind of seriously about that land that Nick's talking about where 10 Green sits. There's a little area beyond 11T where 11T is up there too, where I said, I want to be buried right there. So.
Hopefully I'm around in 50 years, but if I'm not, maybe I'm right there where we're talking.
Nick Jorgensen (01:07:43.387)
beer right there. So Colton, you say what exactly into like perfectly into what I was going to say. So Matt, we have today, so of all the people we've had out here over the years, we have three individuals that have spread their ashes out here in a specific spot, not on the course, but on the property. And my cousin Cody has identified a spot not on the course, but on the property that he wants to build his his forever home on someday.
And why did they, why are they making those choices? Cause it's their, it's their favorite place on earth. And so 50 years from now, I'd love to go stand up on 10 and I don't care who it is, but a member of the Lazy J Sporting Club that, sporting club that stands up there with me and says, this is my favorite spot on earth. That's what, that's what I'm going for.
Colton Craig (01:08:34.092)
Mm. Mm.
Matt Considine (01:08:37.922)
Man, that's powerful and that resonates.
Nick Jorgensen (01:08:38.684)
And I think really, Matt, if you ever get a chance to come see it, it is unbelievably beautiful. And I think it's just people got to see it.
Matt Considine (01:08:44.632)
Well, I have a list of places that I want my children to send my ashes someday. And so that resonates with me, man. That is a very noble, noble work to provide that, that level of something for others. So cool. Well, guys can't wait to, you know, hear updates, have you back on the show.
plenty of other things, you know, we, we'd love to talk to you Colton about in your world and we will, and, Nick, thank you for coming on, man. This is so exciting. We'll, look forward to the updates and that event. What if that is right up my alley again, just just playing golf in a field. My wife gives me a hard time, but I tell her as I will just do that. I'm perfectly content hitting in knee high grass.
in chasing a ball anywhere. if you guys do put that together, let us know. New club would be all over it. And,
Nick Jorgensen (01:09:43.164)
Next spring we don't have a date yet, but we're gonna do it next spring. We were gonna do it this fall, but it got a little dry and it wasn't super pretty in Northern Tripp County, but next spring we're gonna do it. Thanks for having us, Matt.
Matt Considine (01:09:49.485)
Awesome.
Matt Considine (01:09:55.822)
Put us down, put us down. So thank you guys for being with us. Really, really enjoyed it. I look forward to the bag take too. And thanks to everybody else for listening. We so enjoy having these characters and these communities from the game of golf on this show. And you as a listener, are just a massive part of that. so the professor and I from bottom of our hearts, we want to just thank you for being a part of it.
Colton Craig (01:10:00.196)
Mooktunga is a bad tag.
Matt Considine (01:10:23.852)
If you're listening, you enjoy the show, don't forget to like, rate, review, subscribe, wherever you are, click that button of sorts somewhere, and new club. We have our Founders Cup, those extra spots, November 2nd through the 5th at Pinehurst Resort. Shoot us an email, log in the app, sign up. Many, many things to look forward to with apparently a mo-out at Lazy J as a part of that.
Thanks to our partners at Titleist, the Bag Drop podcast is in partnership with Titleist, the number one ball in golf. We'll catch you all in the next one.
