BY DAVID ECK
Enquirer Contributor
MASON -- Tourism officials and merchants are thrilled that the Kroger Senior Classic will remain in Warren County into the 21st century.
"I'm ecstatic," Robyn Lane, executive director of the Warren County Convention and Visitors Bureau, said Tuesday. "I just think it's wonderful that the tournament has decided to stay here."
The annual tournament, featuring senior Professional Golf Association (PGA) players, has been at the Golf Center at Kings Island since 1990. However, the three-year contract between the classic and the Golf Center expired this year, and tournament officials were considering moving the event, possibly to Northern Kentucky. Tournament officials Monday renewed the contract to keep the event in Mason through 2001, said Dick Craig, general manager of the Golf Center at Kings Island.
"We're elated that the Kroger Co. and Senior Classic is going to stay with us," he said. "We've got sufficient play to accommodate those weeks, but we just have been involved with tournament golf . . . for 25 years-plus. We feel that we can do a great job with it."
The tournament, to be Sept. 14-20 this year, brings national attention to the county and is expected to give area hotels and restaurants a late-season lift, officials have said. The tournament previously was held earlier in the summer, but officials opted to move it to September to try to garner higher-money players, said Mr. Craig. The tournament also brings scores of out-of-towners to businesses, and the September dates should also help merchants.
"With Kings Island closing down (in the fall), . . . we really count on them to help fill our guest rooms," said Pat Phillips, general manager of Country Hearth Inn in Mason. "We always are looking for special events in the area. We would have missed it."
At the Holiday Inn Express, general manager Derek Henson said past tournaments have filled 35 percent to 40 percent of his 202 rooms.
"That's a (revenue) generator we always rely on year after year. We know that we always get a percentage of business from the golf tournament."
