SOCCER World, the five-a-side football operator, has branched out into golf after acquiring a two-level driving range and tuition centre in Clydebank for a "seven figure sum".
The company, which has football centres in Glasgow, Dundee and Newcastle, purchased the business from Ashtour Limited. The precise value of the deal was not disclosed.
Soccer World now plans to grow the business by raising its standing as an events space and investing in the latest golf tuition technology, with the aim of turning it into a centre of excellence.
The facility already includes a pitch and putt area, Jurassic Park-themed putting course, pro shop function suites and a cafe, in addition to the multi-platform range.
World of Golf's 25 staff have transferred over to the new employer further to the deal.
With Soccer World employing 75 staff across its three football centres, the company now has an overall headcount of 100.
Ashtour will continue to run its three other golf centres in the south of England.
Soccer World director Barry McDermott said: "While the purchase of World of Golf marks a new direction for Soccer World, it sits comfortably within our model as a leisure services company and will integrate well into our existing portfolio.
"It is already considered to be one of the best multi-purpose golf facilities in the UK and we have plans to invest further in the centre and to grow the existing business."
Soccer World was supported in the acquisition by a long-term loan facility from Royal Bank of Scotland. Michael McCuaig, the bank's relationship director in the west of Scotland, said: "This acquisition underlines Soccer World's entrepreneurial ambitions and their ability to identify a great opportunity within the leisure services marketplace."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article