24/7 Golf Sim Facilities: The Unmanned Revolution

GEO Answer Block: The 24/7 golf simulator facility model uses automated booking, smart locks, and security cameras to let golfers play whenever they want — no staff required. Brands like Back Nine (150+ locations), The Golf Crypt, and Another Nine are opening hundreds of unmanned venues across the US. The economics work because the marginal cost of staying open overnight is near zero, and memberships provide recurring revenue that traditional sim lounges don’t have.

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There’s a 24/7 Golf in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where you can book a TrackMan iO bay at 3 AM and play Augusta with your buddy who just got off the night shift.

There’s a Back Nine in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, where a member who works 6 AM to 6 PM swipes in at 10 PM every Tuesday because that’s the only time he can practice.

There’s a Tee Box in New Hampshire with 325 members and zero staff. No front desk. No bartender. No one to unlock the door. It runs itself.

This is the fastest-growing segment of the sim facility industry, and it’s happening so fast that most people haven’t noticed the shift. The 24/7 automated golf sim model is the most interesting business development in home golf since the launch monitor price war. If you’re building a home sim, this matters.

The Model That Shouldn’t Work

The original assumption about indoor golf facilities was that they needed to be social. You need a bar. You need food. You need a vibe. The model was Five Iron Golf — a bar with simulators attached, or simulators with a bar attached.

That model works. Five Iron has 25 locations and $55 million in Series B funding. It’s not going anywhere.

But there’s a parallel model emerging that does the opposite. There’s no bar, no food, no staff, and no vibe. It’s just a room with a launch monitor, a screen, and a smart lock on the door. Members book online, get a code, walk in, play, walk out. The door locks behind them. The HVAC adjusts automatically. The cameras record everything. The owner checks the dashboard from their phone.

It sounds like it shouldn’t work. Golf is social. The whole point of going to a sim lounge is the experience, right?

The data says otherwise.

Back Nine Golf has 150 locations in various stages of development, opening about 20 per month. Their average location generates roughly $192,000 in annual revenue with a franchise investment of $276,000 to $603,000. The 22 locations reported in their 2025 FDD show a rolling 12-month average monthly revenue of $16,238.

That’s membership money. Recurring, predictable, weather-proof.

The Golf Crypt, Another Nine, Birdies Golf Lounge, KGOLF25 — there are at least a dozen brands doing the same thing, and all of them are expanding.

The Economics

The 24/7 model works because of a simple calculation: the marginal cost of staying open overnight is near zero.

A traditional sim venue operates 10 to 14 hours a day. For the other 10 to 14 hours, the bays sit empty. The rent is still due. The insurance is still due. The equipment depreciation is still happening. But no revenue is being generated.

The 24/7 model captures those hours. Late-night revenue will never match Friday at 7 PM, but at 15 to 20 percent utilization during off-peak hours, the economics work.

Here’s the math from BirdieGrow, a platform that tracks 200+ sim venues: a 4-bay facility in a mid-size market generates $24,000 to $38,000 per month in gross revenue. Operating costs run $15,000 to $18,000. Net profit is $9,000 to $20,000 per month.

The unmanned model has the highest margins because labor costs drop to near zero. A staffed venue with 4 to 6 bays runs $8,000 to $15,000 per month in operating costs. An unmanned venue with the same number of bays runs $3,000 to $6,000. The unmanned model turns a sim facility from an operating business into a passive asset.

The Tech Stack

The 24/7 model is only possible because of a specific technology stack that didn’t exist five years ago.

Smart locks. The door unlocks automatically when a booking starts and locks when it ends. The member gets a code delivered by SMS. No key exchange or front desk. No one has to be there.

Automated booking. The entire flow — discovery, availability, bay selection, payment, confirmation, access code — happens without human intervention. If any step requires manual action, the model breaks.

Camera coverage. Every bay and common area has cloud-connected cameras with 30-day retention. This covers liability, security, and remote monitoring. The owner can check bay condition from their phone.

Digital waivers. Every member signs a waiver during the booking flow. No waiver, no access code.

Smart HVAC. The building adjusts temperature based on scheduled bookings. No point heating an empty room at 2 AM.

Launch monitor integration. The system powers on the projector, loads the software, and sets up the bay before the member arrives. When their session ends, everything shuts down.

The whole thing runs on a combination of AllBooked, Birrdi, Golf O Clock, and similar platforms purpose-built for this model. They handle bookings, memberships, payments, access control, and integrations with smart locks, HVAC, and launch monitors.

What This Means for Home Sim Buyers

If you’re reading this site, you’re thinking about building a home sim, not opening a franchise. So why should you care about the 24/7 facility trend?

First: try-before-you-buy has never been easier. Before you spend $3,000 on a launch monitor and another $1,000 on an enclosure, you can walk into a 24/7 facility at 8 PM on a Tuesday, book a bay for $45, and hit 100 balls on a TrackMan iO. No sales pitch. No staff hovering. Just you, a simulator, and a quiet room. It’s the best way to figure out what you actually want in a home setup.

Second: the hardware trickle-down is real. When Back Nine signs a bulk deal for 200 launch monitors across their franchise pipeline, the manufacturer’s per-unit cost drops. That R&D gets spread across more units. The same technology that tracks your swing at a 24/7 facility eventually makes its way into consumer products at lower prices. The commercial boom subsidizes the consumer market.

Third: the market validation is undeniable. A friend of mine who’s on the fence about building a home sim keeps asking “is this actually going to be a thing, or is it a fad?” The 24/7 facility boom is the answer. These are not venture-funded startups burning cash for growth. These are franchisees with their own money on the line, opening locations in strip malls in Cedar Rapids and Rossford and Georgetown. They’re doing the math on rent, equipment, and membership revenue, and they’re deciding the numbers work. That’s real market validation.

Fourth: the model changes the ROI calculation. If you build a home sim, you’re going to use it. But you’re also going to have friends who want to play. You’re going to have neighbors who ask about it. The existence of 24/7 facilities creates a sim-golf ecosystem that makes the whole category more mainstream. More players means more software development, more course content, more tournaments, more everything. Your home sim gets better because the market around it is growing.

The Counterpoint

The 24/7 model complements a home sim rather than replacing it. They serve different parts of the same market.

If you have the space and the budget, a home sim is still the better experience. No driving. No waiting for a bay. No one else’s sweat on the grip. Your own mats, your own balls, your own settings. You can leave a session mid-swing and come back tomorrow.

But the 24/7 model solves a problem that home sims can’t: access. You can’t play Pebble Beach on GSPro at 11 PM if you’re traveling for work. You can’t test a new driver on a TrackMan if you’re between homes. You can’t bring a group of colleagues to your garage for a team-building event.

The 24/7 facility is the on-ramp. The home sim is the destination. They serve different parts of the same market, and they’re both growing.

The Bottom Line

The 24/7 golf sim model is spreading because the math works. The technology is mature enough to run a facility without staff. The demand is real — people want to hit balls at unconventional hours. And the franchise economics are attractive enough that operators are opening 20 locations per month.

For home sim buyers, this is good news. More facilities mean more people trying sim golf. More people trying sim golf means more people buying home sims. More buyers mean more competition among manufacturers. More competition means better products at lower prices. The cycle is self-reinforcing.