Shackamaxon in NJ

buu · February 20, 2023

Hi

Some of us (my buddies and I) are considering joining Shackamaxon but haven’t done our due diligence yet. Anyone have any details around dues, pace of play, course condition, amenities etc? I have young kids so the pool is definitely a plus. Thank you in advance guys!

Wettyb · March 24, 2023

Holds a lot of water so can be super wet at times. I checked them out when they flipped over ownership to the Heritage group at start of 2021, which is a nice plus as you get the reciprocals for all the other courses Heritage owns in the US. for a junior exec membership they wanted like 2500 initiation and i think around 6500 a year? plus another 2k per year if you wanted to use the pool. From what i've heard they have 450+ members and it can be difficult to get tee times. Also if you're not a full member and have a junior executive membership and whatnot you dont have the same rights as other members, i believe you arent allowed to schedule a tee time before 10 or 11 am, not sure if you'd be in that category but they definitely do not cater to younger members. Things could have changed since then, but if you call and schedule a tour they're good about giving all that info up front

NJgolfer11 · March 24, 2023

6 hours ago, Wettyb said:

Holds a lot of water so can be super wet at times. I checked them out when they flipped over ownership to the Heritage group at start of 2021, which is a nice plus as you get the reciprocals for all the other courses Heritage owns in the US. for a junior exec membership they wanted like 2500 initiation and i think around 6500 a year? plus another 2k per year if you wanted to use the pool. From what i've heard they have 450+ members and it can be difficult to get tee times. Also if you're not a full member and have a junior executive membership and whatnot you dont have the same rights as other members, i believe you arent allowed to schedule a tee time before 10 or 11 am, not sure if you'd be in that category but they definitely do not cater to younger members. Things could have changed since then, but if you call and schedule a tour they're good about giving all that info up front

450+ members?

That is a lot for a private club. Unless its 300-350 golf and the rest are social or house.

I played the course about 5-6 years ago. I think the layout was just ok IMO. The pool area though is really nice, so with kids, that is a nice plus.

Suburban is a much better course, but there is no pool.

Check out Metuchen Golf & Country Club. Much better course than Shack IMO. Plus they have a great pool area. Only downside is they did not have a true range.

JonDaMon8 · April 24, 2023

I was a Junior member at Shack for two years, and I echo what a lot of the comments mentioned above. I recently resigned due to another year of increased dues and a second baby on the way.

Overall my thoughts about Shack are positive, namely that the course the past two years has been in good condition, and Heritage has and continues to put work into it, including tee boxes, redoing almost all of the traps, and driving range (although for me they didn't open the grass range enough last year, the new mats were nice). The layout isn't my favorite but definitely is interesting and never got boring. They also redid the grill room last year (while I don't think it was that bad before, it's definitely nicer now). We weren't members of the pool, so can't comment there.

The downsides were that there were a TON of members, and as a Junior you couldn't get out before 10 on weekends. I never had trouble finding a tee time (I was pretty flexible) but for a country club I'd expect it to be a bit more open. Parts of the course do get a bit wet, especially after storms, but that never really bothered me much and given the topology I felt like they did a good job pumping the water from the low spots. After the one of the storms two years ago that washed away one of the bridges, the course became a bit harder to walk, but still a very manageable walk. I also looked at Watchung Valley, and actually preferred the layout there to Shack, but the $10k initiation vs the $1.5k at Shack (back in 2021) sealed the deal for Shack, plus I lived closer.

Feel free to message me if you have any specific questions.