With the Albertsons Boise Open, Sanders has created a rare gem
Brandel Chamblee (left) of the Golf Channel and executive director Jeff Sanders entertain reporters and sponsors on Media Day for the Albertsons Boise Open (courtesy Jeff Sanders Entertainment)
BOISE — Jeff Sanders is not the mayor of this city of 235,000 in the Treasure Valley of southwestern Idaho, with a metropolitan area of nearly a half-million residents. Unofficial mayor? Perhaps.
At the least, Sanders is a cherished honorary Boisean for the work he has put in through the years as executive director of the city’s premier sporting event of the summer.
Boise State football is king of the fall, but the summer belongs to the Albertsons Boise Open, which will be staged for the 36th consecutive year from Aug. 14-17 at prestigious Hillcrest Country Club. It is the longest-running continuous tournament on the Korn Ferry Tour, a secondary circuit that produces most of the players on the PGA Tour.
But that’s not all. For all 36 years, the event has been staged at Hillcrest. For all 36 years, Sanders and his event management company, now called Jeff Sanders Entertainment, have put on the tournament. For all 36 years, Sanders has served as executive director.
“That is unheard of,” says Sanders, the former star golfer at Sunset High and the University of Oregon who played five years on the PGA Tour. “The same company, the same host venue, the same title sponsor for 36 years? It is unprecedented in professional golf.”
There is more. On Monday during a Media Day event at Hillcrest, Albertsons CEO Susan Morris announced a three-year commitment to extend its sponsorship of the event through 2028.
Susan Morris, the CEO of Albertsons, announced Monday that the company has extended its title sponsorship for the Boise Open through 2028 (courtesy Jeff Sanders Entertainment)
“And we hope to go well beyond that,” Morris told a group of more than 100 media and sponsors of the tournament.
Before the media availability, Morris told me this: “Jeff has been a really good partner. I don’t think we have ever had a complaint from anyone about the work that (Jeff Sanders Entertainment does). They put on a first-class event.”
The Albertsons Boise Open is unique on the Korn Ferry Tour for several reasons.
A decade ago, while promoting PGA Tour events in the California cities of Napa and La Quinta, Sanders decided to go with the concept of adding musical acts to the golf component. Somebody tagged it as “Golfchella” — a nod to Coachella, the annual music and arts festival in Indio, Calif. — and it has stuck.
After the golfers complete play on the course, acts such as Stevie Nicks, Jon Bon Jovi, Dave Matthews Band, Sheryl Crow, Sammy Hagar, John Legend, Luke Bryan, Blake Shelton and Keith Urban have performed for crowds gathered at the course. It is “Golf by day, music by night.”
Last year, on a stage set up just off the 18th fairway at Hillcrest, thousands of fans watched Jon Pardi and the Goo Goo Dolls perform when the golf was done. This year, the slate features concerts by Darius Rucker on Aug. 14, Lynyrd Skynyrd on Aug. 15 and Brothers Osborne on Aug. 16. All of the shows are sellouts.
“It’s the earliest we have ever sold out,” Sanders told the Media Day crowd.
Sanders estimates about 10,000 will see each of the shows. Parking availability and the minimal number of roads leading in and out of Hillcrest limit it to that.
“We could have sold 20,000 for Lynyrd Skynyrd, but we would have never had another concert here because nobody could have gotten out of here,” Sanders says.
He recalls the first concert he ran at PGA West in La Quinta in 2015, with Stevie Nicks and Luke Bryan as the featured acts.
“We sold as many tickets as we could,” Sanders says. “The next thing you know, there are 30,000 people there. You couldn’t believe the energy. It was so much fun. But there was one road in and one road out. I got barbecued with complaints for six months after.”
Sanders actually has four pillars for the customer’s pleasure: Golf, music, food and wine. It has been a winning formula in Boise, where spectators have been able to watch most of the current top players on today’s PGA Tour as they were still developing in the pro game.
There is another major component to the Albertsons Boise Open: Charity.
It is the only event in pro golf that gives 100 percent of its ticket sales to charity, and lets the buyer of the ticket select the charity. To say the formula has been successful is an understatement. This year’s event is expected to generate about $3.15 million for local charities, increasing its total to $40 million over the 36 years of its existence. For the last four years, the amount has surpassed $3 million.
The Albertsons Boise Open is ranked No. 1 by a large margin in total dollars given from a Korn Ferry Tour event. The average, Sanders says, is about $200,000 per year.
The company that sponsors the ticket support charity program is Mondelez International, one of the largest cookies/crackers/candy vendors in the world. Rick Swearingen is the customer vice president for Mondelez, which has sponsored the program “forever.”
“We are so proud to be involved in a big way,” says Swearingen, who has been with the company for 12 years and lives in Boise. “When you see the look on the faces of people who receive (the charitable contributions), it’s humbling. Fortunately, I have the honor to be part of it.”
Swearingen says he has appreciated working with Sanders.
“Jeff’s follow-up, his communication, his understanding of what’s important to the community … he runs a top-notch organization,” Swearingen says.
There is no music after Sunday’s final round, but there is a bonus that day, too: the St. Luke’s Health Plan Junior Day event in conjunction with “Family Day.” Youths get free admittance to the tournament and are treated to a lunch and lessons from the pros. Sanders sees it as a way to give back to the community as well as grow the sport of golf.
“The kids get to see the champion get crowned, and hopefully that motivates them to want to take up the game, or get more serious about it,” he says. “This year, we are going to have twice as many people here on Sunday as we have ever had.”
Sanders notes that all of these things couldn’t be pulled off without the help of hundreds of volunteers who help coordinate the events.
“If we had to pay them,” he says, “We simply wouldn’t have $3 million going to charity every year.”
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Joe Albertson opened his first grocery store in Boise in 1939. Eighty-seven years later, Albertsons Companies operate 2,200 stores in 34 states and the District of Columbia. But Albertsons remains very dedicated to its founding city. The corporate office is located in Boise. The Broncos play in Albertsons Stadium. The biggest pro golf tournament in the Northwest carries the Albertsons name, too. Has for a long time.
“Albertsons is the engine that drives this tournament and is the main reason why this tournament has generated so many dollars for charity,” Sanders says. “Albertsons’ commitment moving forward is what makes this tournament go. It is the key to the success of the event. Without Albertsons, it would not be possible to deliver a product at this level, with the entertainment value it has, with the charitable result it has. It is all tied together.
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“In my opinion, Albertsons is the very best title sponsor in golf. They bring so much to the table. Their culture of wanting to give back to Boise is unique. It is one of the largest charitable organizations, if not the largest, in the state.”
When Kroger’s attempt to acquire Albertsons was blocked by federal and state courts last year due to antitrust concerns, Sanders was relieved.
“Had Kroger bought Albertsons, who knows what its interest in (the Boise Open) would have been?” he says. “It may have been long for the road. We probably wouldn’t have been able to continue on with this tournament.”
Morris’ first job was in high school, as a clerk at an Albertsons in Denver. She has been with the company now for nearly 40 years. She has worked her way up the corporate ladder since then and, in May, was named as CEO.
“Susan is a proven successful grocer,” Sanders says. “She is going to run Albertsons the way Albertsons started back in the Joe Albertson/Bob Miller days. They are who she learned from.”
Morris hasn’t run Albertsons, but she has lived in Boise and has been part of corporate leadership since 2000.
“Ever since I moved here, (the Albertsons Boise Open) has been such an integral part of the community,” she says. “I realize the impact we can make with the tournament. Our vendor partners have been terrific, Hillcrest has been amazing and Jeff Sanders and his team are fantastic. The quality of event we are able to deliver for our vendors has been tremendous. That is the side benefit. The real kicker is, we are able to do so much for the community that serves us so well.”
A big part of that is charitable contributions. In 1990, when Sanders pitched the event to Albertsons executives Warren McCain, Gary Michael and John Carley, it was charity, not golf, that interested them most.
“The charity part, the amount we can give out, is huge,” Morris says. “And the community is terrific about supporting the stuff we have going on.”
Morris likes the event, too, for the communication it creates between Albertsons and its corporate partners.
“It is important for us to build strong partnerships,” she says. “What this tournament allows us to do is create an area where we can be more relaxed, spend time together and just get to know one another. What Jeff and his team do is make this really turnkey for our vendor partners. It is a smooth process. Everything is taken care of. They know they are going to have a great time.
“I am proud of our company for its continuous involvement (with the Albertsons Boise Open). We have a lot of blue sky ahead of us. I am excited for the future of the event.”
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Hillcrest Country Club was established in 1940 and now has 600 members. It is regarded as one of the best courses in the area, well-kept and scenic with the Boise foothills surrounding the area. The course will be set up at 6,800 yards for the Korn Ferry golfers next month.
“Hillcrest has been the perfect venue, especially in the last five or six years as we have implemented the ‘Golfchella’ approach,” Sanders says. “Hillcrest is a fun course. The greens can get firm and fast, the rough deep. It is the only club I am aware of in golf where there is room for 10,000 people on a Coachella-sized stage to host a concert on the property of the country club.
“That is very important to the model and the success of the tournament. The combination nowadays is the primary reason we are able to generate so much for charity every year. We have people coming to watch golf; we have people coming to watch the concert, and a lot of people coming for both. It is an even more perfect venue because of the concert potential.”
Mike Reardon is a board member at Hillcrest and chairman of the Albertsons Boise Open committee. He says the committee promised the club members it would have a vote on whether or not to host the tournament again this year. Seventy percent of the members voted, and 80 percent of those voted to keep it. Hillcrest, too, has committed to be the host site through 2028.
“To host a major event for 36 straight years is unheard of,” Sanders says. “Even if a tournament stays in one city, it normally doesn’t stay at the same golf club for long.”
“There will always be fatigue at any golf course that hosts a big tournament,” Reardon says. “People want to use their course, and it ties up your course for at least two weeks. But Albertsons and Jeff Sanders have been great partners with us, as well as the PGA Tour. Jeff does a great job of promoting Albertsons, Hillcrest and the community. We like watching great golfers play our course, and we’ve had some great music. We like what they do for charity. It is huge for the Treasure Valley.”
After eight years working as president of golf events for Lagardere Sports, with headquarters in Paris and New York City, Sanders resigned in 2021 to start Jeff Sanders Entertainment, which he calls a “small boutique golf/entertainment company.” With six full-time employees — including daughters Nicole Sanders and Erica Shannon — “it’s a family affair,” he says.
Sanders is 69 but looks a decade younger and acts like a kid in a candy store as he focuses primarily on the Albertsons Boise Open.
“My passion for this tournament is as high as it has ever been,” he says. “I love the results that the team is producing. Albertsons has been great to me and my family over the years. I love what the tournament means to the community. I love to see all the people out there enjoying themselves. My job as a promoter is to entertain people. Our team has done a wonderful job with that. The people of Boise have been great to deal with. We’re looking forward to at least three more years.
“I love putting on tournaments. I love putting on concerts. But the most gratifying thing is the amount of money we have delivered for charity.”
This year’s purse is $1.5 million, with $180,000 going to the champion.
“Our first year, the purse was $100,000, the winner getting $18,000,” he says. “We gave $25,000 to charity and everybody thought we knocked it out of the park.”
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As a sponsor for kerryeggers.com, Sanders invited me to attend Media Day, meet some of the corporate partners and participate in a scramble to get a first-hand look at the course.
Jeff, myself and Brandel Chamblee — the Golf Channel broadcaster and former PGA Tour pro brought in to be the main act for Media Day — left the hotel at 7:15 a.m. bound for Hillcrest. Jeff is one of those guys who beats the rooster up each morning. He is bouncy and cheerful. “I feel better than ever,” he says.
Among the first people we run into at Hillcrest are Jeff’s daughters, who greet him with a hug and a smile. They are helping set up for Media Day. Soon we are met by Ryan Fowler, JSE’s communications director, and David Babcock, the ABO’s tournament director.
“On Scheffler:
He is on his way to being one of the greatest players of all time. I would put Rory (McIlroy) and Phil (Mickelson) at between 15th and 20th right now. Scheffler could be one of the top 10 players ever.”
Chamblee, who turned 63 on Wednesday, is a delightful personality who seems genuinely interested in learning about his company asks as many questions as he answers. A first-team All-American during his college days at Texas, he played the PGA Tour for 18 years and for seven consecutive years was among the top 100 on the money list. Chamblee, who has flown in from his home in Scottsdale, Ariz., for the event, is most famous for his broadcasting work for the Golf Channel.
“Brandel is funny and knowledgeable,” says Sanders, who will lead a Q&A session with Chamblee for the media and sponsors in attendance. “They will love to hear his opinions on a lot of subjects.”
As we sit for a private breakfast before the media availability, I get a few minutes with Chamblee. He says ABC asked him to do some TV commentating while he was still on the PGA Tour in the late ‘90s. Beginning with his rookie year on tour in 1985, he had written a regular monthly column for Golf World Magazine, and he also wrote a piece for Sports Illustrated about life on the tour that was well-received. So the TV folks knew he could express himself well and had opinions.
“I still have people talk to me about those Golf World columns,” he says. “I wrote one about all the free stuff we got on the tour, and that resonated with readers. I had a garage full of shoes, but nobody wore 8 1/2 B. All of a sudden, I got a gazillion letters from people who said they wore 8 1/2 B. And I sent a lot of them a pair of free shoes.”
In 2003, his last year on the PGA Tour, ABC hired him as “hole announcer” for 15 tour events that year.
“I didn’t properly understand what that meant,” he says. “I thought I was going to be an analyst. What I found out was, you are basically just there to set the hole up, and that’s it. I later learned there is also some opportunity for analysis, but I was disenchanted with the whole thing. It wasn’t a good fit for me, and I wasn’t any good at it.”
In 2004, he started with the Golf Channel as lead analyst for live golf, also doing pre- and post-event shows.
“I have been with them ever since,” says Chamblee, who will do 22 to 25 events in 2025. “I was quite busy in 2004, and I have essentially had the same role for the same tournaments for the last 22 years.”
Chamblee is always willing to offer an opinion, but it is an informed one.
“I wake up, open my computer and start digging for information,” he says. “I try to find things that are interesting.”
During a tournament, he also hits the driving range to talk to players and caddies about what is going on.
“There is the dig-it-out-of-the-dirt side that is compelling to me,” he says. “And then the competitive side of it. I enjoy trying to find the secrets to golf.
“When I come on the air, everything that can possibly be said about a golf tournament has been said. It’s my job to find something the audience might find interesting. I am such a golf nut, I am looking for things that would interest me, too. The challenge is to say it in a different way every day. A further challenge is to say it in an entertaining way. A further challenge is to say it in a memorable way. That’s the job. It’s fun, and every day is different.”
Chamblee says he has had no coaching from network officials.
“They sit you in a chair and expect you to talk,” he says. “I wouldn’t say I was very good at it the first year I did it. It took awhile to get comfortable in that role. You have to work very hard to have something to say. You shouldn’t just be talking because you have to say something. You should be talking because you have something to say. That is hard to do.”
I ask about the state of pro golf today, with the PGA Tour and LIV on tenuous terms after two years of negotiations for a merger.
“Golf in general is booming,” he says, “but the pro golf industry has been very disrupted with the advent of LIV and the enormous amount of money that is likely not sustainable in the current model. It has had the effect of making the pro game very greedy, and a handful of tour pros have not done the professional game any favors because they sound very entitled.”
He says he is not blaming LIV, or even those who have benefitted from their enormous payouts.
“I understand why some of them have done it, but I don’t think we should laud it,” Chamblee says. “I am really talking about (pro) golfers in general who sound entitled with their flippant comments about not owing the media anything, about, ‘I have earned the rights to do everything I want.’ ”
He mentions the recent incident at the U.S. Senior Open, with Padraig Harrington criticizing NBC’s Roger Maltbie for not helping him look for a lost ball while Maltbie was working for the network.
“It’s not Roger’s job to help him find a golf ball,” Chamblee says. “How could Padraig be that unaware, that far removed from reality? It is a consequence of the enormous money that has come to the game of golf.”
Chamblee tells me the No. 1 priority for the PGA Tour should be “about merit and philanthropy.”
“It is less about merit than it used to be, and it seems like it is headed towards a place where it will be less about philanthropy,” he says. “That would be a bad day for professional golf. It needs to protect both aspects of that. The meritocratic aspect of the game appeals to many people, and the philanthropic aspect of the game appeals to everybody. That is important. Other sports don’t do that.
“The bottom line of golf is still about philanthropy. If that goes by the wayside, then the game would be damaged in a way I’m not sure it could recover from.”
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Through Albertsons Boise Open tournaments over 36 years, Jeff Sanders has raised more than $40 million for local charities (courtesy Jeff Sanders Entertainment)
Sanders addresses the media/sponsors group and mentions some of the players who have played the Albertsons Boise Open in the past: Current U.S. Open champion J.J. Spahn, Scottie Scheffler, Justin Thomas, Bryson DeChambeau, Viktor Hovland. Last year’s ABO champion, southpaw Matt McCarty, has already won on the PGA Tour.
“Twenty of this year’s 29 Fed-Ex Cup champions have played here,” Sanders says. “We have such a great product. It keeps getting better. The guys who played here on their way to the tour continue to have success. These guys aren’t just playing; they’re winning, which shows how good they are.”
Sanders then introduces Chamblee, who is clearly revered by this golf-centric group. He reminisces about playing in the first Albertsons Boise Open in 1990, finishing 15th and winning $1,300. In those days, the secondary circuit was called the Ben Hogan Tour.
“We were a fledgling fraternity of golfers trying to scratch out a living,” he says. “It was a driving tour. We started out in Bakersfield. We drove from tournament to tournament. By the time we got here was toward the end of the year, and I was fourth or fifth on the money list. Only five players graduated to the PGA Tour. It was a stressful time of the year.”
Chamblee wound up finishing seventh on the money list with $73,251 in earnings. It would take him five years to finally get his PGA card. But he has fond memories of Boise.
“I enjoyed being here,” he says. “We played the previous week in Provo. Drove up, and we did a white water rafting through Snake River. I couldn’t believe how beautiful it was here. To think it’s 36 years … wow. What a great commitment from everyone in your community. Not just the spectators, but the volunteers, and put all that together with the charity. It would probably take 20 other Korn Ferry events combined to equal the number you are giving. It is an amazing success story, something even the PGA Tour could learn from.”
In a half-hour question-and-answer session, Chamblee addresses many topics, taking questions from Sanders and from the audience. One is on the LIV Tour’s impact. In June 2023 came the announcement that the PGA Tour and LIV were going to come together, a potential $1.5 billion investment deal. It still hasn’t come to fruition. Chamblee believes it never will.
“At the beginning of last year, I ran into somebody who was in the room when they made the decision (to merge),” Chamblee told the audience. “I asked if it was going to happen. He said, ‘No. It is never going to happen.’ He said the discovery process (in negotiations and litigation) was going to reveal some things that could have been criminal.”
At one point, President Trump met with Yasir Al-Rumayyan, governor of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund, in the West Wing of the White House.
“And Yasir walked out of the room because he was insistent upon the team aspect of LIV being a part of the PGA Tour,” Chamblee says. “There is no evidence that the world of golf is hungry for the team aspect. People love the Ryder Cup, but it took 70 years for it to get the interest it has now. The President’s Cup is not popular, and nobody watches the Solheim Cup. The only team competition anybody pays attention to is the Ryder Cup.”
Chamblee believes Scottie Scheffler — who played in the 2019 Albertsons Boise Open — is on his way to becoming one of the best golfers in history (courtesy Jeff Sanders Entertainment)
On Scheffler:
“He is on his way to being one of the greatest players of all time. I would put Rory (McIlroy) and Phil (Mickelson) at between 15th and 20th right now. Scheffler could be one of the top 10 players ever.
The hurdles are from a physical or a complacency or a distraction standpoint, or from a technical and golf swing standpoint. There is so much information out there it’s easy to change a golf swing. So many good players have changed their swing and are struggling because of that, they changed their body or they got injured.
“When I think about all the things that could beset tour players, I look at Scottie. I know for sure he’s not going to change his swing. He is not going to change his teacher. He is in a great place physically. He is married to his high school sweetheart. He is not going to be drunkenly falling out of bars somewhere. He is just not susceptible to all of that. He is so much better than every single other player. So much better than Rory, than Collin Morikawa, than Justin Thomas or Jon Rahm. It is like Secretariat going against Sham at Belmont in 1973. That’s how much better he is. They can’t compete with him, and he is only 28.”
On the talent level of the Korn Ferry Tour compared to the PGA TOUR:
“Look up the difference between the best and the average and the worst in football, basketball, baseball and hockey. With the leading quarterback or pitcher or hitter or scorer, it’s a 20 to 30 percent difference between the very best and the average, and oftentimes 40 percent between the best and very worst. On the PGA Tour, the difference between the best and worst is seven percent. It is such a fine line in golf, and the Korn Ferry is very close. What the Korn Ferry does is allows players to mature and get used to travel and develop. It is the rarest of athlete who comes out and doesn’t need an apprenticeship. Tiger didn’t need it. Rory didn’t need it. Phil didn’t need it. But those are the exceptions. Most of the time players come out with a modicum of ability and they need the experience. Golf is not like other sports. It is getting younger, it is becoming more about power, but it is still the players from 28 to 32 who do the best, not typically the 22-year-old. That’s where the Korn Ferry Tour comes in.”
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Finally it is on to golf and the scramble, played in 100-degree heat. We have only three in our group — me, Mike Cullum and Shawn Egland. The numbers disadvantage doesn’t work in our favor. Egland booms a number of drives, but Cullum struggles and my feeble game helps only on a number of chips and putts.
There are two big moments, though. Egland drains an amazing 84-foot birdie putt on No. 15 over undulating terrain that is a see-it-to-believe-it accomplishment. On the par-3 17th, I hit a six-hybrid right at the hole. It hits the pin but bounces off and 20 feet by. We all miss the putt and settle for a par.
The day ends with Sanders caddying for me. That’s right — the honorary mayor of Boise hauls my suitcase bag out to the front steps of the club, where friend Bob Edwards is picking me up for a quick dinner prior to my flight home. When we leave, I offer Sanders a $5 tip. He just laughs.
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