Volunteers Will Have to Pay $350 to Attend 2025 Ryder Cup

Volunteers for the 2025 Ryder Cup will have to pay $350 to assist on site at the 2025 Ryder Cup, which is already being criticized for high ticket prices.

Oct 8, 2024; New York, New York, USA; The Ryder Cup sits on a table after a press conference at Times Center. Mandatory Credit: Lucas Boland-Imagn Images / Lucas Boland-Imagn Images

Last week, it was discovered that the FAQ section of the Ryder Cup website indicated that the price to attend the 2025 Ryder Cup at Bethpage Black would be a whopping $750 per ticket.

The ticket prices are about three times the cost of the tickets from the 2023 Ryder Cup at Marco Simone. As the news circulated, the Ryder Cup faced plenty of backlash on social media, including from PGA Tour fan favorite, Joel Dahmen.

Have you seen the insane ticket prices to next year's Ryder Cup?! Lemme see if I can pull some strings here...

H/T: @GolfDigest @KVanValkenburg @barstoolsports

— Joel Dahmen (@Joel_Dahmen) October 21, 2024

“We looked at pricing and we were able to tap into data from all these different venues,” tournament director Bryan Karns said in an interview with SiriusXM PGA Tour Radio. “And we were able to see what people pay, and that really drove this. In terms of our position in this landscape—where do we feel ourselves?

“There are people who have the Ryder Cup on their bucket list in the same way someone would have a Yankees opening game of the World Series on their bucket list. Ultimately that’s where we felt like we are. We’ve got a lot of people, the demand is at an all-time high for this event and so we wanted to make sure we priced it appropriately.”

However, that's not the end of the Ryder Cup spectator pricing controversy. On Monday, Golf.com reported that not only are the tickets expensive, but the volunteers will also have to pay $350 just to help out at the event. The report added that the $350 package is believed to be the heftiest price ever charged for a volunteer at any of golf’s major events, an increase of more than double the cost of the last PGA of America event held at Bethpage Black, the 2019 PGA Championship.

Volunteers will be charged in what is being dubbed as a “volunteer package” to assist the PGA of America. The package includes an event uniform, a drawstring bag, a Ryder Cup pin, food during the shift and a tournament credential.

As money continues to be one of the prevailing themes in professional golf, it's fair to wonder if these are reasonable prices to both attend and volunteer at the Ryder Cup.