Bringing an old favorite back up to ‘par’

Rich Palzewic

Staff

June 16, 2025

OSHKOSH – After successfully running Glow in the Park Indoor Mini Golf & Pinball Arcade for the past three years, Josh Holz said he and his wife, Rachel, recently took over the old Settlers Mill Golf and Games space in Oshkosh.

Now known as Oshkosh Mills Adventure Golf (3025 S. Washburn St.), the couple said in early 2025, they were approached and asked if they were interested in leasing the space for two years.

“Obviously, we said ‘yes,’ and Oshkosh Mills Adventure Golf was born,” Holz said. “Over the span of two months working 12-16-hour days fixing, updating and remodeling the property, we are proud to present a reimagined outdoor course rich with rustic charm, flowing water features and a nod to the area’s mill-town history.”

Holz said there is an interesting story of how Oshkosh Mills came to be.

“Some of it was pure fate,” he said. “Every year, we have a local high school business class come in (to Glow in the Park), and I talk for about an hour. After speaking with them and giving them a tour, I let them play. Near the end of the tour, I heard the phone ring, and the caller left a message. Normally, I wouldn’t listen to messages right then and there, but something told me I should.”

Holz said the caller was a representative from the management company that owned the former Settlers Mill space.

“I felt it was important to return his call ASAP – I didn’t want that opportunity to pass me by,” he said.

Holz said Woodman’s Food Market had bought The Shops at Oshkosh – the outlet mall on the south side of the city – and two parcels in front of the property last fall.

“The management company reached out and said, ‘Hey, we’re not doing anything with this for a little bit. Do you want to lease it? Otherwise, it’s just going to sit there,’” he said. “The end goal for us has always been to get into outdoor courses, so now we have two seasons we get to operate with the indoor and outdoor courses.”

Once they agreed to take over the former Settlers Mill – which dates back more than three decades – Holz said that’s when the real work began.

“We’ve currently put in close to $60,000 in renovations to bring it back up to par,” he said. “I would have given the course a rating of six or seven before renovations, but I think we brought it up to about a nine. I’m not sure it will ever get up to a 10 because that would just cost way too much money. The clubhouse had a 1980s-looking arcade probably from the original time it opened, and every wall had a mismatched color.”

Holz said they completely remodeled the interior.

“The bathrooms are all new, and there is new flooring and paint,” he said.

The work, Holz said, didn’t stop there.

“Regarding the course, the whole icon of the old course was the water mill,” he said. “I’ve talked to many people who said it has not worked in like seven to nine years. It was all messed up, so that took a lot of time and money, but that was one of the things on my list we had to do. Now it’s working the way it’s supposed to be working.”

Holz said lights and speakers were also added.

“Luckily, the greens were redone three to five years ago, so for the most part, those were okay – minus a few patches here and there,” he said. “We’re still working on it, but we have to balance two seasons now.”

Holz said he and Rachel are just going to play it by ear for now and see where the two-year lease takes them.

“Hopefully, we’ll be able to get a longer lease,” he said. “From my understanding, that’s the plan. It’s a great family business that’s been around for a long time. It’s a very big property, so my hope is they don’t need that acre (for other development).”

Holz said Oshkosh Mills has been fully open since June 12.

“We are open seven days per week, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.,” he said. “When we did a small marketing campaign before we opened, people let us know they wanted us to stay open later into the evening – it’s a good hangout spot.”

Though Glow in the Park utilizes a tee time procedure, Holz said Oshkosh Mills is not currently utilizing the same system.

“Our capacity is a lot higher at Oshkosh Mills,” he said. “We’re not doing a tee time, but the longest wait time has been about 15 minutes. I’m still spacing groups out, and we put a smaller arcade in there, too. If there is a group of four that comes in, they pay for golf and get a token to play a game on the house in the arcade. That helps pass the time.”

Humble beginnings

To better explain how both businesses came about, Holz said you have to go back quite a few years.

Though he was born in the Northeast Wisconsin area, he said he moved away when he was seven years old.

Holz said that eventually factored into him and Rachel moving to Oshkosh.

“Rachel and I were living in Georgia, had full-time careers, a beautiful house, etc.,” he said. “I had the same career for about 10 years, and three years into that, I was playing mini-golf somewhere, and that gave me the idea to start a portable mini-golf business where I’d travel to community events, birthday parties, etc.”

Holz said because he still had a full-time job at the time, efficiency was an issue.

“Years later, when I met Rachel, I said, ‘Hey, I want to try this again,’” he said. “It was really successful, and that was supposed to be a stepping stone to try and start a ‘real’ business someday.”

A year into that venture, Holz said he grew impatient.

“I’m very impatient,” he laughed. “I knew what I wanted to do, so that’s when we looked at moving back to Oshkosh. There’s not a whole lot to do in the winter.”

From there, Holz said the Glow in the Park idea was born.

Glow in the Park

Holz said he used his experiences of playing “lots of mini-golf” in the renovation of Oshkosh Mills and before that, the design of Glow in the Park (300 S. Koeller St.).

“Because I’ve played a lot of mini-golf, I know what people like and dislike,” he said.

One of those dislikes, he said, is waiting in line for groups in front of you.

“You come in and pay your money to play, but when you turn the corner, there are 15 groups in front of you – that’s a miserable experience,” he said. “We offer tee times every five minutes. It doesn’t always work because you can’t control human nature – some groups play fast, while others play slower.”

Holz said they do what they can to keep the pace of play manageable and have fine-tuned operations over the last three years.

“(Having minimal wait times) is important to us, so we choose to lose two tee times every hour where we don’t send groups out,” he said. “We’re willing to lose money every hour by not having two tee times. We want to make sure the customer has a good experience.”

Additionally, Holz said upon entering Glow in the Park, you won’t see the whole indoor mini-golf course all at once.

“Instead of seeing everything at once, you go through five different rooms,” he said. “At most indoor places, you see what’s coming next – there’s no surprise. At Glow in the Park, there are three or four holes in each room, so it’s always a surprise when you enter another room.”

Holz said each room also has its own theme.

“Each room has floor-to-ceiling murals and black light paint,” he said. “The mini-golf part (of the business) has become wildly popular and successful.”

To give customers more, Holz said he eventually put a pinball machine and a “tiny, itty bitty” claw machine in the lobby.

“I noticed people started liking to play pinball, so from that one machine, as of today, we have grown to 24,” he said. “There is a really big community of pinball in the area. What’s great here is that we get to turn regular people who haven’t played pinball in 30 years, or little kids who have never even played pinball, into fanatics.”

Lastly, Holz said he has music playing while mini-golfers make their way through the course.

“Music, to me, makes things better,” he said. “In my opinion, when you go somewhere with no music, it’s too quiet and awkward. Music brings together the atmosphere here. Maybe it’s not everybody’s forte, but while you’re here, that’s our vibe.”

 For more information on both businesses, find them on Facebook or visit their respective websites.