1972 and 1973 The first Sunbeam Electric Scottish Open was part of the
1972 European Tour and was held at Downfield Golf Club in
Dundee.
Neil Coles beat
Brian Huggett at the second hole of a sudden-death playoff, holing a 12-foot putt. Total prize money was £10,000 with a first prize of £2,000. Sunbeam Electric had sponsored the
Sunbeam Electric Tournament in 1971. In
1973 the event was played on the
Old Course at St Andrews.
Graham Marsh won by 6 strokes from
Peter Oosterhuis. Total prize money was increased to £15,000 with a first prize of £2,500. Both 1972 and 1973 tournaments were broadcast extensively on
ITV.
1986 revival The event returned to the European Tour calendar in
1986 when, under a new sponsorship deal with
Bell's, the
Glasgow Open, which had been held at Haggs Castle Golf Club from 1983 to 1985, was rebranded as the Scottish Open. After remaining at Haggs Castle for the first year, the tournament moved to
Gleneagles in 1987 and was played the week before the
Open Championship. 1987 also saw the BBC broadcast live coverage of the event, and continued to do so until 1993. It remained at Gleneagles until Bell's withdrew their sponsorship in
1994 following the switch of TV coverage from BBC to SKY that year. In
1995 and
1996 it was held, without a sponsor, at
Carnoustie. The 1986 event had prize money of £130,000 with a first prize of £21,660. This rose to £200,000 with a first prize of £33,330 for the 1987 event at Gleneagles. This had risen to £600,000 and a first prize of £100,000 for the 1992 tournament. Despite the loss of Bell's sponsorship the prize money increased to £650,000 in 1995 but, with the event losing money, this was reduced to £480,000 in 1996.
Loch Lomond From
1997 the Scottish Open's pre-Open place on the European Tour schedule was taken by the Loch Lomond World Invitational, which had been first held at
Loch Lomond Golf Club in September 1996. The top-60 in the World Rankings were invited but few non-Europeans entered. The event was broadcast by the BBC. From 1997 to
2000 the Loch Lomond event was played the week before the Open Championship. These events did not use the Scottish Open name, the rights to which were owned by
ISM. From
2001, it was decided that the Loch Lomond event would be known as the Scottish Open and all prior editions, including the September 1996 event, would be granted Scottish Open status. This resulted in the anomaly of there being two "Scottish Opens" in 1996. The September 1996 event had a first prize of £125,000, rising to £133,330 in 1997 and £183,330 by 2000. The 2001 Scottish Open was run without a main sponsor but from 2002 it was known as the Barclays Scottish Open, and was played at Loch Lomond until 2010. Some concern was expressed that its parkland course, very different from the
links courses on which the Open Championship is played, put European Tour players at a disadvantage compared to their leading rivals from the
PGA Tour, who traditionally spent a week practising for the Open on links courses in Ireland.
Links courses In 2011 it was held at Castle Stuart Golf Links, near
Inverness, due to the financial difficulties being suffered by Loch Lomond. Play was reduced to 54 holes (three rounds) in the tournament due to heavy rain, which caused flooding and landslides.
Aberdeen Asset Management took over sponsorship in 2012, but the event remained at Castle Stuart in 2012 and 2013 before moving to
Royal Aberdeen Golf Club in 2014. It was played at Gullane Golf Club in 2015 and at Castle Stuart Golf Links in 2016. In 2016, the attendance figures at Castle Stuart were disappointing, with a reduction of more than 20,000 to 41,809 over the four tournament days. In 2017 it was held in Ayrshire, for the first time in its current guise, at Dundonald Links, and was played at Gullane again in 2018. Since 2019 the event has been held at the
Renaissance Club and is scheduled to remain there until 2026. ==Disability event==