2014 PGA Merchandise Show Preview
19 Jan 2014
by Pete Wlodkowski of AmateurGolf.com
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- photo courtesy PGA of America
It’s Sunday and I’m sitting on an airplane,
seated amongst the chief
executives of Callaway, TaylorMade, and
Lamkin.
Private jet you ask?
Not quite. These aren't the heads of Google
and Facebook flying their
individual jets to some resort for a Wall Street
Journal conference. It’s the
direct Alaska Airlines flight to Florida on the
Sunday before the PGA
Merchandise Show, the golf industry’s annual
global gathering in Orlando.
That's not to say that golf (and the equipment
industry) isn't important. After
all, it's the one sport that many corporate
CEOs, big athletes, and Hollywood
stars wind up taking up at some point. Golf
captures their imagination, and
attempting to master it keeps the competitive
juices flowing long after they
retire.
Golf is a huge business, if you count the
courses, resorts, professional tours
and of course the athletes, sponsorships, and
the associated TV revenues.
Heck, the Golf Channel is now a financial
juggernaut and Tiger Woods’ total
earnings have just surpassed $1 Billion. But
the total revenue of all the
equipment companies combined is well under
$10 Billion per year, less than
Google alone does in 3 months.
To us, the avid golfers of the world, golf
equipment companies matter. We
wear their brands on our hats and we’re not
even paid to do so. And we love
nothing better than putting a new $400 driver
in our hands, with the hope
that perhaps this could be the one we’ll hit
fearlessly into the 18th fairway
on our way to the club championship, or
qualifying for the US Amateur.
A PGA SHOW OVERVIEW
I’ve been coming to the show for 15 years and
at the beginning of that time
it was largely an indoor production, filled with
enormous booths from the
“majors” and small and mid sized booths from
component companies like
Lamkin and True Temper plus endless rows of
square displays from every
possible golf-related company, from golf
simulators, to golf university
programs, to tournament trophies and tee
gifts. If you can find it in a pro
shop or retail outlet, you can probably find it
here.
The show floor starts off with a truncated
indoor range on one side – you
can see about the first 100 yards of your ball's
flight – with the major
manufacturers on that side of the huge
convention center floor and the
smaller companies getting smaller as you
walk to the opposite side. It’s at
that point that you encounter countless
apparel companies (and where you
tend to find the best “after show hours”
cocktail gatherings).
This the PGA of America’s show, and like the
PGA Championship and all of
their “grow the game” initiatives they do an
awesome job with it. PGA
professionals can get educational credits
towards their Class A status by
attending the myriad of educational
workshops, and each year the show has
a panel of industry luminaries open the show
in a "state of the industry"
type of production. This year Donald Trump
and Annika Sorenstam (who
they are calling "The First Lady of Golf") will
be a big part of the show's
“grow the game” theme. Hopefully nobody’s
going to hear “you’re fired!”
WORLD’S BIGGEST DEMO DAY
What’s been added and turned up several
notches in the last 10 years is the
pre-show demo day at Orange County National
golf course, surely the
largest in the world. Held the Tuesday before
the show, the entire expanse
of OCN’s circular tee (with a massive 500 yard
diameter) is used. Celebrity
spokespeople, like the
Back9Netwo
rk’s Ahmad Rashad, will
be there with long drive champ Jamie
Sadlowski, and thousands of show
attendees looking to get a crack at hitting the
latest and greatest. Because,
after all, you can only pick up a club and look
at it for so long without
wondering about that magic which we surely
hope will help our members
but secretly hope will help us as well.
The demo day is a spectacle unlike any other
I’ve been to. And
miraculously, I’ve never heard about anyone
getting hurt or even hit by a
ball. There’s a nice short game area, too,
where I’m always looking for a
solution to the impending Jan 1, 2016
anchoring prohibition. (Hopefully it
will last no longer than alcohol prohibition!)
True Temper is kicking their presentation up a
notch by giving everyone a
chance to win a
Harley, with a drawing at 4:00 p.m. at
the demo day. It's a real
marketing coup for the leading shaft
manufacturer, and we'll provide a video
of the winner's reaction on Tuesday.
Throughout the week, the amateurgolf.com
team will write with some
product insight and people sightings. If there
is anything you us to be on the
lookout for, or if you’re going to be attending
and want to say hello, please
drop me a line by following the contact links
or using the comment box
below.