Photo: 2nd Mystery Box From FootJoy – More Clues To New Product Innovation

Written by: Tony Korologos | Friday, December 20th, 2013
Categories: Golf Apparel • Golf Gear
Tags: FootJoy

Clue #2 with regards the “new FootJoy innovation” arrived at my door this morning. This is box number two of five. Inside was an interesting object, made from a couple of different materials.

FootJoy Mystery Box #2

See this post for clue #1.

Book Review – Green Glory: A Visual Tribute to the Courses of the Majors

Written by: Tony Korologos | Thursday, December 19th, 2013
Categories: Golf Books • Reviews
Tags: Golf Book

I love picture books. They’re perfect books for my reading level…

I’ve been enjoying a great book called “Green Glory: A Visual Tribute to the Courses of the Majors – Golf’s Renowned Venues.” This book shows vibrant and panoramic photos of golf’s major venues since 1950, along with paintings of them as well. Of course the major tournaments are the Masters Tournament, U.S. Open, Open Championship (British Open), and the PGA Championship.

The photographer for the book was Patrick Drickey, a world renowned photog licensed by the PGA of America. How do I get that gig?

The artist is Linda Hartough, from Harbor Town, SC.

Naturally the first page out of the 250 I opened to was the Old Course at St. Andrews. What are the odds. No really. What are the odds? One in 250 and I turn to THE Old Course.

Green Glory – click to zoom

The 2nd page I managed to randomly find was the photo below of the 13th hole at Carnoustie, a beautiful par-3. See the image below. What a great thought, knowing I’d played both of those courses about five months ago. Seems like years. I miss that place…

Carnoustie hole #13 – click to zoom

Green Glory is full of some great imagery, and a little bit of useful information regarding each venue. This is a great coffee table book for days like today (12/19/13), where it has been snowing for 10 hours. I can thumb through it and reminisce about the rounds I’ve played on some of the courses within. I can dream of playing rest.

To pick up a copy of “Green Glory: A Visual Tribute to the Courses of the Majors – Golf’s Renowned Venues,” visit www.stonehousegolf.com. Retail is $75 for an autographed first edition and $55 for the book unsigned.

Addendum

This is crazy. I just opened the book again, to look for Chambers Bay. Chambers Bay is the host of the 2015 U.S. Open, the first venue in the northwest to host a major. I turned to the Carnoustie page again! What are the odds?

Golf Inventors – Reinventing the Square Wheel for the Millionth Time

Written by: Tony Korologos | Wednesday, December 18th, 2013
Categories: Boneheads • Golf Accessories • Golf Gear • Miscellaneous
Tags: Golf Accessories

I receive hundreds of products per year and I do my best to review the ones I feel are worthy of some airtime. Rather than posting negative reviews of the not-so good products, I choose radio silence. I received such a product last week.

A few days after I received the product I got an email from the inventor, excitedly asking me if I received it yet. At that point I did something I’ve never done before. I sent a come-to-Jesus-moment letter to the inventor. I held no punches and gave my honest and critical opinion of the product (which I will not name) in the hopes that I might keep someone I’ve never met from blowing his life savings on patent attorneys and making 50,000 units in China, only to end up years later bankrupt with 49,995 units in his garage.

What’s this product? It is one of which I’ve seen countless versions. I’ve got around eight of them. Make it nine now. This invention is a “club stand.” It is made typically from one piece of metal, bent so that a club can lean against it. See the photos.

My only use for something like this is to give it to the wife and let her use it to hold up her tomato plants in the garden. No serious golfer will ever use this and I’d bet a round of golf and drinks at Pebble Beach that none of the big box golf chain stores like Dicks or Golf Galaxy would carry one.

Golf Entrepreneur 101

I hate to be such a party-pooper, but before you golf inventors invent the next club stand, a.k.a. piece of bent metal, look on ebay. There are dozens of them and they’re selling for as little as five bucks. If you want to compete with five dollar products on ebay, be my guest. I bet jabbing yourself in the eye with your invention would be more fun though.

The first thing you should do as a golf inventor or product entrepreneur is determine if there’s a demand for the product. And don’t ask your friends. They’ll all tell you how great it is, the same way they’ll say your ugly baby with the three eyes and warts is the most beautiful baby in the world.

Do real research. Do some blind product polling and testing. It will cost money. It will be worth it.

Then you should see if there are other products like it in the market. The golf market is flooded with bent pieces of metal which nobody will use for standing up clubs. Just look at the pictures I found of said bent pieces of metal after browsing the interwebs for about 10 minutes.

Why?

Why am I being so harsh right now? I personally know golf entrepreneurs who have lost their entire life savings and even lost their families because they sank all their dough into their products. Some of these are actually very good and high quality products.

The golf industry is tough. Even the good inventions seldom break through to the big time. I have firsthand experience in trying to get the Dicks Sporting Goods of the world to carry a great golf product and it is quite difficult and discouraging.

Please golf entrepreneurs, before you spend years of your life developing your product, then dump thousands of dollars into patent research and prototyping, then blow money on crappy Chinese manufacturing, step back and look what you’re doing. I want to make sure you’ve done your homework and are sure this will succeed. Then you can send me one for review. If it is useful, I’ll write about it.

Until then, stick with the day job.

Local Utahn Tony Finau Gains Web.com Tour Exemption

Written by: Tony Korologos | Tuesday, December 17th, 2013
Categories: Pro Golf • Web.com Tour
Tags: The Big Break • Tony Finau

Tony Finau with Bud Cauley in the background – 2011 Web.com Utah Championship

The Web.com Tour Qualifying Tournament finished today. Six grueling rounds of high pressure golf at PGA West Stadium Course to see who gets their 2014 tour cards for the Web.com.

I’m happy to report that a local named Tony (not me unfortunately) finished T3 and has earned an exemption, good until the third reshuffle of the 2014 season, which occurs after 12th event. You may recognize Tony Finau from an appearance on Golf Channel’s Big Break Disney or a couple of Tour events.

This is a huge deal for him. It will be fun to see how Tony does. Looking forward to watching his (hopeful) progression onto the PGA Tour.

Historic Golf Discovery: Old Tom Morris’s First Golf Shop in St. Andrews

Written by: Tony Korologos | Tuesday, December 17th, 2013
Categories: Golf Courses • Miscellaneous
Tags: Old Tom Morris • St. Andrews

Tom Morris Golf Shop – St. Andrews

I love to keep close tabs on the “Auld Grey Toon” of St. Andrews. It is my home away from home, even though I’ve only been there twice…

Good friend and Old Course caddie John Boyne tipped me off about a very neat and historic golf discovery by Roger McStravick. Mr. McStravick has been researching in the University of St. Andrews for an upcoming book, “St. Andrews, In the Footsteps of Old Tom Morris.”

The discovery was found through the reading of manuscripts from the Golf Collection in the University of St. Andrews Special Collections Department. In statements written by Old Tom Morris was information pertaining to Tom’s building of his first golf shop next to the 18th green of the Old Course in 1878.

I hope to get in touch with Mr. McStravick and do a small interview about this discovery, and also pick his brain for other great information about Old Tom, the Old Course, and the Old Gray Town. Stay tuned.

For more information check out this article in Golf Business News.

Older posts

Newer posts

« Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 Next »