Taylormade CEO Fuming! - Wants New Rules For Hackers

[GolfSpy_X]

 

TaylorMade-Adidas Golf president and chief executive officer Mark King is fed up, frustrated and fuming about golf's lack of growth. He's lobbying for a new set of rules to make the game easier for beginners and recreational players, like using 15-inch cups and letting them toss their golf balls out of bunkers.

 

King's ideas may be a bit exaggerated, but he's dead serious about creating a new way to play.

 

"We are not getting new people to come into the game. If we're going to change their behavior, it's going to have to feel like it's completely radical," said King, during an interview at the PGA Merchandise Show. "Even when we do attract new golfers, they leave within a year. Do you know why? It's not because it takes too much time. It's not because it's too expensive. It's because it's no fun. It's really hard.

 

 

 

 

READ FULL ARTICLE: http://www.golfweek.com/news/2011/jan/28/frustrated-taylormade-chief-lobbies-new-rules/

[skihippy]

I think that he is going in the right direction with this, but don't most recreational golfers do this any way. I have played with many different golfers from a scratch golfer to a 25 handicap. And they all change the rules a little. Like playing leaf ball during the late fall and if the sand is way too hard do to rain than we don't play out of the bunkers. I am just saying most of the rules that the PGA has can not really apply to recreational golfers because we don't get the opportunity to play the same courses that they do..

[GolfSpy_X]

Here are some of the Facebook comments on this issue:

[GolfSpy_X]

I don't know the exact numbers but I bet if you go back to pre-Tiger days and compare them to now you will not see that much difference. This is not about rules or the game getting harder. We simply saw a huge rise in new golfers taking up the game because of the Tiger-Effect and many of those golfers have left or are leaving the game.

 

His allure has simply worn off to the majority of the population.

[Moecat]

Over the weekend I heard on the local radio 2 guys talk about the same issue, but with probably different ulterior motives than Mr. Hotshot CEO.

 

WWW.flogton.com

[Dave]

All that man cares about is his companys bottom line, and even then probably only because his multi-million dollar bonus is related to it.

[Matt Saternus]

While there's no question that his comments are driven by his desire for more $$$, I don't think that he's entirely wrong. He is wrong about cost not being a deterrent, I have a number of friends who don't play or don't play much because golf is damned expensive. That said, I do have other friends who don't play because the game has a steep learning curve and they don't have much desire to embarrass themselves. While I'm not opposed to the idea of a set of "novice/beginner/hacker rules," I do wonder whether they would help much. Consider that nothing is stopping anyone from playing by whatever rules they want right now. I could take a friend out to the course and tell them, "Just pick up after 10 shots, throw it out of bunkers, etc" but, whether I made these rules or the USGA did, would anyone want to play by them?

[Jondagcl]

I've seen this topic get pretty heated on a few message boards. You have ultra conservative guys and ultra recreational guys going at it and it gets ugly. I'm sort of in the middle - most people play by a set of local rules anyway. I don't know about a 15 inch cup though.

[Matt Saternus]

The 15 inch cup seems impractical. Are you going to have two cups on every green? What is one cup is in the line of the other?

 

I read a suggestion somewhere that they build more executive and par 3 courses, which I think is a fine idea, though perhaps there are enough already, I don't know. Whether there are enough or not, I think those types of establishments should be better publicized as avenues to get into the game. You can play there without all the pressure, you don't need a full bag of equipment, and it might get some people hooked on the game.

[Springbok]

Remember the days when they played the game using feather golf balls, and hickory clubs. Come on! Was that easy? Why not change the rules of baseball and football at the same time. JMHO.

[TheHacker]

IMHO people are not so into golf because the learning curve is just so steep. I have a few colleagues who are just picking up the game, but it will be months before they are ready to bring their game from the lesson tee to a real golf course.

 

Compare that to soccer, basketball, tennis, just about anybody can dive right into it and have some fun.

I think the keys to getting people play golf for the long term are getting them good at it, and injury avoidance. And with proper techniques, one would be less likely to get injured.

 

For this to happen, we need more affordable golf instructions. Starting out golf is not cheap, and I think if the major golf brands want to insure long term growth of the market, they should sponsor golf lessons. This would ultimately help grow the game, and sustain interest for the long term. Golf teachers would also need not worry so much about paying the bills, just concentrate on providing good instructions.

[txgolfjunkie]

The PGA doesn't have their superstar right now, just a bunch of Chris Boshs...no Lebrons. Tell Taylor Made to find a guy who can become a media favorite and run with it.

 

Also, we are becoming a more cost conscious population after the recent economic downturn. How about they lower the price on golf clubs? Shock the world and offer a $100 driver for 80% of the golf population that can't break 90. Offer a $200 set of irons. Enough with this investment we have to make in order to have a little fun. Granted green fees are a little outrageous (the city-owned courses here in Texas are making a killing with their cheaper prices) but offer the golfer a cheaper way to enjoy the game.

[gunmetal]

Maybe just start with axing some horrendous rules like having to play it as it lies from someone else's divot.

[Xamilo]

Also, we are becoming a more cost conscious population after the recent economic downturn. How about they lower the price on golf clubs? Shock the world and offer a $100 driver for 80% of the golf population that can't break 90. Offer a $200 set of irons. Enough with this investment we have to make in order to have a little fun.

 

Agreed, but people NEED to buy expensive stuff to feel good about their game. For example, Wilson/Staff irons. The "7" series (Ci7, Di7) used to sell for just $300 new, and even though they were extremely high performance irons, they just didn't have the "Taylormade" or "Callaway" sticker in front. People just discharged them because "there surely is a reason why they are so cheap and surely that's a bad thing, but the $1000 Callaway FT-i irons surely offer me a better game or they wouldn't be priced that high". W/S irons now are priced near the $600 line, and surprisingly, they are selling more right now than they did before.

 

Its definitely not the case in the U.S., but in some other countries, most of latin america for example, playing golf is a symbol of status and wealth, just as driving a Jaguar or high-end Mercedes can be. Those people NEED to keep the prices high enough to keep the game exclusive, since they don't want to share the time with "other kind of people". I know it sounds stupid but its so true! I know people who are paying two mortgages and sold their car, but keep buying the newest most expensive driver every 6 months when Taylormade releases it...

[Justin66]

Agreed, but people NEED to buy expensive stuff to feel good about their game. For example, Wilson/Staff irons. The "7" series (Ci7, Di7) used to sell for just $300 new, and even though they were extremely high performance irons, they just didn't have the "Taylormade" or "Callaway" sticker in front. People just discharged them because "there surely is a reason why they are so cheap and surely that's a bad thing, but the $1000 Callaway FT-i irons surely offer me a better game or they wouldn't be priced that high". W/S irons now are priced near the $600 line, and surprisingly, they are selling more right now than they did before.

 

Its definitely not the case in the U.S., but in some other countries, most of latin america for example, playing golf is a symbol of status and wealth, just as driving a Jaguar or high-end Mercedes can be. Those people NEED to keep the prices high enough to keep the game exclusive, since they don't want to share the time with "other kind of people". I know it sounds stupid but its so true! I know people who are paying two mortgages and sold their car, but keep buying the newest most expensive driver every 6 months when Taylormade releases it...

 

 

And that is why it's so sad, because it's so true.

 

I have friends that don't want to take up the game because of the supposed high investment costs and/or the learning curve... but come on! If EVERYONE, from the Callaway's to the Acer's lowered prices, the perception would NOT be so bad (still waiting to see if Mr. George Fellows follows through with making the game more affordable). Not only that, there'd be money left in the coffer for lessons! How does the game of golf really lose? I mean, other than the CEO's making a little less money, everyone else (courses, PGA teachers, etc.) would make more. It seems like golf's infrastructure would be made stronger overall by this.

 

This is why I game the clubs I game. I'm not a bad golfer (not great either, but above average), yet I don't spend two months worth of wages whenever some company rolls out their "new and shiny". Not only does this leave me with more money for greens fees, I can provide for my family guilt-free (could you imagine? "Yeah, the power got shut off, but I just got that SWEET forged iron set that looks and plays the same as last year's set") and without any hassle from the wife.

 

The PERCEPTION is what I would want to change. Go ahead and play whatever you like (except counterfeits), but gaming a full set of "big boys" means absolutely nothing. People want to grow the game? Get that ridiculous notion out of people's heads. Hard to do when it's shoved down everyone's throat, but it can be done.

[Dave]

Justin,

 

Your not the only one with a cheap bag, I'm play off low single figures and except for wedges and the odd putter, I've never bought a brand new club. I just wait 6 months for something if I really want it, until it's half the price. I don't care about the odd scratch, they're golf clubs, they'll look like that eventually anyway.

[brandern]

Well good custom fitted equipments do help one to play golf better... so by buying golf equipments at a low discounted price from an outlet might not really bring the best result in one's golf. :)

 

Anyway, not fully enforcing the rules of golf during a recreational play is fine by me (since most of my mates use non-conforming clubs and they don't seem to have much difference from the conforming ones (we are just amateurs)) but changing the cup to a bigger size, and throw the ball out of bunker? that's stretching a little too far that's not golf...Why not change the name of the game and call it floff or sloff and place it in a recreational park! come one, golf is about the challenge... It won't be fun if there is no challenge in a game isn't it?

[KINGRAT]

All that man cares about is his companys bottom line, and even then probably only because his multi-million dollar bonus is related to it.

There is another game PUTT PUTT!!!

he's all about volumn in sales.

Get involved wih kids , that,s the future.

The baby boomers are going into the retirement.

He's more into Sailing and Selling

Wake up the ecomony has been down.Golf is not free!

[Justin66]

Justin,

 

Your not the only one with a cheap bag, I'm play off low single figures and except for wedges and the odd putter, I've never bought a brand new club. I just wait 6 months for something if I really want it, until it's half the price. I don't care about the odd scratch, they're golf clubs, they'll look like that eventually anyway.

 

 

+1!

[BIG STU]

Well heres my 2 cents worth : I have been around this game all my life and it has changed. My dad was a pro at a small public 9 hole course for years. The course was a great beginners course and also had a short 9 hole par 3course. I watched people take up and play the game for years. Some stayed there for their entire golfing life some improved and moved on to more challenging courses. I think part of the problem is that a lot of those smaller tracks have closed up and these newer courses are too hard and frustrating for the beginning and "average Joe weekend golfer". I can remember when we sold Ram Fastback clubs cheap. I can remember those sets were Driver and 3 and 5 wood with 3 5 7 9 PW and you had a choice of 3 different putters and a bag. My dad being the good guy he was would throw in a dozen "lake balls" on the deal. If I remember right the whole deal was around $65 or $70.He sold a ton of those sets. He did not make but maybe $10 or so on the deal but he said he would make it up on rounds being played and loyal customers he as right. Today it is a different type of customer. Pepole see all the hype and have to have the top line stuff. I used to try to sell trade ins cheap to people that were interested in the game but they wanted he newest and "longest" hitting stuff. I also for the life of me cannot understand people I see and hear people trying to play these hard courses from the back tees all the time i am talking about people that cant break 100 on a 6000 yd course playing a72 7400 yd course from the tips. I hear them in the restuarants all the time"you know that (insert name of course) really broke my balls today but I shot 125 from the tips but Joe won he shot 119. How in the heck can it be fun?? i guess different strokes for different folks. I also think here is too much Golf instruction on TV and print media today people read and see all this and they get confused and then get discouraged and quit the game. Also I think the price of green fees in this tight economy has hurt the game. Yes I know thecosts of maintaing a golf course but people are so demanding they think every golf course has to maintain the standards they see on tv They probably would not play some of the courses I grew up on and I still down here play some of the older less maintained courses Yep people have changed and Golf along with it but I think not for the better

[HillWilliam]

I agree that the Tiger factor has diminished and many of the newbies have left the game. It will take a player that captures the public's imagination the way Tiger did before we see another growth spurt like that.

 

Also, the costs associated with golf are DEFINITELY a huge factor. Clubs you can work around if you are diligent. Beginners should buy used clubs that suit their game. But green fees have yet to retreat with the rest of the economy. I make an average wage and used to play 40 rounds a year...Now it's closer to 25 to 30 and it's primarily money driven. To play well, I need to practice and most ranges are 9-10 bucks a pop for a decent sized bucket. Go out and play and it's an average of $40 (in my area) for an acceptable course. $60-$80 for a good course. The $25-30 rounds are gone and that's the price point where people will play regularly on daily fee courses. On weekends I expect to pay more but seeing golf courses empty during the week should be a tip off that prices need to come down. I AM seeing some specials this winter for the upcoming season that are encouraging. Courses are fighting for rounds to stay open and this should be the year we see prices retreat.

 

Club wise, the costs have skyrocketed in the last decade. Premium drivers are $299-399 for the latest models. Not too long ago that was the cost of a set of good irons. Good current irons are $800-$1200 now. It's nuts. The current economy can't sustain that. Cost conscious consumers buy 2nd generation clubs regularly now ($199 drivers and $499 irons). Even putters have gone crazy. You could buy a good range of putters for $50 before. Now it's $100-$300. Some manufacturers are getting it. Cleveland's bronze line of putters are reasonably priced and nicely finished.

 

To sum up, Taylor's CEO is dead wrong on many counts. He's merely marketing here. I don't want larger holes or free drops. I want to play at reasonably priced courses with properly priced equipment that performs. Time for CEO's to stop looking at Hatteras and start looking at Sea Rays and realign their products and goals.

[cheymike]

Lets see... People can play baseball in the park on Saturday and have a good time with a cheap bat, glove and ball, or heck in some cases a stick and a rock. They don't expect to play like the Yankees and nobody cares.

 

People can have a pick-up game of basketball at the schoolyard and have a good time even if they play with a volleyball instead of a b-ball and $10 vs $200 shoes. They don't expect to be in a class like Shak/Lebron/Koby/MJ/Malone/Wilt. They laugh when they completely miss the basket/backboard.

 

People can have a Sunday game of football and have a great day in tennis shoes and shorts with rags for flags hanging off their sides instead of cleats and pads and helmets. They probably aren't playing up to the caliber of Packers vs Steelers. They laugh when they miss a pass and fall in a mud puddle.

 

But in our sport those who play well complain about those who don't taking too much time and slowing them down. Club makers tell us we suck and we MUST play their $400 club to be better. Ball manufacturers tell us we don't hit it far enough so they make a $5 ball just for us. Our so-called buddies tell us we need to go spend weeks at the practice range so we will be "good enough" to play with them. Country Clubs tell us if we can't "afford" to join them, we can't play on their hallowed grass. For God's sake, do NOT try to play golf at "our" establishment in a T-shirt and tennis shoes. AND TURN OFF THAT DAMNED CELL PHONE!!

 

To be "good" at our sport, you have to drive like Couples, look like Poulter, scramble like Mickleson, putt like Kaymer and act like Palmer. And by the way, if you aren't "good" at it, it is NOT allowed to be fun.

 

I wonder why anyone would want to leave this sport????

[BIG STU]

Sprinklerhead; Well said. In this area we have a lot of retirees. In the past courses sorta shunned the locals even members during prime season. Well in the past couple of years the tourist rounds have been down sharply due to the economy. A lot of the courses down here have gone to management groups and so they have have been sharply discounting membership rates and local rates. Friends from out of town say they get something in the mail every week from down here advertising good golf and hotel rates. I know the city of Myrtle Beach owns Whispering Pines golf course down here and they were in the paper the other day talking about leasing it out The city claims they lost money on it last year. I do know they lost quite a few of their local members this year due to the big golf groups with 5 or more courses were offering so much better deals for the money.There is a lot of competition for the golf dollar here now.

[The HUMP]

I have never been a TM or Mark King fan, but the proverbial cow dung has hit the fan.

He is absolutely dead on about amateur and professionals having different rules. I have been in the golf business my entire adult life in every single aspect , going on 35 years now. Public golf, private clubs,

equipment sales etc. The game is dead. NGF ,, a group I have never been fond of ,reports that we are now losing 2 golfers for everyone 1 we gain. Do the math. The game as we know it is toast. Do the elitist at the USGA really want to grow the game ? I have to 2nd guess that.

I sometimes wonder if they would not rather it revert back to a game of Kings and land barons as it originated.

The game is too damn hard, takes too long and is too expensive for most. A prominent golf figure says,, 8,000 yards for tour professionals is like 6,400 yards for the avg. am. What does that tell you? It's like rolling up to the Daytona 500 starting line in your Yugo.

Sports do come and go in popularity, at least spectator wise. Boxing- dead, horse racing-dead, tennis - dead, Indy car - dead, bowling -dead. Golf is on life support right now. Do we want it to be only for the few ? Do we want it to be as big as the NFL, not hardly. Do we need it to support the thousands of people currently trying to make a living out of it ? I don't think so. But, it could easily go the way of so many great past times. If you love it, let it evolve. After all it is still simply the joy of a ball in flight after being well struck. Does it matter how or with what ?

[captseadog]

My private course has had to go public/private in order to survive. We now have 5 plus hour rounds. There easily could be two cups on a hole. One standard and one 8 inches. All double digit handicappers would have to use the 8 inch hole and single digit the standard hole. This would help cut down on time of a round.

 

If a double digit handicappers ball goes into a standard hole, they could pull it out and place it within six inches of the hole and continue to play out to the bigger cup. If a single digit handicappers ball roles into the larger hole, they do the same. It would cure a lot of course back-up problems.

 

To those that will argue tradition: We are not playing with wood shafts and feather balls. Golf needs this quick to survive or we all will only have fond memories of the game.

[Super Tuna]

To be "good" at our sport, you have to drive like Couples, look like Poulter, scramble like Mickleson, putt like Kaymer and act like Palmer. And by the way, if you aren't "good" at it, it is NOT allowed to be fun.

 

I wonder why anyone would want to leave this sport????

 

+a bajillion to you Cheymike and The Hump. I'm barely out of the starting gates in this game and even I can see it's losing people hand over fist, even out here where there's a lot of golfers. And lordly how I wish people would stop trying to play like they're on tour. You drive the ball 250 tops, you don't need to play from seven-fricken-thousand yards. You don't need to go all Furyk like over a put, your career doesn't depend on the shot. Ho hum.

[Justin66]

Geoff Shackelford has an excellent book, The Future of Golf: How Golf Lost Its Way and How To Get It Back. In it, he says:

Golf's future is far from certain, but it can thrive again with a more balanced approach to architecture, technology, maintenance, and courses. Is is even possible that affordable and fun golf could play an integral role in rejuvenating the spirit of community that so many Americans long for.

 

Shackelford is a proponent of rolling back the ball. This would, in theory, also reign in the 7,000+ yard courses that are too expensive to maintain (which gets reflected in our greens fees) and painful to play.

 

He also suggests the use (or rather, overuse) of trees is a golf-killer. I should explain that one a bit... trees are good for obvious reasons, but too many on a golf course takes away options for the golfer. The trees dictate how the hole should be played, instead of giving us the ability to come up with creative (and possibly faster) solutions. It's also a maintenance issue, though the pace and style of play issue is far greater.

 

Here's a great quote about equipment (p. 222):

An end to the distance chase stops the madness of golf existing primarily as a consumption pastime revolving around the marketing and quarterly profit margin needs of a few manufacturers obligated to no one but their stockholders. Shifting the focus back to the sport itself will benefit the shareholders who matter most: golfers.

 

Did I mention that this book is excellent? It is, and there's a few points in it that are in line with what Big Stu and Cheymike said earlier (by the way, +abunch to both of you). Frank Thomas's Just Hit It is another like Shackelford's book. I definitely recommend both to anyone.