By MATTHEW FUTTERMAN

Just in time for the Masters Tournament, golf superstar Tiger Woods is back at the top of the sport’s rankings. But does professional golf need him like it used to? WSJ’s Matt Futterman looks at some of the new faces bringing fans to the sport.

When the career of golf’s top player and biggest star was in free fall in 2010, the brain trust of professional golf in the U.S. gathered in their Florida headquarters to contemplate life after Tiger Woods.

Huddling with consultants from their Austin, Texas, advertising firm, senior executives at the PGA Tour tried to figure out how to persuade fans, sponsors and television networks to stay invested in a sport whose biggest draw had been disgraced. The golf world looked like it was about to go through a difficult generational transition.

“Every 10 to 15 years you have a passing of the baton from one face to the other,” says Ty Votaw, the tour’s executive vice president. “We were about at that 15-year mark with Tiger.” There was one problem, though—there wasn’t any obvious candidate ready to grab the torch from Mr. Woods, and the consensus among sports-industry executives was that professional golf was headed for trouble.

Defying predictions, the post-Tiger collapse never happened, thanks to the rise of a flashy new crop of players. By nearly every measure, professional golf became richer, more competitive and more stable while Mr. Woods was dealing with the sex scandal and injuries that sent his career careening off course.A flashy new crop of players like Bubba Watson and Rory McIlroy sprouted just as Tiger Woods’s troubles hit.

Tour revenues rose to a record $1.11 billion last year, compared with $1.02 billion in 2010. The tour’s new nine-year television contract with NBC and CBS, signed in 2011 when Mr. Woods was tumbling down the rankings, will pay an average of about $800 million annually, a 33% increase over the previous deal, according to one person with knowledge of the deal.

The PGA Tour now has title sponsors for all 42 of its tournaments, each of them paying $6 million to $12 million, depending on the event. Last year, FedEx Corp. extended its deal through 2017 to provide at least $35 million a year in prize money, and tens of millions more in advertising, for the season-ending FedEx Cup championship.

Television ratings still spike when Mr. Woods is on the leaderboard in a final round, especially at a one of golf’s four majors championships. But CBS, the tour’s lead broadcaster, says more people are tuning in to final-round coverage even when Mr. Woods isn’t in the field.

“We’re happy that he’s back and that he’s playing well, but we’ve always felt he spikes off a very strong base, and we think what we’ve done the past couple of years shows that,” says the PGA Tour’s Mr. Votaw.

At the Masters, Mr. Woods will resume his pursuit of Jack Nicklaus’s  record of 18 major championships. He has been stuck at 14 since 2008, when he began struggling with injuries. He lost the No. 1 ranking, which he had held for all but a few months since 1997, in 2010, eventually falling to 58th.

As he faded, the spotlight shifted to players who were teenagers or younger when Mr. Woods came of age. Those players don’t look, act or dress like the golfer of yore, preferring flashy, bright colors and slim-tailored cuts to pleated plaids. More important, they have proven gifted, making the sport as deep and competitive as it has been since Mr. Woods’s emergence.

“As he’s gotten older the talent has gotten better,” says Bubba Watson, the defending Masters champion, whose star rose just as Mr. Woods’s dimmed.

The emergence of players such as 34-year-old Mr. Watson, Northern Ireland’s 23-year-old Rory McIlroy, and Rickie Fowler, a 24-year-old American who grew up racing dirt bikes, came at a perfect time for the sport. They were golfers in the Tiger Woods mold—supremely talented and fit athletes who happened to play golf. Dustin Johnson, for instance, can dunk a basketball.

Still, tour executives felt they needed a strategy. By the fall of 2010, the PGA Tour was starting negotiations on a new television deal, which provides the bulk of its revenues. Some of the tour’s tournaments needed new deals for title sponsors. Millions of fans who associated golf with Mr. Woods and his aging rival, Phil Mickelson, couldn’t pick budding stars like Messrs. Johnson and Fowler out of a lineup.

In the fall of 2010, PGA executives gathered in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., with a team from the Austin advertising firm GSD&M to concoct a way to sell the sport in a post-Tiger world.

One idea was to focus on the different type of fan that each of the emerging players attracted. Mr. Watson, for instance, a self-taught free spirit from the Florida panhandle, is a favorite with the beer-and-wings crowd.

Mr. Votaw says that approach didn’t feel sustainable over time, and didn’t reflect the emerging competitive tension between the new stars and tour veterans. Professional golf, he argues, was in one of those critical periods “where the young people come in and begin to overtake the stars that preceded them.”

The resulting ad campaign, called “Vs.,” would highlight younger players such as Messrs. Fowler, Watson and Johnson taking on the establishment and trying to break into the sport’s elite.

Fortuitously, as the PGA Tour rolled out the commercials, those players began winning. Mr. Watson captured two tournaments in 2011, then won the Masters last year with a miraculous shot out of the woods on the final playoff hole. Keegan Bradley, 26 years old, won the PGA Championship as a rookie in 2011.

Golf had found a new story to tell, and with the economy recovering, sponsors and television partners were ready to listen.

“We all got spoiled for more than a decade with Tiger’s performances,” says Sean McManus, the chairman of CBS Sports. “But we looked at the incredible strength of the young players and thought there was a great future in being associated with the tour.”

Because the PGA Tour is a nonprofit organization that turns over its excess cash to charity, one measure of golf’s success is the size of those contributions. The tour donated a record $130 million in 2012, surpassing the previous high of $125 million in 2010. The tour is projecting record profits for this year, thanks to the new TV deal.

Prize money for players will reach a record $298 million this year, up from $278 million in 2008.

Part of the PGA Tour’s appeal to NBC and CBS is that its sponsors commit to buying roughly 75% of the ads during the broadcasts. “It’s as close to a guarantee as you’re going to see in big-time sports today,” says Mr. McManus.

CBS has seen television viewership for golf rise steadily. Audiences for final-round coverage of tour events averaged 3.5 million in 2012, 46% higher than in 2010. So far this year, an average of 4.1 million viewers have watched final-round coverage of the network’s three tournament broadcasts. NBC’s audiences grew to 3.4 million viewers last year, from 2.3 million in 2010.

Mr. Woods’s participation in tournaments still has a big effect—but not as big as it once did. In 2012, his participation in a final round boosted viewership by 60%, compared with 118% in 2009.

One of the few parts of professional golf that doesn’t appear stronger now than in 2009 is the business of being Tiger Woods. Mr. Woods doesn’t disclose how much he makes, but he has fewer of the kind of blue-chip sponsors that once boosted his annual income to roughly $100 million. He lost Gatorade, General Motors, Accenture and Gillette, but still has Nike, EA Sports and Rolex.

That, too, might be changing. Mark Steinberg, Mr. Woods’s agent, says his phone has been ringing far more often in recent months as his client climbed the rankings. “I’ve certainly seen a bit of a sea change in the corporate marketplace the past several weeks,” he says.

    —E. Michael Johnson

ORLANDO, Fla., January 21, 2013 … Golf Datatech, LLC (www.golfdatatech.com), the golf industry’s leading independent research firm for consumer, trade and retail golf trends, has released a first-of-its-kind study developed to evaluate the reaction of “serious golfers” to the U.S. Golf Association’s proposed new ruling that would prohibit anchoring the putter to the body while making a stroke.  The study, which is being announced prior to the start of the 2013 PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando, reports that a majority of golfers surveyed feel that their game will not be impacted by the rule, while the small percentage who use a long putter will continue to play regardless of the ruling.

The results of the study are based on responses from 1,766 randomly selected golfers drawn from Golf Datatech’s exclusive Serious Golfer Database, who play an average of 68 rounds per year with an average handicap of 14.3.

“This is such an explosive topic in golf that we felt the industry needed a benchmark for evaluating the opinion of the game’s most avid players,” said John Krzynowek, Partner, Golf Datatech.  “On a practical level, the proposed ruling on anchoring putters has minimal impact on most amateur golfers, as only 5% use a long putter, and the majority of serious golfers don’t believe long putters aid in the putting process. Overall, however, the debate over long putters has far more to do with a few elite professional players and less to do with the game as played by the average golfer.”

Key findings in the Golf Datatech study on the Club Anchor Ruling include the following:

• Among the respondents who had an opinion about whether or not anchoring the putter makes it easier to putt, 45% feel that anchoring the putter makes it easier to putt; 55% believe anchoring the putter does not make it easier.
• 60% of respondents believe that the governing bodies of golf should ban the anchoring of clubs to the body, while 40% believe they should not.
• 62% of respondents do not believe the anchoring ban will cause some amateur golfers to enjoy the game less.
• If the proposed rule is enforced in 2016, 31% of current long putter users will continue to anchor their putter, while 31% will not anchor against their body and 38% will switch to a conventional putter.

Download a copy of the entire Club Anchor Ruling Study.

About Golf Datatech, LLC

Golf Datatech, LLC was established in 1995, and since that time it has become the industry’s golf standard for accurate and timely information on the retail sales, inventory, pricing, and distribution of golf products through the on and off course channels.  In 1998, the Company extended its reach into consumer research and strategic sales and marketing consulting.  In 2006, the Company expanded its retail and consumer research programs into the United Kingdom and in 2008 added markets in Europe.  Golf Datatech now produces the first-ever electronically driven golf retail sales reports for the UK, Sweden and Germany.

“For the first nine months of 2012, Golf Rounds Played throughout the U.S. are at an all-time high in terms of percentage increase, up 7.5% over 2011,” said Golf Datatech’s Tom Stine. “This is the largest jump in rounds played since we began tracking them in 1999. With the weather data from Weather Trends, International, it is easy to conclude that favorable temperatures and low precipitation throughout the year has been the biggest contributing factor. However, we also hope that the golf industry’s ‘grow the game’ efforts are beginning to pay dividends and play a part in this noteworthy increase.”

Stine adds, “It’s sadly ironic that these findings have come out just as the Northeast was hit with a devastating hurricane that has impacted so many individuals personally, while causing extensive damage to homes, businesses, schools and leisure facilities, such as golf courses. Our thoughts are with everyone affected by the storm.”

In spite of the devastating hurricane, full year data on the entire country, including the Northeast, speaks very positively for the entire golf industry. Key findings in the study include the following:

• The East North Central region, which includes Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Michigan, has reported a 13.4% increase in rounds played year-to-date, the most significant increase in the country. The average temperature has increased by 4.2° as compared to 2011, while the precipitation has decreased 31%.
• In the South Atlantic region, which consists of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Delaware and Maryland, rounds played increased by only 3.7% as compared to 2011, which demonstrates one of the smallest increases in the country. The average temperature increase was only 1° as compared to 2011, and there was no  change in the amount of precipitation.

For more information on national rounds played or other Golf Datatech Reports, call 888-944-4116 or visit www.golfdatatech.com.

So, what innovations tipped the scale and created broad demand for a spikeless product? Why have many tour players embraced a product they historically shunned? How big is the spikeless category and how big will it become in the long term? Which brands are consumers most likely to purchase? This 166 page study of the spikeless golf footwear will attempt to shed light on these questions and much more.

A few findings from the study include:

• About one‐third of those surveyed consider themselves to be “loyal” to a single golf footwear brand
• 35%of respondents who are aware of spikeless golf shoes say they are likely to buy a pair within the next year
• Single digit handicappers that already owned spikeless footwear, 70% were very pleased with their performance
• The average respondent typically pays $107 for a pair of new golf shoes
• 29% of serious golfers surveyed have purchased a new pair of golf shoes within the past three months

To purchase the study or to find out more please click here or call us, 888-944-4116.

This Study encompasses all aspects of custom fitting by sourcing Golf Datatech’s exclusive database of Serious Golfers, meshing the results with past report results and delivering the most thorough and comprehensive report to the industry.

To learn more about the study or to purchase click here or call 888-944-4116.

Men’s On-Off Course Golf Apparel
Compared to mid year 2011, the sale of men’s shirts, including short and long sleeve, increased 10.9%.

In regard to men’s tops, which include sweaters, vests and fleeces, sales have revealed a significant increase of 10.4%.

Compared to YTD June 2011, the sale of men’s bottoms, including pants and shorts, showed a significant increase of 19.6%.

Women’s On-Off Course Golf Apparel
For women’s shirts, including short and long sleeve, there was a 7.1% increase in sales.

Compared to mid year 2011, the sale of women’s bottoms, including pants and shorts, resulted in an increase of 1.3%.

Companies included in the monthly reports are:
Adidas
Ahead/Kate Lord
Antigua
Ashworth
Ben Hogan
Bette & Court
Bobby Jones
Bugatchi
Byron Nelson
Callaway
Carnoustie
Cutter & Buck
EP Pro
Fairway & Greene
FootJoy
Forrester
Gear For Sports
Greg Norman
Harry Vardon
Isisport
Izod
Jamie Sadock
Lija
Lilly Pulitzer
Liz Claiborne
Mizuno
Monterey Club
Nicklaus Sportswear
Nike
Oxford
Page & Tuttle
Peter Millar
Ping
Polo/Ralph Lauren
Sport Haley
Straight Down
Sunice
Sun Mountain
Sunderland
Tail
Tehama
Tommy Bahama
Tommy Hilfiger
Travis Mathew
Under Armour
Zero Restriction

Golf shops that are interested in getting the FREE monthly reports should contact Suzie Phillips at sphillips@golfdatatech.com or 407-944-4116. Apparel manufacturers who would like to see a sample report should contact Tom Stine at info@golfdatatech.com or 407-944-4116.

About Golf Datatech, LLC
Golf Datatech, LLC was established in 1995, and since that time it has become the industry’s golf standard for accurate and timely information on the retail sales, inventory, pricing, and distribution of golf products through the on and off course channels. In 1998, the Company extended its reach into consumer research and strategic sales and marketing consulting. In 2006, the Company expanded its retail and consumer research programs into the United Kingdom.

Its an anomaly but in a good way. There aren’t many, if any golf courses around the world that can make the same claim. In a world where new is constantly considered better, old in this instance, never loses its sex appeal with golfers. The desire of visiting golfers to play the famous Old Course at St Andrews Links shows no sign of waning as applications for the 2013 season flooded in earlier this week, the first chance to request a tee time for next year.

More than 1,900 applications were received by St Andrews Links Trust, which manages the seven Links Trust courses at the Home of Golf, after the process opened at 10 am BST, Wednesday morning, an increase on the previous record of 1,800 applications set for 2012. The Old Course is renowned around the world as the place where golf was first played and has hosted 28 Open Championships, more than any other venue, with the likes of Bobby Jones, Jack Nicklaus, Seve Ballesteros and Tiger Woods among its champions.

Golfers are invited to apply online directly to the Trust for Old Course tee times each September for the following year. Although demand exceeds the number of times available, there is a ballot or lottery system in operation, which is drawn 48 hours ahead of play, and tee times can also be booked on the other Links courses. Euan Loudon, Chief Executive of St Andrews Links Trust, said, “We are encouraged to receive such a high number of tee time applications. Normally in the second year after the Open Championship we would expect to see applications flatten off but this year has seen record numbers apply. These are still challenging times in terms of the economy so it is important for Scottish golf tourism that we continue to see high numbers of visiting golfers choosing to come to play here and elsewhere in Scotland.”

The tee time applications will be processed in the coming weeks and golfers will be notified directly if their applications have been successful. Visitor green fees in high season, has been increased by £5 to £155 for the Old Course in 2013.

]]> http://www.golfdatatech.com/2012/09/measuring-demand/feed/ 0 http://www.golfdatatech.com/2012/08/adidas-taylormade-chief-sees-big-golf-suppliers-getting-bigger/ http://www.golfdatatech.com/2012/08/adidas-taylormade-chief-sees-big-golf-suppliers-getting-bigger/#comments Wed, 08 Aug 2012 19:26:14 +0000 suzie http://www.golfdatatech.com/?p=844 Continue reading →]]> Bloomberg News – Julie Cruz on August 07, 2012

Golf-industry consolidation is set to continue, according to the head of Adidas AG (ADS)’s TaylorMade brand, as weaker equipment sales and a slowdown in course openings lead smaller businesses into the arms of larger competitors.

“It’s a very challenging industry to find success,” Mark King, chief executive officer of TaylorMade, said in an Aug. 2 phone interview. “In some parts of the industry, like retail, we’ve seen not only consolidation, but shrinking. We’ve seen the reduction of some of the golf courses. We’ve seen plants disappear. So there’ll still probably be some consolidation.”

Sales of golf equipment in U.S. on- and off-course shops shrank by 17 percent to $2.41 billion from 2007 to 2011, according to figures provided by Golf Datatech, while the number of courses opening in the country declined by more than 80 percent in the same period, the National Golf Foundation said. That hasn’t stopped the biggest suppliers from getting bigger. TaylorMade increased sales by 27 percent in those five years and Adidas this year agreed to buy Adams Golf Inc. for $70 million.

The German company isn’t alone in wanting a larger slice of an industry that research institute SRI International estimates is worth $76 billion in the U.S. alone. Dick’s Sporting Goods Inc. bought the Top-Flite brand this year, while Canadian golf retailer Golf Town Canada Inc. acquired Austin, Texas-based Golfsmith International Holdings Inc. for about $97 million.

Buyers may be encouraged by signs of a rebound in the industry this year. Sales of golf equipment rose 9.9 percent in the first six months of 2012, according to Golf Datatech, while the National Golf Foundation estimates that the number of course openings in the U.S. this year will stabilize at 20.

Chinese Opportunity

For TaylorMade, whose sales exceeded 1 billion euros ($1.24 billion) for the first time last year, one of the biggest opportunities for growth may be in China, according to King.

In as few as five years, China “probably has big opportunities,” King said, cautioning that it could be as many as 20. As Chinese migrate from rural areas to cities and the middle class increases, “golf will boom in China,” he said.

The number of “golf enthusiasts” in China rose 22 percent to 51.8 million from 2006 to 2011, according to Barry Johnston, a spokesman for Cologne, Germany-based market researcher Sport+Markt AG. In Europe and North America, interest during the same period “remained pretty stable,” he said.

Golf’s importance to Adidas was highlighted when divisional sales overtook the Reebok brand in the first half of this year. While golf revenue rose 29 percent to 788 million euros on a currency-adjusted basis, Reebok sales fell 16 percent to 787 million euros. Adidas posted total sales of 7.3 billion euros.

Olympic Golf

The increase in TaylorMade’s revenue was driven by “fast-growing” sales of RocketBallz fairway woods and gains in the U.S., King said. The CEO said he plans to boost the brand’s share of the global market for iron clubs to 30 percent from 25 percent in the next few years, while aspiring to increase its share in balls to 15 percent from about 8 percent.

To help achieve the former goal, TaylorMade has built performance labs that allow players to purchase customized clubs after having their swing analyzed with highspeed cameras. There are about 20 centers in the U.S. and the brand plans to double that number in the next three years, King said.

TaylorMade, based in Carlsbad, California, will be seeking to capitalize on opportunities presented by the return of golf as an Olympic sport at the 2016 games in Rio de Janeiro.

“It’s obviously going be a wonderful celebration of golf to be back in the Olympics,” King said. “We plan to really be a part of that. We’re going to take the opportunity over the next four years to talk about it a lot, to support it a lot.”