Callaway Focus on Women

Focus on Women 

When Ivanka Trump hosted Callaway Golf’s Girls Club in New York City last month, she sounded as serious about the sport as her co-host, LPGA star Morgan Pressel. That is, with the exception of one complaint: Trump says she usually is the only woman in a foursome.

It’s a common refrain among women golfers, and a problem Callaway hopes to solve.

The company best known for a men’s product with a feminine name – Big Bertha – is making a fresh appeal to a vital demographic: Women. The initiative isn’t just about selling more Callaway clubs to existing female golfers; it’s about finding ways to attract more women to the game.

“Women are spending a whole lot of money taking kickboxing and tennis lessons; why aren’t they playing golf?” asks Michele Szynal, Callaway’s vice president of public relations.

It’s a question clubmakers have asked countless times, and many, if not most, have failed to answer it adequately. Industry observers who have heard half-hearted promises to woo female consumers likely will roll their eyes over this latest push.

But Callaway officials maintain their plan is fueled with resolve. They say they already command a healthy share of the women’s category, and the only way they can boost revenue is to grow the market overall.

What appears a no-brainer decision to target an attractive audience, however, doesn’t come without risk. Callaway’s strategy could divert resources from other initiatives that promise faster returns, and, worse, it may yield virtually nothing.

A case can be made that Callaway’s efforts, no matter how exemplary, won’t work in a male-dominated industry that remains rigid to change. And one could argue the very nature of the game – five-hour rounds that require plenty of practice time – doesn’t mesh with the lifestyle of many women who juggle career, home and children.

That’s not to say progressive golf leaders aren’t finding ways to make the sport better accommodate women, but their practices still are the exception rather than the norm, meaning it’s unlikely an army of new women golfers will arrive at courses anytime soon.
Nevertheless, Callaway officials say the potential upside of the women’s market is too significant, to be ignored. Market data indicate women are underrepresented in the game and underscore the difficulty of retaining them: According to the National Golf Foundation, women account for 25 percent of all golfers in the U.S. They represent a more balanced 40 percent of all beginners, but they quit the sport faster than men.

Five years after introduction, 27 percent of women remain playing, compared with 54 percent for men. Retailers say the lack of sustained efforts and the mistake of treating all women golfers the same have doomed previous recruiting attempts. They insist the time is right for the company with the right approach.

Callaway CEO George Fellows agrees with that assessment. As the former chief of cosmetics giant Revlon, Fellows understands better than most the economic clout women wield and their distinctive buying behavior.

So as step one of the initiative, Fellows commissioned an “ethnographic study” to better understand the female consumer. This wasn’t an exercise limited to the company’s marketing department; Fellows even dispatched into the field members of Callaway’s research and development team to observe women shopping and playing on the course. They took notes about everything, from how the women were treated in retail stores to how they used their clubs on the course to how they researched their purchases.

Jeff Colton, Callaway R&D’s senior vice president, witnessed first-hand how intimidating it can be for women to purchase equipment at a golf retailer.

“It’s no different for a woman than going into a car dealership,” he said. Callaway executives put the information they culled to work in a variety of ways. It played a factor in the creation of Callaway’s new Gems set, designed for maximum forgiveness and packaged to ease newcomers into the game with one simple purchase.

It is an entry-level set with eight clubs in a lightweight carry bag, including a draw-biased titanium driver and a 2-Ball putter for $599. The company’s previous entry-level set offered seven clubs, but Callaway’s research revealed beginning golfers struggle around the green, so they added a chipper.

The company’s study also discovered that women spend more time online researching their purchases than men.

“Women take seven to nine times longer to make a purchase,” Dillon says. “Retailers think they’re just kicking tires, but they’re not.”

That’s why Callaway’s home page now clearly showcases its women’s products. The company also plans to bulk up its online shopping experience, but declined to reveal any details.

Callaway is addressing mainstream women’s publications such as Allure, Shape and Marie Claire to tout the game’s virtues and benefits. That’s why Callaway spokeswomen Pressel and Trump hosted the media event for health and lifestyle editors in New York.

“The editors of these magazines are the gatekeepers for women,” Szynal says.

To the audience of these opinion-shapers, Callaway executives pitched golf as a way for women to stay fit and active, get ahead at work, meet new people or spend more time with family and significant others. Callaway staged the event specifically to address non-golf women’s media.

Callaway also has recruited 50 female PGA professionals to serve as brand ambassadors, many of whom will be featured during a series of grass-roots events the company is hosting nationwide.

On March 24, for example, Callaway held an event in Scottsdale, Ariz., at which 150 women tested the company’s latest equipment and received instruction tips and an opportunity to be custom fit. Callaway executives say they don’t harbor unrealistic expectations for their efforts.

They know the payoff won’t come immediately. But they’re betting that someday, when Ivanka plays golf with her famous father, he’ll be the only man in their foursome.

TAG: