Golf Channel Acquires Revolution Golf

Erik Matuszewski reports at Forbes on Golf Channel's purchase of Revolution Golf and its 2 million subscribers.

He explains how this could be an Amazon Prime-inspired play:

Five years ago, Revolution Golf launched a premium subscription offering for which members pay up to $124 annually to access a library of exclusive video content, special offers on training aids, equipment, and exclusive member-only events. Two-thirds of the business's subscribers play golf at least once a week during the season. That participation is part of what makes golf unique – the sport’s fans are also passionate players.

Golf Channel is serving that passion. And not just via TV, but also through its continually growing digital businesses: playing, instruction, travel and now e-commerce.

As Golf Channel’s McIntosh says -- “We want to connect the world to golf.”

NY Times: "You Can Always Get a Tee Time, but Turning a Profit Can Be Tricky"

Paul Sullivan uses his NY Times Wealth Matters column to talk to a nice range of golf course developers, including Warren Stephens at Alotian Club and Paul Schock of Prairie Club. The topic? The costs and perils of buying or building a golf course.

Most of the stories end on a positive note, but not after cautionary tales about spending.

This from Chip Smith, who bought the TPC Myrtle Beach but later sold it to Chinese investors in 2014.

But last year, when he and a partner, Doug Marty, bought a course in Florida, Wellington National, he said he realized just how much money it could cost to turn around a course and make it profitable.

“We went into that one and evaluated the facilities and the golf course,” Mr. Smith said. “It was by far the worst one I’d ever seen in terms of being open and playable but being in awful condition. Doug likes to say we went in with an unlimited budget and exceeded that.”

They shut the club for a year of renovations. It has now reopened and started to attract members. The two partners are betting that it can attract members from the surrounding equestrian community and nearby Palm Beach.

But recouping their investment will take time. The initiation fee is $7,500 and annual dues are $6,750, comparatively modest in an area where $50,000 and $100,000 initiation fees are common

Callaway Buys Travis Matthew

The tentative $125.5 million deal was announced on today's earnings call, where, as Claudia Assis reports the company announced a 24% increase in net sales.

The full Travis Matthew purchase release:

CALLAWAY GOLF COMPANY TO ACQUIRE TRAVISMATHEW FOR $125.5 MILLION

CARLSBAD, Calif., August 3, 2017 – Callaway Golf Company (NYSE:ELY) announced today it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire TravisMathew, LLC, a high-growth golf and lifestyle apparel company, for $125.5 million in an all-cash transaction, subject to a working capital adjustment.

“We are very excited about this acquisition,” commented Chip Brewer, President and Chief Executive Officer of Callaway Golf Company. “With its golf heritage, culture of product excellence and double-digit growth in the golf and lifestyle apparel business, TravisMathew is a great fit with our business, brands, culture and our strategy to grow in areas tangential to golf. This acquisition, once completed, is expected to be slightly accretive to earnings in 2018 and create significant value for our shareholders over the long-term. We look forward to working with the TravisMathew management team to maximize this brand’s growth potential.”

The acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions, including securing regulatory approvals, and is expected to close in the third quarter of 2017. Post-acquisition, TravisMathew will continue to operate out of its Huntington Beach, California headquarters.

The purchase price values TravisMathew at a multiple of approximately 11.8 times projected 2017 full year adjusted EBITDA. Callaway also expects to realize significant value from potential tax benefits associated with the transaction.

In 2017, TravisMathew’s net sales are expected to be in the range of $55-60 million, of which approximately $10-15 million will contribute to Callaway’s 2017 second half financial results assuming the transaction closes in the third quarter of 2017. Including approximately $5 million of estimated transaction expenses and incremental non-cash expense resulting from the acquisition purchase accounting adjustments, TravisMathew is expected to be approximately $0.04 dilutive to Callaway’s 2017 earnings per share but is expected to be slightly accretive in 2018 after taking into account anticipated financing costs and incremental investment in the business to support future growth

Eleven Million Wedges Later, Vokey Enters Canada's HOF

Nice tribute from Rick Young on wedge designer Bob Vokey, who entered Canada's golf hall of fame this week in the "builder" category.

He writes this with a great supporting quote from Acushnet's Wally Uihlein on the key players behind the wedge as we know it.

Eleven million Titleist Vokey designed wedges (and counting) after the very first went into the bag of PGA Tour player Andy Bean in Memphis in 1997, Uihlein believes Vokey’s place in the game’s equipment history is cemented. That point was reinforced by a short history lesson on the wedge category the Acushnet CEO indulged me with.

“This is Bob’s peer group,” he said leaning forward. “He deserves to be mentioned with Edward MacLean, who really had the first-ever patent on a wedge, with Gene Sarazen who took his inspiration for the sand wedge from MacLean, with Ben Hogan and the Sure Out, Sure On, which was the first wedge system with Hogan being the first to say, hey, the club off the fairway needs to be different than the club around the greens. From there, all due credit to Roger Cleveland. He was first to really put his toe in the water and say, I’m a wedge guy, in a full-on commercial sense. Finally you have to give credit to Karsten (Solheim) because he made the high-lofted wedge aesthetically pleasing and functional at the same time. Then there is Voke.

Bloomberg: ClubCorp Sale A Positive Sign For Golf Industry

Bloomberg's Taylor Cromwell considers the ClubCorp sale for $1.1. billion and says it's a positive statement about the core golfer market stabilizing.

He writes:

More broadly, golf has seen a resurgence in so-called avid players, those who play at least 25 rounds on a regulation course per year. The number rose to 8.8 million last year, up 400,000 from 2015, according to the National Golf Foundation. Avid players are critical to the health of the sport because they account for 80 percent of industry spending.

The challenge now is rebuilding with more realistic aspirations.

Several analysts are quoted saying the market correction days have peaked. Thoughts?

ClubCorp Sells After All: For $1.1 Billion To Apollo Global

Reuters' Greg Roumeliotis reports that the publicly-traded company owning 206 clubs and serving over 400,000 members, including at Mission Hills and Firestone, has sold to Apollo Global Management.

It's an all-cash, $1.1 billion deal netting shareholders $17.12 a share, a 31% premium over Friday's closing price. 

DallasNews.com's business writer Paul O'Donnell noted this:

Sunday's announcement comes about three months after ClubCorp's board said it would not seek a sale. Longtime CEO Eric Affeldt announced at the same time that he would be retiring. A month later, the company added two new directors at the behest of activist investor FrontFour Capital Group LLC, which had been critical of ClubCorp's management.

Phil Knight: Nike Lost Money For 20 Years On Golf Equipment

Talking to Bloomberg Television's David Rubinstein, the Nike founder declares that in spite of Tiger Woods, the company could never be profitable on equipment sales.

After mentioning their recruitment of Woods had started three years prior to Tiger turning pro, Phil Knight says the math was simple.

“It’s a fairly simple equation, that we lost money for 20 years on equipment and balls,” Knight told interviewer David Rubenstein, host of “The David Rubenstein Show: Peer-to-Peer Conversations.” “We realized next year wasn’t going to be any different.”

The Bloomberg TV interview airs Wednesday at 9 pm ET.

"Behind the scenes at a $2,000 wedge fitting"

As PXG and others have established high-end club fittings that lead to eye-popping prices for clubs, Golfweek's David Dusek tells us about his experience with JP Harrington's setup at Titleist's facility in Oceanside.

While many of us can't comprehend spending $2000 on a set of wedges, clearly there is a market for these personal service fitting given that Harrington will do 50 to 60 days of fittings with customers. Dusek explains what they'll get for their $2000 besides some very futuristic-looking clubs.

First, the heads are forged from 1025 carbon steel before being milled to precisely the desired shapes. Internal weights made to fit each specific wedge head help raise or lower the center of gravity based on loft, then a large, highly polished tungsten weight is attached in the toe to pull the CG into the center of the hitting area. All that weight can be added because the back plate is made from brushed titanium, which is exceptionally light.

While the grooves are identical to those of Titleist Vokey Design SM6 wedges, the soles of JP Harrington wedges are CNC-milled. Most have aggressive heel and toe relief for increased versatility, but if there is a buzzword Harrington loves to talk about, it’s camber. His wedges tend to have a lot of curvature from the leading edge to the back of the sole, as well as from heel to toe. Harrington believes this helps players maintain speed through the turf for improved consistency.

Poll Result: "How important is it which pros play those clubs?"

Golf Channel Equipment Insider Matt Adams asked his followers on Twitter if tour pro endorsements influence purchasing, and also set up the question with this Morning Drive segment on TaylorMade's recent Rory McIlroy signing.

Granted, his followers are likely core golfers who are prone to have been with the game longer, but it's still fascinating to see how voters believe that professional endorsements translate to buying influence:

When considering the purchase of new clubs, how important is it which pros play those clubs?

— MattAdamsGC (@MattAdamsFoL) May 14, 2017

The segment:

Playoff Shipping Wars: "It certainly caused some consternation"

When GolfChannel.com's Rex Hoggard broke the news earlier this week, I think we just figured the details would suggest merely an optics play. But the FedExCup rule declaring players who endorse competing shipping companies ineligible could have greater ramifications. Oh sure, maybe it just scares a few players away from being endorsed by UPS and on we go with a brown-free Playoffs(C).

But after reading Bob Harig's ESPN.com follow-up chat with agents about the ramifications over some sort a shipping-company endorsement provision, the details will be very important. When and if we get them.

The PGA Tour said it would not comment on that aspect of the contract prior to briefing the players fully on the matter.

"It's certainly less than ideal,'' said agent Mark Steinberg, whose Excel Sports agency represents several players. "It was clearly a part of the negotiation that the tour went through, and it was one of the last stumbling blocks. PGA Tour sponsorship deal may bar players endorsing FedEx rivals from competing in playoffs.

Harig's story includes Chubby Chandler making the Mercedes-BMW analogy, and you can bet many companies will take this precedent and attempt demands in future negotiations.

More interesting will be the ramifications should Amazon want to endorse players while also moving into competing businesses.

Also fascinating will be the perception of the FedExCup as a sports competition should the provision actually rule a competitor ineligible from participating. Could that further damage how the sports world sees the FedExCup?

TaylorMade, Ashworth, Adams Sold For $425 Million To Private Equity Firm KPS Capital Partners

Nice work by Ryan Ballengee at GolfNewsNet with the news shared to Taylor Made employees Wednesday.

The deal ends a year-long effort by Adidas to unload their golf equipment and apparel brands.

David Dusek and Jason Lusk report for Golfweek on the deal, including this:

The New York-based KPS Capital Partners manages $5.3 billion in global assets in manufacturing and industrial companies, including automotive parts and electrical components.

About half of the $425 million will be paid in cash, while the remaining portion will be paid in the form of a secured note and contingent considerations. The final sale is expected to be completed in late 2017.

Rory Blames Golf Ball In Explaining New Equipment Deal

After reiterating twice that his Masters ProV-1 golf ball struggles prompted more testing, something tells me Rory McIlroy will get pulled-over by the police every time he drives through greater Fairhaven.

As was reported here and the Forecaddie, McIlroy has signed with Taylor Made and cited the improved golf ball as a primary reason. (James Corrigan wrote in The Telegraph that the deal is worth $10 million a year.)

From David Dusek's Golfweek.com report on the signing.

“I wasn’t really happy with the golf ball I was playing, and I needed to do something,” McIlroy said during his press conference Tuesday at the Players Championship. “I felt like I struggled in the wind. So I sort of went back to the drawing board and tested for about 10 days pretty extensively after Augusta. (I) worked with a lot of different things, but I worked with the TaylorMade guys one day and started just on TrackMan (launch monitor) on the range and saw stuff with the golf ball, that new T5x ball that they have. I thought, ‘Wow, this is what I need.’ This is exactly the thing that I’ve been struggling with, and this is, I feel, what I need.”