Partnership With Suppliers Means Both Sides Win

The advancements in technology, equipment and fitting the past few years are truly mind-boggling.

I recently had one woman come to me and say. `I tried four different sets of clubs and they’re all better than what I have. What should I do?’

It takes time to sell golf equipment because you’re not only selling equipment, you’re also selling an education to the consumer.

While you’re fitting somebody, you can be giving them a lesson. With some people, it doesn’t matter what you put them in until they can at least make decent contact with the ball, so you don’t need to start changing anything.

Fitting has become so compact now. With different heads and shafts, all you generally have to do is click them together and you don’t need 30 bags of stuff as it was in the past. The manufacturers have really come to the plate when it comes to fitting.

It usually takes about an hour to fit somebody by the time the person warms up and you talk about different equipment. At this point in the season, we’re in that trying stage, but a big day for us here at Cottonwood will be our demo day this Sunday.

I am so proud of our demo day, which has our four main brands. All of their major reps come out and their tech guys. A lot of our staff is spread out to the tents of the companies that they play, support and believe in.

We have hot dogs and pop and it turns into a bit of a circus, but it’s kind of neat and always busy. Hopefully, the weather cooperates this year.

People walk the whole range and try different stuff. We make notes about who tried what and sometimes, we’ll sell 10 to 15 sets that day. Then, we’ve got our notes about who tried what for reference later on.

Then, we’ll take the manufacturers out golfing and have some dinner afterwards and thank them. I believe you’re partners with your manufacturers and that we should be working with them. If we have a demo day, we’re out there with the reps instead of expecting them to handle everything that day.

It makes sense to spend the time together, so that everybody wins. From our side, the members love the entire day and love trying different stuff.

Both sides benefiting is the sign of a good partnership and an incentive for everybody to make a demo day successful.

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