As you read this I will be in sunny Florida at the PGA Merchandise Show. I’m staying in a $300 room at the Rosen Center Hotel next door to the convention center. If I were actually somebody important, I’d be staying in a $450 room at the Peabody, which is across the street, but that’s another story.
I mention the cost of the rooms not to impress you, but to make a point about how crazy costs are at events like this. There is a semi-pervasive attitude at these things that costs are not important because the company is paying, so it’s okay to pay $300 for a room that would cost $150 or $200 back home.
While I’m exposing my cheapness, why is it that you can stay in a Motel 6 and receive free Internet and my $300 room charges me an extra $10 a day for that service?
Speaking of cheap, I’ve attended the show for the last ten or fifteen years mainly because someone else has paid, and if you have learned anything about me since I invaded this space it is that I rarely pay for anything, and once again that is true. But I’m not alone; the lobby bar at the Rosen is standing room only with guys who have less reason to be there than I do. It’s a Confederacy of Dunces, dressed in company clothes with official-looking credentials hanging around their necks. Some are selling, some are buying and some are looking for a job. Me? I’m doing all three.
The PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando is an odd bird. While it is fun to check out all the new stuff, I also use it as a barometer for how the golf business is doing. Last year the atmosphere was fearful; the banks were going broke faster than the golf courses and nobody was signing any long-term leases.
As it turned out, everyone’s fears were justified as sales in the retail golf business fell as much as 30 to 40 percent in 2009. The truth is, even if you would like to help the economy, you’d be dumb to buy a new set of clubs if you’re worried about losing your job, so you re-grip and make due.
This week’s Farmers Insurance Open, or what used to be the Buick Open, is another indication of how the year went. It’s hard to believe that they used to say, “What’s good for General Motors is good for America.” Paybacks are hell, and paybacks for fifty years of sleeping at the wheel are often fatal. But the Buick Open is not the first golf tournament to lose a sponsor and it won’t be the last; the question is has anyone at General Motors learned a lesson?
When you hear of the PGA Merchandise Show you naturally think of shiny new golf clubs, and there are a lot of those here to be sure, but like your local pro-shop, the PGA Merchandise Show has become a soft-goods show. I never actually measured, but I’ll bet half of the display area is clothing. One of the things that retailers have discovered is that selling golf shirts requires little if any training, therefore your local pro-shop has become a glorified bright colored shirt store.
In addition to clothes, there is a ton of golf crap. A couple of years ago I told you about the guy who invented the fake golf club that served as a portable urinal. There, years ago, I did a video on Loud Mouth clothes; you know that ugly stuff that John Daly is wearing these days. Then there was the potty-Putter, which makes me believe that there is nothing too stupid for the American investor.
I’ve talked to several manufacturers that plan on attending this year’s show and generally their attitude is better than last year. Maybe recessions are organic and every twenty years we need one to remind us that $450 hotel rooms are a bad idea for the most part.
If I see something totally cool, I’ll post it ASAP, and if I get something free… well I guess I’ll keep it.
