You Don't Need a $1,600 Set of Irons to Play Good Golf

Every guy's trip has the same group text somewhere in the middle of planning it. Flights are booked. Airbnbs are booked. Tee times are booked. Then somebody asks the question that feels like a pitfall in a video game: what are we going to do about clubs?

You've got three options, and none of them are good. You ship your clubs ahead of time and pay considerably more than the flight cost you, then spend the entire trip hoping to God they show up in one piece and on time. That's the exact reason companies like ShipSticks exist. Or you check them in and pray your travel bag can handle the turbulence, and that whoever's handling your bag had a good morning and the right cup of coffee. Or you show up to the course with no bag at all and hope the rental rack doesn't hand you a set of Wilson irons from 1965.

I spent three years at Topgolf, a year after that as a golf sales manager at Dick's Sporting Goods looking at the retail side of things, and two more at Next Round Golf, a secondhand golf brand out of Richmond, Virginia, where I went from shipping to social media to technical writing. I've watched the entire lifespan of a golf club, from the moment someone decides they want one to the moment they actually buy it. Guys would come in over and over again looking for clubs for a business trip or a bachelor party, and it was always the same problem. The clubs they had access to weren't fit to them, or their swing, or anything close to what they actually wanted.

That's exactly why what Alex is building with GolfClubsNow caught my eye. It's the same idea that changed travel with Airbnb. I've got Airbnb on my phone right now. Instead of a hotel room that might not be up to your spec, you rent a room in someone's house, treat it with respect, and there's a good chance they invite you back, usually for a lot less money than the hotel would have cost. GolfClubsNow runs the same model, except it's the set of clubs collecting dust in your garage. If you've got a set of 2012 TaylorMade RocketBladez sitting there lonely, you can list them and rent them out for $30 to $50 a day and let someone actually put them to use. Need a set for four days? You browse what's listed, book it, pay through the platform. Easy as pie. There’s also going to be a partner protection plan as an option as well, just in case a shot goes awry and something gets damaged. But the best part? You show up to the course with clubs you actually trust instead of a ragamuffin rental-rack set you know nothing about. Nobody's shipping anything. Nobody's gambling on an airline. Nobody's gambling on whether the guy loading bags woke up on the wrong side of the bed.

That solves the logistics problem. But it opens the door to a conversation I love having even more: you don't need the latest and greatest equipment to play good golf.

I can't tell you how many times I watched golfers at Dick's talk themselves into a $1,600 set of irons, even after I tried to talk them out of it. $600 to $700 drivers, $400 fairway woods and $1,000 Scotty Cameron putters. That's the price of feeling cool on the first tee, and it won't lower your scores. You can walk into a PGA Tour Superstore, a mom-and-pop golf shop, or scroll eBay for a few minutes and walk away with a set that plays just as well as anyone else's. I used to putt with a $20 Titleist Bullseye and knock in putts the same way I would with a Scotty Cameron Newport. The putter's not what's missing. It's the person behind it.

Golf is half performance and half ego, and most golfers will never admit which half is driving their next purchase. I'll tell you straight, it's ego. The guy I'm actually scared of is the one who rolls up with four or five clubs in a stand bag, or one of those little clip-on carriers with three tees stuck in it. A fairway wood, a long iron, a mid iron, a short iron and a putter. That's it. He's already pulled nine or ten clubs out of his bag because they're "unnecessary." That's a guy who's done the work. He knows his distances. He's dialed in.

Now the guy who rolls up with a custom-fit set of Miura KM-700s, a $700 driver and a matching headcover for every single club, like he's Aaron Rai? I'm not saying he can't play. He probably can. But he's also trying to look good, and I'm not faulting him for that. A lot of the time, though, that bag is a conversation piece, not proof of skill. I've fit enough golfers to know a great set in the wrong hands doesn't hit the ball any straighter than a $200 set off eBay. No amount of money fixes a two-dollar swing. The equipment isn't the equalizer people think it is.

That's exactly where GolfClubsNow gets more interesting than just a travel convenience. If you're not even sure golf is going to stick for you, rent a set and find out. Rather than walking into a Dick's Sporting Goods and dropping $300 to $400 on a TopFlite bag, rent a set for a day for $50, go to the range, hit some balls and see if it's something you actually want. Because if it is, I guarantee you'll end up spending a lot more than that anyway.

The clubs are a tool. Nothing more, nothing less. If you're heading out on a trip and don't want to deal with shipping your own bag, or you just want to try something before you buy it, check out what Alex and his team have going at GolfClubsNow. Rent something good, play your game and have a great time doing it.

Thanks so much for reading, and have a good day.

Garry Callis Jr.

Founder, True Path Golf