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PRESS ROOM
Reprinted from Golf World Just two months young, the Golf Tour
Trailer visits private and public clubs throughout Northern Virginia and
showcases men's and women's golf clubs from more than 20 major
manufacturers. It offers one-hour custom-fitting sessions with
professionals who also provide instructional tips to ensure a proper
swing. Last week, Callaway Golf increased its representation on the trailer by providing its new Custom Fitting Solution, a club fitting system that incorporates IBM ThinkPad T21 Series notebooks to record swing data such as ball speed, club head speed and distance. Tour Trailer is the first shop in Virginia to offer access to the Callaway Custom Fitting Solution. Working on 3- to- 4-day weekend visits, the trailer works in conjunction with the host professional and pro shop. "It's a no-brainer," says Mark Jansen, director of golf at Heritage Hunt G&CC in Gainesville, Va., one of the first clubs to host the Trailer. "A pro will never have access to all those clubs for their customers to hit, and they're not going to take all our business in two days. Once the one-hour fitting session is complete, the customer has the option of ordering from the trailer or taking his or her club specifications for use in a future purchase, Donahue said. "Rarely does someone fit into standard [models], so we only carry about 30 sets, but we can have fitted clubs to the customer in two weeks," he said. "If a customer decides not to buy on that day, then they can come back to their own professional and still have their information to get the right clubs." If a set is purchased through Tour Trailer, the host pro shop receives a percentage of the sale, and if a The Golf Tour Trailer and Performance Studios-fitted customer returns to buy from the host shop, Donahue gets 10 percent. "It's a win-win situation for us, the pro shop and the customer," said Donahue, whose 15 years of club fitting experience led to his ownership of the Dulles Golf Academy and a golf apparel shop in Washington Dulles International airport. Then he saw the potential for the Tour Trailer concept. "I didn't feel comfortable with the idea of fitting someone indoors and seeing them hit a ball into a net 10 feet away," he said. The trailer's first three weekend visits to clubs in the Northern Virginia region grossed $60,000 in revenue. "It's obvious what the public wants," says Donahue. "My phone is ringing off the hook every day." Next year, Donahue plans to add two trailers to serve Virginia and three more for expansion into surrounding states. For The Golf Tour Trailer and Performance Studios schedule, visit http://www.golftourtrailer.com. -- Terence Chang |
Immediate access to custom-fitted golf clubs and instruction is nothing
new to PGA professionals, and now--thanks to Jerry Donahue's Middle
Atlantic The Golf Tour Trailer and Performance Studios--even the occasional weekend golfer is reaping
the benefits of a full-service traveling pro shop.