What Am I Wearing?: Numerous times during the two seasons our club is open I’ll call the shop from the golf course and whoever answers the phone has to tell me exactly what I wore to work that day. This has become a fun game with my staff, but the main reason I do this to them is to make them aware of their surroundings. If they can tell me what color and brand of clothes I chose that day, they will pay more attention to our members and the way they dress.
Member Only Merchandise: Everyone wants what they can’t have, and a unique logo that only members can purchase has worked extremely well for us. Our normal logo is three pine trees, but for the members we created a logo with a gold circle around the pine trees. We create an area in the shop where the members see the merchandise along with sending an email blast at the beginning of each of our seasons with a link to the merchandise available for that season.
Top 10 List: At the end of December, my staff runs the numbers of the best 10 customers. I personally send each of them a handwritten note to congratulate them and thank them for their support. Each note has a 20 percent off card for them to use the next time they visit the club.
Subliminal Sales: My belief has always been that the golf professional is the model for the brands we carry. Many times throughout the year, we put the shirt I’m wearing that day on the front rack facing the shop door. Members and guests see me out on the range giving a swing tip or greeting the groups and they come in and purchase merchandise. It isn’t uncommon to sell every one of the shirts on that same day.
Collegiate Merchandise: With Texas being a fanatical football state, we introduced merchandise with our logo along with a collegiate logo. We chose five schools the majority of our members had attended and created an entire line of merchandise they can choose from, sending an email every September with the different options.
Corporate Merchandise: We have numerous corporate memberships, and we offer each of these accounts a 20 percent discount for orders placed with their logo on the sleeve and our logo on the front of the shirt. Corporations are going to spend money on their clients and having their company logo and our pine tree logo has been very successful.
These and other practices – including end-of-the-year cornhole for discounts, video email blasts and offering members golf clubs for cost plus 10 percent– have led to consistent growth in our shop over a 21-year period.