True Temper’s Don Brown has seen the golf business – and his role in it – change quite a bit over his nearly 25 years with True Temper Sports. From his start as a design engineer to his current position as Vice President of Marketing & Innovation, Brown has also been a part of True Temper adding new brands and products to its portfolio along the way. PGA Magazine caught up with him recently to learn more about True Temper’s plans for 2026 and how PGA of America Golf Professionals can benefit from knowing more about golf shafts.
PGA Magazine: How have you seen True Temper Sports change in your 25 years with the brand?
Don Brown: Even though we’re a 100-year-old company – and some of our products, like Dynamic Golf shafts, have decades of legacy in the game – we’re still finding ways to improve upon those products. Obviously, True Temper Sports now has a wide variety of products and brands, encompassing SteelFiber, Acura, Project X and the True Temper line. But we’re also excited about bringing new technologies to market that are going to bring better results to golfers and golf coaches.
What are some of the new shaft technologies we’ll be learning about this year?
Brown: First, we have a new graphite shaft for irons coming out called Titan. It features a really unique stiffness profile with a much softer handle section paired with a new technology called SYNEX that keeps the shaft from feeling too soft. Golfers can actually load the shaft more without it feeling whippy. We’ve seen a couple mile an hour ball speed gain against some of our existing products and some competitive products, and we’re really encouraged about Titan.
Another really interesting product we have coming out is a shaft designed specifically for female golfers. A lot of better female golfers play a softer men’s shaft, but we’ve designed a shaft from the ground up for women. We’re working with an engineer from Texas A&M, and she’s been highly involved in the development of the shaft, and all of the product testing has been done only with women, and that’s not usually the case with women’s golf shafts.
What should PGA of America Golf Professionals who work as coaches and clubfitters know about golf shafts as a new season begins?
Brown: Obviously, this is the time of year when a lot of new products from the OEMs start coming out, and you see a lot of consumers buying clubs or even shafts off the rack in a big box environment or directly from company websites. PGA of America Golf Professionals who offer fittings and know about shafts understand that many consumers are leaving a lot of yardage and performance on the table by playing shafts that don’t really fit them.
The best fitters I see start with the driver, since a lot of golfers have preconceived notions about what they need there. By letting them hit a few shots with what they think they need, then a few with something that fits them better, you gain a lot of trust by finding them another 10 yards. That makes the conversation about the rest of the set that much easier.
Don’t be afraid to show customer their spin numbers – if they’re educated enough to be asking about shafts, they probably have been on a launch monitor and know what their spin numbers should be. That’s beneficial, and smart fitters use that to their advantage.
