Everybody loved Pierre. With his affable personality, his French-Canadian accent, plumpish frame and continuous sparkle in his eyes, he was the favourite personality in our office. I think a lot of people underestimated the fact he was an intelligent, well-educated man with an amazing ability to communicate with people and quickly gain their support in social situations or in finding business solutions. He taught himself to speak English by diligently watching the English news on TV (and cartoons on Saturday mornings). He went to the Université du Québec in Montreal and graduated at the top of his class in Economics. Since the textbooks were primarily written by prominent American economists, reading them over and over again is how he learned to read and write English.
I met Pierre when we both worked for the Canadian Federal Government. We developed an immediate friendship. As an Anglo originally from the heart of English-speaking Canada, Pierre was my first real exposure to a French speaking Quebecker. I loved the fact he bought his gas at “texacko”. But I also greatly respected his savvy business sense and his drive to succeed. Pierre always asked me to help him with his English spelling and pronunciation, but the foolish thing is, I never worked with him to improve my French. We both loved golf and shared golf stories over coffee. In one of those sessions, we decided to start our own golf company.
Soon afterward, we developed a business plan for a mail order golf shop. At that time, you could only buy the best golf equipment through a golf course pro shop or sometimes at a driving range – always at high prices (although not as sky-high as today’s major investment required for individual clubs). Our objective, therefore, was to offer discounted pro-line golf equipment by mail order (the internet and on-line retailing did not exist at that time). Our business plan was impressive as we recognized that expansion to the US would mean more revenue because we could buy golf equipment much cheaper there. The other important opportunity was the ability to play golf year-round in southern climes while supporting our American branches during the frigid Canadian winter.
With our freshly drafted plan in place, I approached a company with great pro-line clubs seeking to move into the Canadian marketplace. Lynx USA was a brand of pro-line golf clubs that I had seen at a Toronto golf course pro shop. The set had surprised me with its high-quality irons and, more pointedly, its persimmon woods.
I must digress a little to talk about persimmon woods.
In this modern day of graphite and titanium woods, many golfers have never seen handcrafted persimmon woods. I can tell you they were magnificent. They were derived from US grown persimmon trees, a hardwood with a noticeable grain that adds to the attractiveness of the brown coloured wood (later versions such as my Walter Hagen persimmons had a dark coloured epoxy covering, presumably for added strength and consistent colouring). They say the older the persimmon tree, the denser the wood and hence the more effective it is at hitting a greater distance. Each wood was made of a single piece of hardwood and shaped by golf artisans to form the appropriate lie/loft. A metal base with screws to secure it provided strength, weight and balance. The face was a lot smaller than today’s clubs and the ball had to be hit in the centre of the head or the distance would be noticeably shorter. I’m not sure where the expression came from originally but hitting a persimmon wood “on the screws” produced a noticeable and pleasant sound as the ball was struck and it took off down the fairway. It was a true skill for the golfer to hit it in the centre of the club. The woods were covered with a lacquer coating to protect it from water and impact scratching, but the brown wood colouring and noticeable grain gave it a memorable appearance.
When I saw those Lynx USA clubs, I knew I wanted to play them.
I contacted the company and met with the Canadian sales rep, convincing him about the validity of our business plan and our desire to own a driving range, the first step in obtaining pro-line credibility. To my surprise, he liked our plan and offered me a demo set of clubs, including those magnificent persimmon woods. Unfortunately, he would only make one demo set available (sorry Pierre), but he provided us with his full catalog of products and, the coup de grace, the pro-line price list. Pierre was flabbergasted by this breakthrough, but we both knew this was the start of our golf business dream.
We chose the name “Action Golf” because it was a bilingual English/French name – a must for our Canadian market. After our success with Lynx, we began to contact pro-line sales reps, indicating to each that we had secured a (unnamed) pro-line brand. Slowly, with the exception of Spalding – the market leader at that time – we obtained the cherished price lists.
We used the catalogs from the suppliers to diligently cut out golf equipment pictures and paste them into our first mail order catalogue mock-up. Using my map making skills, I lettraset the words and text around each picture – a laborious task. Pierre matched this for the French version.
We approached the telephone company to obtain a business phone. Mine was mounted to the stairway en route to the basement. Pierre settled for an extra phone in his bedroom. With no great source of investment capital, we initially approached friends and ordered in clubs from the suppliers to sell to them. This provided some working capital to order in a few extra sets, and some credibility and credit standing with suppliers.
The first real test for Action Golf came when we built a portable display sign and negotiated a small rental fee for space in the corridor of a busy local shopping mall. We carted to the mall our sign, made from an italicized styrofoam representation of our company name, mounted on a standing green plywood support wall. We brought with us several club sets and bags to be displayed. With the aid of a draw, we managed to get the names and addresses of interested parties which we followed up by contacting after the weekend display. We talked to many people, including avid golfers anxious to obtain pro-line equipment at a fraction of the pro shop prices. It was hard work though: setting everything up before mall opening was a packing challenge requiring several trips; talking to people for hours on end was initially exciting but eventually became repetitive and quite tiring; finally, carrying everything out and taking it home just before the mall closed meant a late night. We did this for two weekend days and nights.
Near the end of the weekend “show”, after we had sold several of the sets we had brought to be displayed, we met the powerhouse owner of a local golf store that was the largest seller of Spalding equipment and many other pro-line equipment in Canada. She appeared with some local golf pros and proceeded to look closely at our display, and eventually at our catalogue. By coincidence, Pierre had managed to obtain a set of Spalding equipment on consignment from a small golf club near his home. When the golf queen saw the Spalding set she approached me and in a loud and threatening voice exclaimed “We are the largest Spalding golf club retailer in Canada, and I’ll make sure they never sell a set to you again”. Ah, the joys of competition.
Later that week, I received a call from the Spalding Canada’s head office asking where we had purchased our Spalding clubs. Of course, I’d never tell. I was told, in no uncertain terms, that they would never sell to us, and they would speak with other golf club reps about the fact we were not golf professionals or authorized to sell pro-line equipment. Ugh. The same day I received a call from Titleist repeating this story. Without Titleist we could not sell the best-selling pro-line golf ball. By the end of the week our catalogue had been significantly reduced in size, but fortunately Wilson and Lynx remained with us.
This was a major setback, to say the least. As Pierre’s wife and mine, often babies in hand, answered the Action Golf phone line, more often than not the potential customer had to be told that the products requested were currently back-ordered.
We needed a new plan.
Pierre told me he had seen a driving range advertised in nearby Touraine and one weekend we went out to see it. A driving range was the fallback way to get pro-line equipment – if we owned it?
The driving range was interesting, but definitely not busy on a weekday afternoon. We noticed no one was in the service booth when we arrived but in the distance a tractor was picking up range balls. We waited for its return and introduced ourselves to the owner, a local farmer. He indicated that on his property he had a driving range and a mini-putt that he said needed repairs (Oh My. Reconstruction would be a better term!). In the distance he showed us his nine-hole golf course which we toured while standing on the back of the hitch rail of his tractor. His pride and joy, although, sadly, not ours, was a two-story building which he exclaimed was a bar, complete with several tables and an “event room”. Upstairs was his storage area.
The farmer indicated to us that he wanted to retire and while he loved to play golf, the facility was wearing him out with maintenance. What maintenance? His son, he noted, disliked golf and would not help, preferring instead to work on truck repairs in the maintenance garage. We asked him if he was interested in a potential partnership but he stated the land and this golf facility was his pension. He really wanted to sell it. He also confided that he had recently lost his liquor serving licence for the bar because his son was selling liquor and beer out the back door – to local teenagers. He was missing the extra revenue from the bar.
Pierre and I told him we would think about potentially buying the property and would get back to him soon.
Well. Well. Well. Was this an opportunity of a lifetime?
After leaving the facility we stopped at a nearby restaurant/café to discuss the opportunity in more detail. Positively, the property included 150 acres, some of which included the golf course and a small area in crops. The farmer wanted to keep his house but would sell the land, garage, bar, golf course, mini-putt and driving range. It was, however, a difficult time for investment of any kind.
Both Pierre and I had young families, starter houses, and a mortgage. Lending rates at the time were about 11% (this is not a typo!) – if available. Pierre thought the farmer might be interested in simply mortgaging the property by taking an annualized pension of $25,000, paid monthly for – say 10 years. At interest rates current at that time, such an arrangement significantly reduced the actual value of the property but provided the farmer with a reasonable pension.
The idea seemed possible, even for us, to pay the monthly amount with offsetting revenues from Action Golf. Pierre even had a good friend who might be interested in running the operation for us. While Touraine seemed distant from Ottawa, in fact there was some future potential for the city of Hull (now Gatineau) to expand into that area. Maybe we could later sell the land. (How amazing that risk analysis at that time seemed so uncomplicated for young people).
With the foundation of an idea and Pierre promising to work out realistic numbers, we contemplated how we would broach the idea in the near future with the Touraine farmer.
On our way home we worked our way toward the west end of the city and just before we split to go toward our respective home destinations, we both stopped in shock along the road. There, halfway on the edge of the urbanized area and the more remote Touraine, was a bulldozer working a sizeable piece of land along the busy road. A sign was prominently displayed indicating “Future Home of Hull’s All Inclusive Golf Facility”. Whoa! We both got out of our cars and looked at the sign and the work going on. It was a sizeable area. It adjoined the city of Hull. It was a few short minutes from Ottawa. Immediately we realized the Touraine investment would definitely be in jeopardy.
Pierre and I met again a week later to discuss the next steps and indeed they now appeared more difficult. In the meantime, my wife had announced that she would no longer answer the Action Golf phone line as embarrassingly while answering a call my son had been screaming in her arms. Not a good way to win customer credibility. Pierre indicated that he had spoken to a local Sports Experts’ franchisee who was interested in selling Lynx and Wilson pro-line equipment, on consignment.
With careers opening up for both of us in the federal government, we both decided to end the Action Golf venture. I did order a new set of Walter Hagen Ultraflex irons and persimmon woods (which I still have to this day) from Wilson. I gave my Lynx USA set to Pierre and we disconnected the Action Golf phone lines. The left-over equipment was to be sold on consignment (slowly) through Sports Experts.
Shortly afterward, Pierre was promoted. I moved to another government department. Resurrecting the Company was never brought up again. Pierre and I played golf occasionally together after that, but sadly, we eventually drifted apart. I wonder if he still has his persimmon woods?
Did I mention that this story was the fiftieth anniversary of our dream to be in the golf business? Some interesting things have transpired since then:
- A few months after closing Action Golf, Pierre called to tell me we had to remove the equipment at Sports Experts quickly – that very day in fact – as the franchise was closing down. Apparently high interest rates had killed their business.
- The golf business has certainly experienced its ups and downs, but the property in Touraine is now still a driving range with the same building housing the bar. A subdivision development is close by.
- The golf business declined dramatically after our adventure. I ensure it’s because young families could not afford to give up five hours of household time to a frivolous expensive game and interest rates soared. By 1980 interest rates rose to almost 20%!
- The recession of the late 1970s and early 1980s must have been too much for the new driving range complex in Hull. I’m not sure it was ever completed and it is no longer there today.
- The queen of Canadian golf retailing sold her business and eventually the store closed for good. Pro line golf equipment seems to be available everywhere now at exorbitant prices, perhaps brought on by the high technology upstarts Callaway, Cobra and Taylor Made
- Spalding no longer makes pro-line golf equipment. Seems it was usurped by those start up companies.
- Metal woods, initially introduced on a mass basis by Callaway (Big Bertha), eventually replaced persimmon and laminate wood golf clubs. I gave my cherished Walter Hagen persimmons to a friend after undertaking a major downsizing move during Covid. A picture is linked to this post.
- Lynx USA seems to be back in the golf game after several decades. They now specialize in clubs for juniors. Great move!! (Have you ever tried to find good clubs for juniors)?
- According to the US based National Golf Foundation more rounds of golf were played in 2023 than in any year since they began keeping records in 1986. By the way it is now just slightly more than in Tiger Woods’ prime year in 2001 (531M vs 518M)[1]. People now seem to be playing golf more than ever, but I suspect it’s because the social and economic fabric of people playing the game has changed dramatically since those days of Action Golf. Long live the game!
MainstreetRob 