Behind the Golf Brand Podcast with Paul Liberatore
It’s like playing a round of golf with some of the most interesting innovators and entrepreneurs and listening to the stories behind their success.
Hi, I’m Paul Liberatore, and I love talking to entrepreneurs and the stories behind their brands. I find it intriguing when people are vulnerable and honest about their struggles and successes. I invite you to join me as I explore other people’s stories. We will celebrate, above all, the challenges and setbacks that ultimately lead to some of the biggest names and brands in the game of golf.
So come join me on my quest to find the stories Behind the Brand.
Behind the Golf Brand Podcast with Paul Liberatore
#81 - Golftrainingaids.com: John Diulus and Emily Faulkner (CEO)
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We made it to Episode 81 of the Behind the Golf Brand Podcast. In this week's episode, I interview my good friends John Diulus and Emily Faulkner of Golftrainingaids.com.
Founded by PGA Master Professional Dr. Gary Wiren, in 1984 as a resource for providing training aids to teaching and touring professionals, GolfTrainingAids.com has expanded to now offer the world's largest selection of golf teaching and training aids. Serving the golf industry for over 35 years, we are the most knowledgeable one stop shop for all of your training needs.
Today we play golf.
Speaker 2Let me show you how we do it in the pros.
Speaker 3Yeah . Welcome to behind the golf brand podcast. I never missed with the seven eye a conversation with some of the most interesting innovators and entrepreneurs behind the biggest names in golf. My
Speaker 4Friends were the golf clubs. I lived on the golf course. I lived on the driving range
Speaker 3From pro talk . You should learn something from each and every single round you play to fun from on and off the green.
Speaker 5Why would you play golf? You don't play it for money.
Speaker 3Just let me put the ball in a hole. This is behind the golf brand podcast with Paul liberatory .
Speaker 6What's up guys, Paul from golfer's authority. Welcome to the behind the golf brand podcast. This week, I have two special guests from golf training aids.com. I have John dials and Emily Faulkner. This would be a really cool show because you allow , you guys might already know Emily from Instagram and John is a powerhouse and he's coming in and taking over the golf world. So this should be a lot of fun and I'm excited to have him on the show. So welcome to the show today. We're
Speaker 7Excited. Thanks for having us.
Speaker 6All right . So where are you guys located?
Speaker 7So we are, our warehouse is based in west Palm beach, Florida. Um, we've run the company out of this area , um, for a little over 30 years.
Speaker 6So tell me the story of golf, trans.com , cuz they're like an OG golf website. Like they're one of the originals. I mean top 10, probably original. So how'd that all started ?
Speaker 7Yeah. So , um, well a little so we , we bought the company a , a little over eight months ago . Um, we were looking for an eCommerce business and my business partner and I were our avid golfers , uh , think , uh , ed , my business partner is a member at like four or five different club , uh , has been a golf training geek forever. So we decided we wanted to buy a golf training aids company. Um, and we found golf training aids.com reached out to the owner and literally a couple weeks later we owned the company. So it's , uh , it was a great acquisition, loved the business. You know, I , I ,
Speaker 6You bought it a good time too, right? Because I mean golf's up 50% or whatever it is, right.
Speaker 7It's, it's funny how life works. Uh , I spent a little over 20 years as an executive in the travel business, you were asked most people. I had the sexiest job in the world being able to travel all over the place in the pandemic hit. Um , and we again looked for an eCommerce business and found golf training aids.com . And my only right is I didn't do this 20 years ago
Speaker 6Really
Speaker 7To work with Emily.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Speaker 6I mean , I feel like life is short, right? So it's like I was telling before the show , I quit my job and I was thinking like, okay, I have, you know, 20 years left really doing this, but this is more fun. So it's kind of like, I'm glad I'm doing it now. This , I mean , scary, but I'm glad I'm doing it now because it's like looking back. I'm glad I did that. You know? So it's cool to hear that from you cuz you had a good storied career in travel.
Speaker 7It's hard to say that there's a silver lining from the pandemic, but I think what it , it , it trained everybody is to really think about what they wanna do with their life. Mm-hmm <affirmative> um, you know, you're , you're , you're stuck at home and you start to think through, you know, I , I really like the balance of working outta my house, what I really wanna do. And then this opportunity came up and it's just, you know, I , uh , my wife and I firmly believe in the saying everything happens for a reason. So totally as a result of the pandemic we get in the golf business, then I could be happier.
Speaker 6So how'd you fi so you were you're in the travel industry and you just decided, you know, maybe I wanna do something else for, you know, that's not related to this. Like, how'd you even find like how'd, you know, that golf training aids was for sale back then, like that's kind of random or did you know somebody? So
Speaker 7I knew I wanted to get into the eCommerce world and believe it or not, I bought two URL, golf training, aids , Depot, and golf training aids warehouse. Cause I thought there was a gap in the golf industry where, and again, I , I , you always look back to your experiences in the travel business. Expedia was created to be an aggregator of all kinds of product. There really didn't exist. There, there wasn't a training aid training aid aggregator online. So we were actually gonna build something on our own. And I just literally typed in training aids.com because I wanted to buy the URL and the website popped up and I , and I , and I , again , I told my business part and I said,
Speaker 6Oh crap,
Speaker 7<laugh> I think it's a good business. I think we could probably do it better, but maybe we could buy them and , uh , and expand on the business. And, and that's exactly what we
Speaker 6Did. So when was that?
Speaker 7That was August. Well, we , we officially took, bought the business in August of 2021, but the initial conversation happened probably 45 days, almost two months before that.
Speaker 6So it was fast.
Speaker 7It happened really fast. Yeah.
Speaker 6I mean then two months you have a golf company, like that's already been running forever. Well , and
Speaker 7I'll play the other crazy thing. The owner is also was an attorney , um , really , and that's cool and hated it <laugh> , um , and wanted to get out. So he wanted to become an entrepreneur and , um, we bought this at another business, but we negotiated the sale of a company with him and he takes his son and his wife, they bought a huge RV and they drive the country every year during the summer. So they spend like four months in an RV going
Speaker 6West enjoy life, right. Enjoying life, like not ,
Speaker 7We literally negotiated the deal , um , at, at an RV stop .
Speaker 6<laugh> shut up really?
Speaker 7Right . Yeah.
Speaker 6Where , where was it? Like some small town in middle of nowhere?
Speaker 7Uh, somewhere in Montana, somewhere in Montana. Yeah . That's I never saw him . Right . I didn't see him until we had a zoom call with one of our other business partners and he gets on and you know, he's in this RV for three months and he's got this full beard and his S out to here . So yeah, it was , it was quite an experience
Speaker 6That is crazy. So this is what I know about golf trainings.com . I know it's been around forever, right? Like literally forever. What year did it start? Emily? Do you even , do you know, or John? I know
Speaker 8For 35 years I 19
Speaker 7Five . Yeah.
Speaker 6Was it like a , was it like a book based thing or like a magazine, you know , or mail flyer thing?
Speaker 7It was a , it was a catalog company created by, like I said , uh , Dr . Gary wire , who's a hall of fame teaching professional.
Speaker 6Yeah. He's really famous.
Speaker 7Um , and he's an amazing person. Um, and, and they really started the company to provide tools for teaching professionals and PGA pros. Um , it was really never meant to be a retail company. Um , but now golf has exploded
Speaker 6And e-com exploded.
Speaker 7Yeah. Yeah. And , and , you know , the retail side of the business now makes up probably 80 to 85% of our business where it was started as primarily a wholesale company ,
Speaker 6Golf , trains.com . It's been around since like when everybody started buying domains essentially. Right. Yeah . Like probably like mid nineties, maybe earlier than that, I would assume. I don't know I was in high school.
Speaker 7Uh , well , so the , the company, the original name was golf
Speaker 6Around the world. That's right . It was golf around the world. That's exactly what it was. I remember
Speaker 7That. And, and I give Dan credit Dane , um , who works for us now as our GM , uh , and head of , uh , head of product had a product. Um, he wanted to get in the retail space and he's very techy to begin with. And he had the , uh , the foresight to go out and , uh , buy the , the URL called trading aids.com .
Speaker 6Wow. And I , and I was telling you earlier, like before the show started, like my dad knows Dan well,
Speaker 7Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 6That's CR I mean, I , like , I know Dan, cause my dad would say, oh yeah. And he'd call Dan. And then he would talk to him . I remember like, this is the early two thousands about call stuff. And so, I mean, it's cool to hear all this because like, I don't know , my dad always spoke very highly of the wires and it's cool to have you guys here because it's kind of like full circle. Cause I remember like sending you product, you know, like I graduated college. So like, here's my story. Right. Like I graduated college and I used to be a pilot. So I was like flight training all the time and I was making no money. So I went for my dad and so he was a consultant and he's like, Hey, I started a golf training aid . He's like, I don't know what to do with this. It's like early internet days. And he's like, so, you know, would you help me market it? So I was like, sure, I knew nothing about marketing. And so all I did is I just wrote letters to like all the editors of every , uh , golf magazine, essentially like the equipment editor and be like, Hey, my dad invented this, you know, golf training aid. And we mailed it to him and that's essentially how we got like how we met Dane. And I mean , it was, it's just cool. Like here we are 20 years later. It's weird. How long
Speaker 8Training aid out for,
Speaker 6Huh? My dad's training aid . I mean, we still have it. It just like it's called Accu hit and I'll send you guys one. Um , I think you guys did carry a long time ago, but then my dad stopped doing it, but now I own it. So , um, it's just this little grip training aid's about as big as about, as big as that. Right. And about , and then it's barrel shaped and it, you put on the grip and it helps you keep your hands, like these fingers apart and kind of like kinda got an oversized grip would do for you. And I kind of make it bigger and it's, you know, it was cheap and it worked. And I remember here's true story. We were in Vegas and my dad's like, Hey, I invented this thing. I was in college. Right. And I flew from , I , I flew home to, to my parents. And so I , he was like, Hey, I've invented this thing. And I'm like, what is he ? I'll call it the Accu hit. And it's this mangled up rubber thing that he like music rubber to make it and all this crap. And there was like a hose. And I was like, what is this? He's like, just trust me. It works. And so do sure, sure, man. Like I like love the driving range. I started using it and all of a sudden the ball were going straight and I was like, what did you just invent? This is like the coolest I've ever seen in my entire life. But um, I'm not trying to sell it. I'm just saying like,
Speaker 8Yeah ,
Speaker 6But it was a long time ago.
Speaker 7We , the , the one thing I really liked about this business, well , there's a lot of things I like about it. But one of the things I like is we get to meet people like your father all the time . There are inventors who come to us, partly because Dane has a reputation of someone who is a trusted expert on training aids . But we get people walking , you know, we're in , we're in a warehouse and all of a sudden we'll get someone knocking on the door and it's like, who's this person. Well, I have this training and I wanna show somebody . I think it , you know , I think does
Speaker 6That really happen ?
Speaker 7Oh yeah . All the
Speaker 6Time for real
Speaker 7Dude
Speaker 6Guys who invent training aids are , I'm telling you my dad's like that. Like he's
Speaker 8<laugh>
Speaker 7Yep , yep .
Speaker 8Lots of ideas.
Speaker 7Yep .
Speaker 6Yep . And so people knock on the door and say, Hey, I wanna show you this training aid. And you're like, how'd you find us? Right. And then you're like, we're , we're a warehouse. You need to go. <laugh> no , I'm just kidding. Um, so then let's, let's switch to Emily for a minute. So Emily, lot of you guys probably know her from Instagram. I mean, so how many followers do you have on Instagram?
Speaker 8So I have , uh , almost 350,000 followers on Instagram.
Speaker 6It's crazy numbers.
Speaker 8200,000 on TikTok . It was pretty,
Speaker 6When did you let me ask this social media question to you. Okay. So like, did you jump on the TikTok , like right when it came out like three years ago or were you on it later on?
Speaker 8Honestly, I think I started probably at least a year and a half after everyone was all take off . I started pretty late in the game actually. Yeah. But , um , I like it a lot, you know, I think it's a different following than my Instagram. It's a lot.
Speaker 6Is it really?
Speaker 8I think it's a lot younger age group than Instagram, than , you know , Facebook, but I think it's really fun. I , I like sharing all of my golf videos and trick shots with everyone and I don't know . I think it's a great
Speaker 6Platform. Do you do that on Instagram too? Like on your shorts or your reels or whatever it's called?
Speaker 8I do.
Speaker 6That's cool. So then I remember like my friends were like, oh, you should go on TikTok . And I was like, that is not my demographic. Like <laugh> , they're like, no, you should do it. And this like in the very beginning,
Speaker 7You'd be surprised
Speaker 6<laugh> oh , I know. And then now I'm like, oh, I should did . They told me to, you know , like that was kind of , not really, I mean, I'm on Instagram. I should like, I mean, we have an account. I just, I haven't really, I should, I should probably talk to my social team about that and be like, Hey, let's focus . I know. I think now, well, in the beginning we weren't making a lot of videos. So then it was like, you know, it was , it was like , all the dancing was going on too. Like everyone's doing a dance and I'm like, I'm not dancing. I'm like doing like some fake dance across the screen. Like to some song I don't even know, like I'm not doing that. And then now it's more, it's kind of changing though. Right? Because you can see it with YouTube and Instagram. They're all going short, short stuff, right. To compete
Speaker 810, 15, second videos that are just
Speaker 6Funny . Yeah. It's like when you started seeing everyone else copying somebody, then you know, it's like, okay, they're , they're threatened.
Speaker 8Exactly.
Speaker 6So I , I like totally geek out on this stuff cause I like to see like, okay. That's, that's interesting. You ,
Speaker 7You , you know that before the show, we , we both shared where we were , our families were and uh, your family and my family are from a , the same or same small region in Italy.
Speaker 6Teeny tiny.
Speaker 7Yeah. Very, very, very small. You don't really meet a whole lot of people , um, that are from that region.
Speaker 6Um , see we're brothers, John we're probably, we probably know each other, like our families probably know each
Speaker 7<laugh> . Um , but one of the reasons I I'm on TikTok all the time is because, you know , most Italians eat . Like they either eat or cook. I like both
Speaker 6And talk
Speaker 7And I find all kind of recipes, all kind of recipes on TikTok. It's actually pretty cool.
Speaker 6Really. See I'm like, I like, so like I find like an old man I'm like really that's on there. You know? I mean, I , yeah, we , I know we totally digres to , to for some random reason, but um, yeah, listen , this , you guys, literally John and my family and John's family are like from the same small province in Italy, which is like not a popular province, like , oh, we're from Rome or something, you know, whatever it's called. Camia right. It's Romi . So it's like, oh , you know , you just tell me , oh yeah . We're from here. It's like a one in 60 chance or something. So it's kind of crazy because , um, you don't see that. I mean , it's cool.
Speaker 8What town is that close to in Italy ?
Speaker 7It's um , it's a couple of hours outside of Rome.
Speaker 6Um , yeah. It's like two and a half hours, like Northeast of Rome. Okay . It's really pretty, it looks like a postcard because it's so like all these like stone houses everywhere and it's like, it's the Foothill of the foot foothills of the ALP. So it's like rugged. I don't know . It looks so cool. Uh , I loved it and the food was so good. And like everybody makes alcohol in their basement. Like there's like these huge old wine barrels. And like this wine is like the best wine you've ever had. Like it's , it tastes like candy. Like it's so sweet, but it totally messes you up. Like for real, like there's a little bit, it's so strong. Like they don't regulate it. And I remember we went to this, like, we went to this , there's a big city called Pesca it's on the east. It's on , it's like a half hour away, but it's on the Eastern side of the , of the country on the ocean. Right. Or on the , and we like went to this like home Depot, whatever they call it there. And it was literally like two aisles, just winemaking stuff. I was like, what the hell? But so John , let's go there. Come on. You probably you're the travel industry golf . Let's go right now.
Speaker 7Yeah .
Speaker 8I know at the golfers are beautiful.
Speaker 6I'm like , could you imagine that'd be so much fun. Um, so then Emily, how did you find golf trainings.com?
Speaker 8So actually I've worked for golf trainings for almost two years now. And the previous owner, he reached out over social media to work together , uh , with a , to do a partnership. And I told him I'm originally from south Florida, you know, I'm, I would really love to come back down here and we'd end up turning into a full-time job. And, you know, I told him how much I love training aids. I've used them since I was four years old playing in tournaments. And I talked about some of my favorite ones and you know, how much they've helped me and some of the biggest tournaments I' got to, and it turned into a full-time job and I'm loving it.
Speaker 6That's crazy. Enjoy it . So literally they like just reached out to an Instagram and said, Hey, we wanna sponsor a post or sponsor whatever. And you're like, nah , nah , nah , nah , nah . Oh my job ,
Speaker 8Exactly . I said wanted to do something more. So I'm very happy with my decision .
Speaker 7Well , but her hand they call it handle. Right. Is it handle or
Speaker 8Yeah , it's golfer girl .
Speaker 7M golfer, girl M . So it it's , uh , obviously there's an affinity for golf. Um, Emily also , uh , played the vision . Yeah.
Speaker 6But you're good though. Right? It's not like, oh, hi , I'm gonna pose for like , and I'm gonna pose the golf club. It's like, no, you're a golfer and you're good. I played
Speaker 8One in college and I played since I was four , I traveled all over the world playing torn .
Speaker 6Yeah . You're , you're the , you're the real deal. It's not like, you know, it's not like, oh, I'm gonna pose in front of a cart. You know, it's just like,
Speaker 8Exactly . No, I love it.
Speaker 6Right. I mean, especially cuz people do that and it's like, you know, being a , a people do it . Yeah. Like actually, cuz you're, I mean seen on golf trainings.com, like you're kind of like the spokes model , right? Like you you're using the products you're in the, you know, the you're giving feedback on it. Like I think it's really cool that like it's kind of a , a balance, right? Like being able to show, right . Exactly .
Speaker 8No I'm in charge of all of our content creation and I really enjoy doing it
Speaker 6Because big, big task.
Speaker 8Yes, no it is. But I enjoy it and I make a lot of like 10 kids and second videos just showing, you know, how to use the training aids and um , setting it up. And so many of our training aids are so easy to use too. Like I, you know, there's hundreds out there, but I think everyone that we have on our website is something that's simple, you know, to put together, to use and really can help a lot of different players. So I mean ,
Speaker 6So how many training aids do you guys carry?
Speaker 7Um, I'm gonna say we probably have over 200 SKUs. Um,
Speaker 6Holy crap.
Speaker 7Mm-hmm <affirmative> yeah , we had more than that. When , when we bought the company and, and some of the stuff we, you know, we kind of parsed out because
Speaker 6You vetted, vetted , you kinda vetted it. You're like this thing does not work like this is like
Speaker 7<laugh> . Um , but I will tell you when we bought the company, one of the things we realized that we needed to , uh , really invest in this content because you know, it's training aids are one of those products where if you open the box and you look at it and you think, you think to yourself, how , how am I supposed to use? Yeah.
Speaker 6You're like , what is this? How is this gonna work ?
Speaker 7Right . What is ,
Speaker 6It's not, self-explanatory like none of 'em are.
Speaker 7So we, we invest a lot in content , um , and, and specifically videos so that if consumers are looking how to fix a certain part of their game, they can see the video on how it's being used so that they can then replicate that at the range or in their home.
Speaker 6And that's big, right. Because you can't just take a picture of it and be like, oh, here's the picture of the unit. And here's a person holding it. It's like, that's not gonna help them figure it out. Like you kind of have to give an, an example or an instruction on how to use it. Um,
Speaker 7Probably out of the office once every two weeks mm-hmm <affirmative> , um, filming content so that we, you know, especially, and that's one of , one of the attractive things about new training aids that come into the market because they know they can come to us and we have , um, you know , uh , professional photographers , uh , obviously Emily knows what she's doing. Um, so we have , we we're able to develop really good content for new products.
Speaker 6So I may ask this question and like, how, like how much time does it take to , to , to put together that content? Like, let's see , let's say I send you a new training aid. Right. Um , that you, I mean, obviously the , the manufacturer might say, oh, here's our imager in here. It is . But you're like, yeah, that's not kind of how we like to do it. We want it to look a certain way. We want it to, we wanna show people how to use it a lot
Speaker 8Time. At least , uh , every time I go out and shoot it , it's a couple hours on either the range or at the course. Cause a lot
Speaker 6Of I could imagine. Yeah. It's like a , a lot of time.
Speaker 8No , it does . And then editing and just figuring out too with what social platform or YouTube, you know, it's longer videos, Instagram pick off shorter , um , you know, figuring out which content is best for each platform, but it does take a lot of time, but you know, we're trying able to target every different , uh ,
Speaker 6Group. So are you the only person like making the content then right now for job tri
Speaker 7Yeah . Wow . Yes .
Speaker 6So then how, and then what , let me ask a second question then. So like, if somebody comes to you, I'm assuming it probably takes a while for it to like be ready to sell. Right. Like you probably get the product, but then you're like, okay, we gotta make this thing look a certain way and we need to be able to use it and explain it. Um, that's a lot of word I couldn't imagine. Cuz trainings are different. It's not like you buy a new piece of equipment. Right. And you're like, we already know what this thing does. It's a driver. Right. Like I know what it does, but like we give us , you know, when you get some random looking like hook, you know, with some things on it or something you're like, what is that? Um, what would you say, here's a question for you? What would you say is the hottest training age right now? Based on like your guys' experience. I know one already, I already know almost if you're gonna say it,
Speaker 8Probably the David board right now.
Speaker 6I do . That's what gonna say myself.
Speaker 8I love it.
Speaker 7Yeah. It's great product. It really is.
Speaker 8So just one idea.
Speaker 7Yeah. That's , that's probably our, our , um , how to selling product and I will tell you the other, the other thing that is interesting , um , that we've learned is some of the training age that were created 20, 25 years ago that are still really effective. Um, there's a market for those. So one of the things we're doing is we're looking for products that were maybe very, very popular 20 years ago , um, and making slight modifications to them and relaunching them with , uh , uh , where they're their slight improvements. And I'll give you an example of one that we're gonna launch. Um , later this month , um, we, we owned a power fan, which is a, it's a ,
Speaker 6Oh, I remember that thing.
Speaker 7A swing fan. Yeah. And , and it's been around for 20, 25 years. Um, and we, when we were talking about making some improvements to the product , um, danger with us , our GM, that one of the long drive champions used it in his workouts all the time. So we reached out to Maurice Allen. I , yeah , Maurice is a 30 time winner , uh , on the, the , the prolonged drive circuit and loves the product, uses it every day and is part of his workout routine. And , uh , we're gonna relaunch it with , uh , his custom grips that have counterbalance weights , uh , on the end , um , his workout routine . And , uh, he's gonna get behind, it loves the product already uses it. And we're gonna relaunch that , um , later, later this month.
Speaker 6So like, let me ask this question, when you say relaunch, like, so you guys own the rights to it now, or the name or the patent, or like, what's sort of with all that.
Speaker 7We , we have the trademark , um, and we're gonna , we're going to use that and , um , get back out market it ,
Speaker 6Uh , that's smart. I didn't even think about, that's really smart, John, like those, those training aids back in the day that like, I wouldn't say they fizzled, they just kind of like the people who made 'em don't make 'em anymore right. Or moved on their lives or whatever it might be.
Speaker 7So this is a true story, but , um , brilliant Dane Dane happens to also keep , um, a collection of old, old products . So he has a huge collection of old training aids.
Speaker 6Yeah . It's called the warehouse.
Speaker 7<laugh> yeah . He's a little bit of a pack rack . Um , but he pulled out this product. I'm like, where is that? And , and I won't share the , the name because , um, we're gonna try to recreate this, but the inventor of it , um, it's unfortunately no longer with us , he passed away and it was very successful 20 years ago and there are other products that are like it, but this is actually better. Um, so we're excited about seeing how , um , we're in the process of trying to find a manufacturer , um , to make it see
Speaker 6That's next level stuff, John, like for real, I mean that's, no, it really is because it's not like I'm coming into it and I'm gonna buy an e-comm store and I'm going to like sell stuff. Right. You're like, yeah , I'm gonna do that. But then I'm gonna find those training aids that like don't exist anymore, or people have 'em, but they don't make 'em any , whatever it might be like that that's so smart because there's prob I mean, there's probably hundreds of 'em out there thousands.
Speaker 7There's , there's a lot, there's a lot. And you'll hear a lot about them . Um , over the next six months is there's , um , I'd say that there are four products that were we're in the process of trying to find manufacturers , um , because we think there's , um , there's an opportunity to sell that .
Speaker 6So are you looking like overseas for the manufacturing or change your us
Speaker 7A little , little bit of both. We have , um, the , the nice thing about being in business for 30 years and one place you've identified manufacturers here in the local area. So we have , um , you know , dye cutters , uh , plastic manufacturers, all , we have a lot of those companies here in west Palm beach and in the port area that we use,
Speaker 6But we also a big time . We
Speaker 7Also overseas . Yeah. I'd much rather do it near , um , you have a lot more control. Um, uh ,
Speaker 6I mean the cost is a little bit higher, you know, obviously cuz it's in the us , but that's marginal considering all the , how big a pain the it is. They get stuff from overseas right now that it's like
Speaker 7It it's um , it is , it is really crazy. The shipping, the transportation cost of getting a product from say China or Korea , um , is it's astronomical. Um , so you're right now the price of the cost gap has really narrowed. Um, if you can find a man , a manufacturer here in the states who can do it.
Speaker 6Yeah. And that's not going away anytime soon. Right. It's not like, oh, COVID , it's not even a COVID thing at this point. It's past COVID it's more like, yeah, CO's always gonna be there, but I don't think it's like, once prices go up, they're not gonna go down. Right. Like shipping's not gonna go down all of a sudden, it , it just doesn't the savings you might have overseas on a product. You double it because that's, what's gonna cost to ship it here essentially. Yeah . Yeah. And then you're like, well, I could have paid that in the United States and I would've made it for three hours less right now or whatever it might be. Yeah . Um, I mean, that's cool. You guys are pivoting too in that way. We're not just focusing just on the E eco side, but like you guys want to be the training aid epicenter. Right. For anything that's training might
Speaker 8Be like the one stop shop for training aid . And we start cause before now, too , and
Speaker 6Different you have what? I'm sorry.
Speaker 8Uh , range finds .
Speaker 6Oh really?
Speaker 7Yeah . So we're , we're trying to get into the electronics side of the business also.
Speaker 6So that's smart ,
Speaker 7Um , simulators, launch bonds , right . Was , uh , range finds .
Speaker 6It was like an untapped market that you guys never really did. Right. Cause before you're just doing just training aids and now there's a whole electronic side too, which is blowing up like crazy because they're becoming more affordable and being able to dude, Emily, you're gonna be busy as hell man. Oh yeah .
Speaker 8We are already are.
Speaker 6<laugh> like, you're gonna be like running around like , okay. Now why are you doing this? You're like, I don't even know how to use that yet. Oh , we'll figure it out.
Speaker 8Yeah.
Speaker 6Go figure out to work that simulator <laugh> so what I mean, you guys have a big presence on Amazon too, right?
Speaker 7Uh , we do. Yeah. Um, you know, when we bought the company, we obviously looked at the traffic that we get on our website, which was decent for , uh , for company our size . But if you really want the sell, you want access to those third party marketplaces. So we sell on Amazon, Walmart, eBay , um , with Amazon obviously paying the , the biggest of three . Um ,
Speaker 6Now are you, are you shipping it yourself out of your location or are you doing like a , we do ,
Speaker 7We do both FBM. Um , FBA is where you house the product , um , at Amazon's warehouses. Um, and uh , so yeah, we do, we , uh , we do both , we ship it from our warehouse, which is FBM and, and for Amazon
Speaker 6That's smart. I mean, you guys are really diversified now. Right? It seems like, I mean , were you guys that diversified prior to you purchasing the company or no, in terms of , um , traffic sources?
Speaker 7No. Um , I think the , the previous owners started to get into Amazon. Um , but I think we took it to the next level. I mean, it it's, it's, it's expensive. Number one, it's expensive to sell on Amazon and to , you need capital to be able to buy the inventory and house it there. And um , and I think we were able to do that because , uh , companies well capitalized and , um , that , um , and we're able , you know , playing those , those marketplaces.
Speaker 6Yeah. Cuz I mean like even with D board, like I know you guys have it on your site, I've seen you guys. I know you guys have it on Amazon cause I've seen it saying, you know, so I know like you're really, you know, you , you sell lots of products. What I think is smart because what I think is great about training aids is that it's, they're relatively low priced . You know what I mean? When it comes to golf equipment so people can just purchase it and uh , not think twice about it or have to like explain to their wives like, oh, I spent $500 on a driver, right? Yeah . It's more like, oh I bought this training. It's only 40 bucks. Like it's okay. It's cool. You know, I think like this, I call it the smalls. Right? The smalls of golf. Like I think like it's a great area to be in. Um, so then I, I mean, what, I mean you're not professional golfer. Are you John ? Are you just like, are you like good or what?
Speaker 7I'm a , I'm a seven handicap. Oh you're love , play, love the competition. Go on two or three golf trips. Um , spite every year I've played all over. Definitely all over the country. Um, and uh, played , uh , in Europe and Ireland. So yeah . I , I just love , I love the game. I love the game of Carl . Emily's a better girlfriend than I
Speaker 6Am. Yeah. Have you and Emily played against each other yet? I wanna know more ,
Speaker 7But we're soon. Yeah. We're gonna play in a tournament. Uh , together. We we'll , we'll be on the same team . We'll be on
Speaker 6We're that same team though. We like , oh , I'm gonna doing best ball. I'd be like, oh
Speaker 8I have the lower hand . Yeah. <laugh> I'm excited.
Speaker 6So Emily was telling me before show that she was on holy moly, which I didn't even realize that yes . A
Speaker 7Year ago. Well, she didn't tell any of us. <laugh> really, my buddy saw her on TV.
Speaker 8Mm-hmm <affirmative> I just , and a lot of people reach out that were going , oh, I just saw you on ABC's. Uh , holy moley. But no , it was a really neat experience.
Speaker 6What season was that? One or two or three?
Speaker 8The third one I believe
Speaker 7Ask the water was after ask the water
Speaker 6Was cold . Was the water freezing?
Speaker 8It was filmed every night in LA at two, 3:00 AM and oh my goodness. It was , I think it was 33 degrees. And when you got knocked in that water at 33 degrees. Oh my gosh. It was pretty like ,
Speaker 6It shocked you you're in shock.
Speaker 8It does. And I I'm from south Florida originally. So
Speaker 6You you're like , you're never cold <laugh>
Speaker 8I was excited to get back to Florida, but it was a really neat experience. I met a
Speaker 6Lot of , so like , did they reach out to you or did you reach out to them or what happened? They
Speaker 8Did. They actually reached out over Instagram, one of the producers and it was, I think it was over a six month interview process until I finally went on the show. Yeah . We had a couple zoom interviews, couple ones over the phone and then whoa . They let me know that I was coming out there and I think it was about, I think it was March that I went out , finally went out
Speaker 6Of what year? Last year or the year before it was
Speaker 8Last year? Yes.
Speaker 6Um, why they film at two o'clock in the morning? What the heck?
Speaker 8Because they just wanted to be , uh , dark and just the,
Speaker 6Oh , you could see a set. All cool looking . I ,
Speaker 8It was , it was so cool. It was right in like the middle of like a valley too in California. It was beautiful. I
Speaker 6Wish I could , but you didn't win though, right? You didn't get the green jacket wherever they say it .
Speaker 8Uh , no, I did not. The cold definitely got to me, but it was fun.
Speaker 6How far did you get?
Speaker 8Uh , I went , honestly, I went through the first, I , I got the hardest hole. Um, it was the one with the windmills and I had a great pod . I actually was closer than the guy I was competing against with my putting , but got hit by the windmill. And then
Speaker 6The major golf gods were against you <laugh>
Speaker 8Yes, it was. It was , it was fun though.
Speaker 6That's so crazy. Cause when you told earlier , I was like you , you were cause I , I we've watched all the seasons, but I guess I wasn't really paying attention. I don't know . Um , I mean I want to be on it. That'd be fun.
Speaker 8A lot of people have reached out and when it was live on ABC, a lot of people reach to out . And then I think it's on Hulu now and a couple other platforms.
Speaker 6That's crazy. That's a life goal right there, John, for me to be on holy moly . So yeah,
Speaker 7There you go.
Speaker 6So what, like this year what's coming up, you know, I mean, it sounds like you're saying earlier about, you know, the new equipment you're recreating, right. Redeveloping, which I think is fricking so smart. Oh my God. So smart. Um, what else is going on? Like what else are you gonna be doing this year? Cause golf season's about to start.
Speaker 7So , um, January is my first , um, time going to the PGA show and we identified a handful of products that were, that are new , uh , that we really like. And , um, and , and were actively marketing those , uh , trying to bring help the owners or inventors bring those products to market. So , um, golf forever is one golf forever is , um , uh , a swing aid . It's got a D three , uh , swing weight in it. Um, and it also has some resistance fans where you can do a full workout with it . It's a really, really great project . It's called call forever. Um,
Speaker 6Oh yeah , I've heard that.
Speaker 7And they just signed. Um , so the funny thing is when they, when they invented it, the , one of the, one of the guys who's part of the original company , uh , was Scotty Scheffer's strength trainer. Um , and Scotty's been using uses it . He's kind of a superstitious guy and uses it for every tournament. He takes it with him and uh , and now he'll be endorsing the product. Um ,
Speaker 6Oh, wow. So that
Speaker 7Product that we're selling , um, tour aim is another one. Uh , uh , young guy from California created a alignment device that has prerow holes so that you can use , uh , pizza for swing plane analysis. He use for putting , um , alignment when you're at the, Range's a great, great product , uh , not super expensive. Uh , we're selling that. And then there's a , a few other products that we're also marketing,
Speaker 6Wow, this is gonna be a big year for you. Right. Cause this is gonna be your first full year, especially all the changes you've made too, like positive changes, like cool stuff you're doing like yeah , yeah , yeah . Um , yeah , things are , are crazy.
Speaker 7Things are good. It's good for people golfing again, you know, it is , you know, we're fortunate. I wouldn't say we're lucky because we went into this , knowing that golf was on the , on the rise again. Um, but we're, we're very fortunate that people want to use our products. Um , anybody that is a semi-serious golfer, whether they're a 25 handicap or a two handicap , um , want to get better. Um, which is, you know, our tagline is, there's a better player in everybody. Um , for everyone I should say. And it's so true. I mean, everybody wants to shoot lower scores and hit the ball further. That's the common thing theme with every golfer.
Speaker 6Yeah. They everyone's trying to get better. Right. I mean, that's just what it comes down to. I mean, like who, I mean, I think
Speaker 7You
Speaker 6Play , do I play ? Yeah, I try. I try to play how and
Speaker 8Play .
Speaker 6Uh, I play, I'm not, I'm not , uh , that good though. That's one thing, right? Like that's kind of like, my journey is I'm always trying to get better. Cause I'm like the normal average person who like used to be good, like a million years ago and then had a family, had a job and then like, didn't play all that much. And so now, like I'm always trying to find good equipment to get better.
Speaker 7Yeah. How ,
Speaker 8How young were you when you started playing
Speaker 6Like five? Probably. Okay . I was little, but I never got like crazy good. I wish I did. Um , you know, but once you have kids, it's like you have no time to play. I mean , I didn't, but now I have I lots time now, so it's all good.
Speaker 8<laugh> how old are your kids ?
Speaker 6They're uh, nine and 12. Oh , so,
Speaker 7So I'll give you a little trick. Um ,
Speaker 6I wanna hear this.
Speaker 7My son played , um , baseball and soccer and really didn't really like either one. And then I took him out , um , to play golf with me and he got in the golf cart and I let him drive and he was instantly hooked. So because I let him drive the golf cart. Um , whenever dad was going off to practice playing golf, he wanted to come with me.
Speaker 6Oh , that's
Speaker 7Cool. And some of the best days I've had with my son are on the golf course. Um, you know , he played high school. Golf was pretty good player. And uh, but yeah, it was, it was a , it was a great way to, to , to bond with , uh , with your child.
Speaker 6Yeah. I take my kids out. It's, it's , it's a , it's fun, you know, like they fight and whatever and they argue and it's like, once we did , we actually, this is a true story. We went golfing. My dad and I, and my boys went golfing like three weeks ago and I let , I got in trouble with the ranger because I let my nine year old drive the cart and this dude would not leave me alone. Like for the next three holes , he was like, you're not allowed to have him drive the cart . You're not allow to have him drive the car . It's against the insurance. And I'm like, whatever, dude. I'm like, okay, he's not driving the cart . Um, but I tried , so that's true story. I , I filmed it on my GoPros to see what, and I'm sent to my editor. Cause I'm like, I gotta see this, cuz this is actually pretty funny because the way we did it was <laugh> we only, we only gave him a five we're like, you can get a five, the most you can hit is a five on every hole . Right. And so then at , at the end of the , of course my nine year old wins. Right. Cause I all got a 45 and I was like, bro, you can get a 45. Like you got a thousand probably, but like gave , we don't , we don't wanna slow a play. It was fun. It was a lot of fun. Yeah . It was um , I wish I like, I, my oldest son doesn't really like it all that much. He thinks practicing is boring is what he said. And then my younger son is good, but then everyone's like, oh, he plays baseball and they're like, oh, his golf, swing's gonna mess up his baseball swing. And I'm like, is that really true? I don't believe that . I'm like, that's all BS. I think that's BS.
Speaker 7We have a training aid for that.
Speaker 6Do you? What's it called?
Speaker 7<laugh>
Speaker 6Oh good . You could have sold me on it . You could like, oh, it's the whatever 2000
Speaker 7<laugh> .
Speaker 6Oh , I think it's awesome. What you guys are doing. And I think it's really smart too, because I , I mean, you guys are the SOS for training aids . Like you've always have been. Right. And especially now, I mean, I think, I think people go into Amazon and they only see a small fraction of, of the training aids that are out there. Right. Just all the big names essentially. And what you're doing now is you're bringing in like, you know, there's a lot more training aids out there you could be using that could help you and you should know more about it. And like, I mean, it's an easy sell, right? If it works and you get better, then buy it.
Speaker 7Oh look , I , I still have training aids that I purchased 15 years ago in my garage. Um , the first training aid I ever bought was , um, and again, my son was a pretty good player, but he wasn't a great putter and I bought cutting mark . It was , it's a wooden . They don't make the wooden version of cutting mark anymore. Um , but I still have it in my garage. Still have it . Really? Yeah.
Speaker 6Maybe you should bring it back. You should bring the wood version back.
Speaker 7There you go. That's all
Speaker 6Right . There's so many products out there. I bet there's like so many products that just like disappeared, right? Like for one reason or another that are just like, that could be a good YouTube series, like hunting for training aids, like, oh, you know, like those people that go looking for used clubs that could just be Emily looking for old training aids and being like this thing still work. And then it's all like some weird thing, but
Speaker 7Hey , maybe we can do something right . A good idea.
Speaker 6Yeah . That'd do really well. I bet. I don't know . I , I mean serious . I didn't really think when you said that you were doing that, like I'm like , that is the smartest thing cuz no one ever does that. Right. Like everyone thinks like technology evolves. Like you're not going back and making the same golf ball from 30 years ago. Right. Or golf club, whatever. It might be the golf . And so
Speaker 7The golf swing hasn't changed, you know ?
Speaker 6No. And I don't think training age really changed . Right. I mean, I think people are missing out on stuff that I don't think it's, it's so smart when you say that. I was like, oh my God , it's a smart guy. Um , no like for real, cause that's really smart. I love hearing this stuff. Um, but I think there's a plethora of like product out there that are amazing. That just disappeared for one reason or another. Yeah . You know, and um, to bring it back is really cool. Yeah . So like what, what is your biggest way of promotion then? Would you say like, are you, is it mainly YouTube video? Is it mainly your Instagram? Is it like, what is it for products?
Speaker 7Um, so we do a little bit of everything we're in, we're in multiple market channels. So we , uh , we obviously do a lot with Emily on Instagram. Um, and TikTok TikTok is a recent edition . Um, we still do the old fashioned email. Um, you know , we
Speaker 6Have your list, has your list has to be ginormous like ,
Speaker 7Um , I , I would say for a company our size , uh , it's pretty big. Um, and, and getting bigger by the day. Uh , so we still do a couple emails a week. Um ,
Speaker 6I see 'em
Speaker 7Yeah, we're actually thinking about starting. I
Speaker 6Saw the di I saw the DIT board one this morning.
Speaker 7<laugh> oh , nice. Nice
Speaker 6With legal and like this. And then it's like, I saw that one this morning. I was like, I'm talking to these guys today.
Speaker 7Uh , we do a lot of paper click , uh , with Google, Microsoft. Um ,
Speaker 6You do Facebook ads or not really.
Speaker 7We do. We do. We do , uh , we do Facebook, Instagram, and we , again , TikTok . So yeah, we're, we're in all the , the major social networks.
Speaker 6Well then plus like what you're doing with your , with Emily's following and Emily's, you know, her personal stuff, whatever she's, you know, people see it , like seeing that before, you know , um, what do you like most about training aids? Like just like what made you excited about training aids of all the e-comm that was out there for golf ?
Speaker 7Um, well, like I said earlier, I think one of the things that was exciting was a , was a really a purely business reason, which is , um , there really, wasn't a well known aggregator , um , of multiple products, training products in one place. And , um , and that's how we found about training aids . And again, I think there is an opportunity to grow that side of the business for sure. Bring more products , uh , create new new products , uh , and offer tickets .
Speaker 6Well, I'm excited for you guys. I think it's really cool. Like I had no idea, like, all I knew was like ancient history with my dad and then like, you know, I did a , I talked to you guys a couple years ago. I think it was even before Emily. Um, just, you know, I think we reviewed some products and I signed up for your affiliate program or something. It was a long time ago. Okay . Um, so like to see it now, it's like, it's just , it's a whole other level. Right. So I think it's really cool to see that. And I had no idea. I didn't even know there was a new owner to be honest. So I think that's cool.
Speaker 7Did it ?
Speaker 6Well, I'm really glad that , uh , you guys run on the show today. Is there, where do people F like, what's your , I mean, obviously know your URL, but what's your URL in case people don't know it yet after staying it a thousand times today . Yeah .
Speaker 7Right . Great . Um , so if you wanna buy , uh , a training aid , go to golf, training aids.com and it's golf training aids , all one word.com . Um , we have pretty much every training product known to, to man. Um , and , uh, and , and you find it on, on our website.
Speaker 6They're everywhere you guys like for real, if you type in golf training aid, like they're number one, like automatically, essentially, and then you start typing in like random training aid . They probably have that too. So
Speaker 7Yeah, we , we have , we have a pretty good URL . Um , that was another reason why one , one of the other reasons we bought the company, so yeah .
Speaker 6Yeah. You literally the best URL, right? Like , I mean , it's like literally the search term. I mean, you should have bought John, did you buy those other URLs too? So you could like, just in case yeah . Yeah. Didn't cost that much. Probably it's like, oh , 30 bucks. I'll do that. Yeah . Well, I'm really excited to have you guys in this show and talk to you and I appreciate you taking time today. You guys gotta support golf, training aids.com because I mean, there are , they are the source. Like , honestly, I can't think of anybody else. And you can't say Amazon because like the stuff's on Amazon is pretty much their stuff. So it's like, if you guys want a training, a to get better at golf, then you have to check out their website and as you can see, they're really cool. And , uh , you guys gotta support 'em . So , um, I appreciate you guys being here today and I will see you guys in the next episode.
Speaker 7Thanks Paul.
Speaker 8Thanks for having us.
Speaker 3Thanks for listening to another episode of behind the golf brand podcast, you're gonna beat me a golf stay connected on and off the show by visiting golfers authority.com . Don't forget to like subscribe and leave a comment . Golf is always more fun when you win, stay out of the beach and see you on the green.
