Violence against women in a Good Good ad stains slow responders: PGA Tour, Callaway, Golf Galaxy, Golf Channel
They all hoped it would just go away, but public outrage forced them to do the right thing ... eventually. Has golf culture really changed?
The only thing more disappointing about the slow and weak response by the principals in the Good Good Golf YouTube channel scandal was its utter predictability.
There should have been immediate distancing and disassociation from Callaway Golf and Good Good Golf after they aired an outrageous commercial that endorsed violence against women. Instead, it took almost a week.
Why?
Because corporate America, the foundational structure for the golf industry, hoped it would all blow over.
It did not.
Last Friday, an ad aired online in which Good Good Golf co-founder Garrett Clark rushes across a tee box and levels a female golfer who is looking in his bag, then stands over her, points at her on the ground, and says, “Do not touch my new driver.”
Who thought this was acceptable? Who thought this was funny? Who thought this was anything but horrific?
Good Good, that’s who. Of course they did.
It’s a frat bro content creator and apparel company with more than 2 million subscribers to its YouTube channel, making goofy videos. It also sells ugly hats and even uglier shirts. When you hear some idiot on TV scream, “Get in the hole!” when a pro golfer tees off on a par-5, dollars to doughnuts he’s wearing Good Good gear, hat on backward, shirt untucked.
Then, the commercial.
There was, appropriately, immediate backlash that convinced Good Good to delete the ad. The backlash snowballed into international outrage, with resounding consequences.
Cool. It took far too long.
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The ad aired Friday.
By Saturday night the PGA Tour, Tour CEO Brian Rolapp, Callaway, Dick’s Sporting Goods and Golf Galaxy, and Golf Channel all should have cut ties with Good Good. The fact that none did until they were forced by public sentiment tells you everything to need to know about these folks and how they view women.
In case anyone wants to argue that this commercial was not an endorsement of violence against women, know that Callaway, as penance, on Thursday committed $1 million to support initiatives that combat violence against women.
The club in question was a driver made by Callaway in collaboration with the new hip-and-with-it brand. The ad was vetted by both Callaway and Good Good. Incredibly, it raised no alarms at either place, with anyone, until social media began its cycle of outrage.
The irony is few brands had done as much to promote women in golf than Callaway, which has perhaps the most potent brand-to-athlete recognition relationship in the women’s game, the one-time face of women’s golf, Annika Sorenstam. She condemned the ad but, sadly, did not condemn either Callaway or its leadership.
This comes at the height of the Caitlin Clark era, when women’s sports are surging like never before. She’s a basketball player, but she loves to golf.
Her involvement in the game might have helped spur the biggest growth spurt women’s golf has ever seen. The COVID-19 lockdown triggered massive growth in the golf industry in the United States, and the segment that has grown the most by both percentage and raw numbers is women’s golf, up 45% and 2.5 million golfers compared to 12% and 2.3 million for men, according to the National Golf Federation.
Callaway just scored the worst own-goal in sports marketing history.
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More than 8 million women now play golf, but the chairmen of all of the entities in question — the Tour, Callaway, Dick’s, and Golf Channel — all are men. Which might explain the slowness and gradualness of the only acceptable responses.
So we had the scramble, and the admonitions, and the apologies, and the disassociations. The problem with all of it is, nobody wanted to do the right thing unless they had to. Everybody wanted to try to ride it out. Which means they are all as guilty as they could possibly be.
That includes the Tour, which, on Thursday, announced that Good Good would no longer be the title sponsor of a tournament in Texas in November.
That includes Golf Channel, which needed four days to decide to not air the Good Good edition of “Big Break,” which was due to begin Tuesday but, after sponsor Golf Galaxy pulled out, was initially pushed back a week and has since been canceled altogether.
That includes Dick’s Sporting Goods and Golf Galaxy, which needed five days to decide to pull Good Good merchandise from its shelves.
That includes Rolapp, who only responded to the commercial’s misogyny when he was questioned at a press conference four days after the incident, then landed this stinging indictment: “I think what we saw was concerning.”
Rolapp’s milquetoast response was a resounding reminder that, before moving to the PGA Tour last year, Rolapp spent more than two decades working for the NFL, America’s most notorious sports league when it comes to ignoring issues like domestic violence and sexual harassment in the workplace.
That includes Callaway, whose executive roster looks like President Donald Trump’s cabinet. After one day, Callaway issued a chastisement … of Good Good. After three days, Callaway pulled the driver from its website. After six days, as its stock continued to lose value, Callaway finally cut ties with Good Good.
Callaway’s abrupt about-face, after partnering with Good Good for three years, might have been prompted by Callaway being threatened with exclusion by huge retailers like Costco, which apparently removed access to Callaway products Thursday, at least temporarily.
And, of course, there is Good Good.
Clark is the general manager.
He should resign.
He should have resigned Saturday morning.
Instead, five days after the commercial aired, as Dick’s, Golf Galaxy, and the PGA Tour Superstores began pulling Good Good stock from their shelves, Clark issued a rambling, 8½-minute “apology.” In it, he explains the process of the production of the ad, and insists that the woman was not injured, and that Good Good is women-friendly — as if any of this matters.
At all.
It does not.
The obtuse and embarrassing statement just paints Clark and Good Good as defensive, tone-deaf, and completely uncomprehending of the gravity of the moment.
As tone-deaf as Rolapp, the PGA Tour, Callaway, Golf Channel, and Dick’s/Golf Galaxy.
All of them did the right thing, eventually, when forced to do so.
But none of them did the right thing for the right reasons in the right time frame.
