The End of the Washington Golf Expo

The Washington Golf Show ended pretty well. We had a lot of fun, sold a bunch of clubs, ate too much, and our backs hurt.

Packing up to leave was not very smooth. On Sunday we got to the show early in order to secure a loading bay for our truck. Of course I picked the loading bay that had a broken door. Some of the staff at the Dulles Expo center would argue that I broke the door. It is no ordinary garage door it is used for loading and unloading trucks. The door is huge and very heavy. It is not electric either. It is operated using a chain. It was a bit jammed so I pulled on the chain as hard as I could and a giant spring fell off. To make a long story short, we had to load most of the truck with a 3 foot clearance. That was as far as the door would open.


Additionally, we lost a Utility Knife that we borrowed from a Union Employee at the Dulles Expo Center. The gentleman's name was "Moose". The name was actually stitched into his shirt. A male adult who has the name "Moose" gets the name for 3 reasons:


He is Big

He is nice

If you upset him (e.g. lose his knife) he will turn on you and scare you.

We offered to pay Moose for his knife. We were approached by his extremely unfriendly boss (he was unfriendly before both the garage and the knife incidents) and we offered to pay for it. We were then approached by Moose and we offered him money as well but he gave me a death stare and walked off. I am very afraid that we have not seen the last of Moose. I would have paid him double the value of the Knife.

Following the show, Me, Maureen, Mike, and Mike's staff picked up very fatty BBQ take-out and watched the Patriots lose at the Holiday Inn. I was pretty depressed about that. Apparently the rest of the country was not.

Monday, Maureen and I drove our 18 foot truck home for 7.5 hours. In typical Generation Y fashion Maureen retreated to the comfort of her IPOD Touch. I listened to talk radio (no sports) the entire way home because I am 30 something years old and possibly getting duller by the second.

2008 GRIP Wedges & Hybrids

Here they are folks...some early pictures of our 2008 GRIP Hybrids & Wedges

Road Show

It is that time of year - Road Show! We arrived late last night in Fairifax, VA for the Greater Washington Golf Show. It was about 7.5 hours from our offices in Northborough, MA but we had to stop in Hartford to pick up more clubs from our warehouse and to ship out several orders from our surprisingly successful dead of winter/post holiday driver sale.

A lot of people came up very big for us with this show including:

• Irene (GRIP Marketing and PR) for organizing, planning, and getting us ready for the shows. Irene planned this show with amazing detail right down to the amount of extension cord we need by inches.


• Ken from Pin Hi golf Crafters in West Boylston, MA for building 12 sets of irons and a ton of drivers in 40 hours.


• Steve, our club builder in Hartford for doing the same as Ken (he actually beat Ken by 26 drivers but we are not counting)


• Maureen from GRIP for bringing a GPS and keeping me company for 9 hours of travel and packing boxes in the freezing cold outside the Hartford Warehouse.


• John W from Ryder in Auburn, MA for a great deal on a truck for all the shows. It wasn't the most comortable truck but we got here.


• My wife for taking care of the kids, house, and cats while I sel golf clubs every weekend until late March. Additionally she provides a ton of support for me!


• Paul from East Coast Golf (where our office are) for always helping out when we need it.


• The Hyatt Fair Lakes in Fairfax for providing a great place to stay at an amazing rate thanks to Hotwire.com


• Mike Blair for hooking us up with an amazing Driving range 10'x10'x10' for our booth and Dancin' Dogg for setting us up with a top notch indoor golf simulator for the range.

I thing that covers it. If you are in the Washington DC are we hope to see you at the golf expo.

We have to unload the truck around 9:00 AM in the rain - I hope we get into the garage. I will be posting more pictures and notes from the show...stay tuned.

Driving range

Paul From East Coast Golf cut the PVC pipe that we need to build our driving range. He used the spare pieces , an extra scrap of net and the corners that we will need to build the driving range at the Greater Washington Golf Show to build a small model of what it should look like. The little action figure represents me standing around selling Wide Sole iron sets.

Charlie Mandel

I had a great lunch with Charlie Mandel from Rankmark. We are looking forward to participationg in the 2008 Rankmark Club Testing

Escalade golf cart

Now I am being seen in one. I wonder how many people actually drive around in an Escalade golf cart. I am sure it is cool if you are famous to be seen in something like this. What about the average person living in a gated community in Palm Beach or Miami?

On the subject of Cadillacs, I parked next to a brand new Cadillac CTS today. I am know that Cadillac is targeting the "30 Something" market with these new vehicles. If by any chance some marketing genuis from General Motors is reading this, you should probably consider having me drive around in one for free. I am the young him thirty-something entrepreneurial type that you are targeting. When the world sees the President of GRIP golf in this car it will positively affect your sales. I have an IPOD and look how many other people got them too.

I absolutely love the CTS. Much cooler than a Lexus, BMW or any other comparable mid-sized Yuppie sled in the same class. The car is pure cool.

Fancy carts

These carts at the pga show seem like something i should be seen in