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Dicks lays offs all its Pga Pros

Man that's a real bummer. I don't know about other stores but my local one never seemed to have anyone there who knew much about golf, so maybe my store just didn't have a PGA pro. I hope these guys find some other jobs at other places.
 
Not surprising to me. I've yet to go into a single Dicks Sporting Goods and be impressed by the sales staff.
 
I got to be pretty good friends with the pro at the store in Macon, GA and he told me 2 weeks ago he was going to retire in January if he could just make it until then. Hate that all these pros lost their jobs like this. Just sucks.
 
That stinks. I like the pro at one of our nearby Dicks. Interesting about the TM mention and check out the comments below the article.
 
ddec said:
That stinks. I like the pro at one of our nearby Dicks. Interesting about the TM mention and check out the comments below the article.
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same here. got to know the one at mine fairly well and took a few lessons from him too. good guy.
 
Comments are interesting. So some of them found out via an ESPN tweet? Hmmmm
 
I rarely use Dick's for my golf purchases but for people in smaller markets they were sometimes the only store with a pro within 100's of miles. This is indeed sad news.
 
Just_Hacking said:
I got to be pretty good friends with the pro at the store in Macon, GA and he told me 2 weeks ago he was going to retire in January if he could just make it until then. Hate that all these pros lost their jobs like this. Just sucks.
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I knew the one in North Macon really well. His name was Mike and he gave me and KellyBo our first formal lessons several years ago. Greayt guy but he seemed still young to be retiring this year. Anyways I hate to see folks losing their jobs. I noticed the pro at the Athens store had not been in the last few times I went by there and now I know why. :beat-up:
 
sparksjr said:
Comments are interesting. So some of them found out via an ESPN tweet? Hmmmm
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I couldn't see the comments for some reason...
 
This is absolutely terrible. The direction this sport is headed in is downright scary...

Not gonna lie, I chuckled a bit when I read about them tanking because they bought all 4 TM drivers this year haha. I really do believe that ALL the companies need to release a little less frequently if they want to keep profits up. Most people just aren't going to buy a new driver multiple times a year.
 
I feel horrible for all those affected. I will say that Dicks in general has not been my go to store for my equipment simply because of my experience there. The only thing that made it somewhat reasonable to go where the professionals. Now that they are gone i see no reason to go there at all now.
 
SkiBumGolfer said:
This is absolutely terrible. The direction this sport is headed in is downright scary...

Not gonna lie, I chuckled a bit when I read about them tanking because they bought all 4 TM drivers this year haha. I really do believe that ALL the companies need to release a little less frequently if they want to keep profits up. Most people just aren't going to buy a new driver multiple times a year.
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^This...

I don't think that we can convince ourselves that this is an isolated incident. In the past year, two other golf shops have closed here in Iowa City. I talked to the owner at one of them and he claimed it was hard to compete with online retailers, and he didn't want to point fingers, but it seemed like most people would come in... use the launch monitor and the pro's advice, and then order it for $50 cheaper on ebay.

This isn't the only problem though. The gluttony of the club market has truly gotten a bit ridiculous. It reminds me of collecting baseball cards. It used to be that there were only a few brands of cards... then those brands released multiple models. (ie what used to be just Topps, turned into topps finest, topps chrome, topps stadium club etc... all in the same year) this oversaturation (mixed with a public disinterest) was basically the downfall of the market. Golf is sort of doing the same thing. What used to be 1 driver and maybe 2 iron sets per manufacturer has ballooned. Look at TMaG for example. How many drivers have they released since last fall? SLDR, JetSpeed, SLDRs, SLDRwhite, SLDR mini driver, Adams XTD... i mean holy sh1t!!!... i understand catering to each kind of golfer, but how are the consumer and the retailers supposed to keep up. TM isn't alone... callaway has put out at least 3 drivers (with the new bertha/optiforce to come out soon) along with countless sets of irons. This is great for the savy consumer, but they market has to come crashing down at some point. The industry can't continue at this rate, especially with the current dip in golf's popularity.
 
Man, that certainly seemed like someone was blaming the biggest OEM for their struggles. Don't think we have any PGA Pros at the local Dicks, but nonetheless it is terrible for the industry and for those people. Now what are they going to do to sell the equipment?
 
I feel fortunate. The 2 we have here the Pros are great guys. One I took lessons from way before he went to Dick's I sure hope they hold onto their jobs.
 
Having them in the stores never made much sense to me, maybe in isolated stores with not golf shops in the area, where they could build a fitting and lesson business. But here locally I never saw him doing anything but sitting behind the desk or doing light club work. Nice guy, I hate that he lost his job, but I certainly didn't see him using his skillset
 
Hate that my fellow pros are out of work. The ones I know in Orlando are going to be ok.
 
Ole Gray said:
I knew the one in North Macon really well. His name was Mike and he gave me and KellyBo our first formal lessons several years ago. Greayt guy but he seemed still young to be retiring this year. Anyways I hate to see folks losing their jobs. I noticed the pro at the Athens store had not been in the last few times I went by there and now I know why. :beat-up:
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The one I was referring to is named Charlie Bradshaw. He worked at the one over off of Eisenhower Parkway (near Best Buy and Target). He actually told be back in the spring that if a Pro left the store that Dick's was not going to replace him and they DSG was "slowly" going to remove Pro's from the stores.
 
Really interesting that they blatantly called out TaylorMade as part of the problem. But on the same note, to say that Tiger Woods had something to do with it seems a bit of a stretch. IMO


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Just_Hacking said:
The one I was referring to is named Charlie Bradshaw. He worked at the one over off of Eisenhower Parkway (near Best Buy and Target). He actually told be back in the spring that if a Pro left the store that Dick's was not going to replace him and they DSG was "slowly" going to remove Pro's from the stores.
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Yea I have met Carlie too. Great guy for sure and I hope he is doing well now.
 
That really sucks. I know the PGA Pro at a local Dick's very well and I hate to see him lose his job, but to be honest, Dick's was the last place I ever bought anything golf related.
 
Thats where I got my last few sets. Got great trade in deals & Greg ordered em to my specs
 
Brianbigoats said:
Bad news for the industry
In the articale i hate how the keep saying fired it was a layoff not a firing hopefully they got a little bit to help them change jobs
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They got 2 weeks pay and 1 week insurance coverage.

Capitalism: God's way of determining who is smart and who is poor!
 
bulldog said:
Thats where I got my last few sets. Got great trade in deals & Greg ordered em to my specs
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yea I bought my latest driver there for $3.25. This year's Nike driver after trading in three wedges and a 3 wood. It was in the demo bend however it still looked new. The cashier said we almost had to pay you for this one :D
 
My 5-gw cobra baffler xl in graphite was $56 after tax
 
Trying to fight a shrinking a demand with an increase in supply had to give eventually. Golf participation has been on a downward trend for a number of years yet over those same number of years the supply of new releases has increased significantly. I did not go to Harvard School of Business but even to me this never made sense. Someone earlier in the post referenced baseball cards which is a good analogy except the demand was there at first and as the demand waned so did the supply. I think we are headed back to fewer releases and a focus on quality and stability. Titleist and Ping have a more stable model than Taylormade and Callaway although Ping has been more aggressive lately. It's allot easier and financially more feasible to be a Titleist or Ping loyalist than a Taylormade or Callaway because at least you don't feel like your equipment is outdated 2 months after you bought it.
 
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