Ball Fitting

[misterjohn]

There is widespread agreement about the wisdom of getting fitted versus buying off the rack both in terms of clubs and balls. The surprising part is that the two fittings are done separately. This is surprising for several reasons. First, in driver fitting, it is the combination of the driver, the ball, and the golfer that determines the outcome. It stands to reason that there might be synergies between driver and ball that are possible if these fittings were done together rather than separately. Second, most major OEMs own a ball company, thus it is in their interest to try to harmonize both pieces of equipment to work especially well together. This would create an "ecosystem" in the language of Silicon Valley that would lead to more loyalty among customers. So why doesn't this happen? What are the opportunities for engineering balls that work exceptionally well with the OEMs clubs? Even if the engineering is doubtful, why do we not at least see attempts to advertise in this direction? For instance,, if you are Cleveland/Srixon looking to gain market share, why not design a ball built to be especially capable when paired with ultralight clubs? If you could actually pull this off, it would seem to offer a tremendous business advantage.

[Clambake]

I think the engineering abilities to differentiate the products and make a combo solution that improves performance are questionable, but let's assume for a minute it is possible and consider the marketing.  I think it is best to look at this from a broad marketing perspective and understand how the market makes its purchasing decisions and the driving factors for each.

In the example you gave about the SV-speak ecosystem, the buyers are making large capital expenditure decisions and trying to maximize their returns on that investment.   Cisco can provide a better value by selling routers and switches and network management solutions by bundling solutions which have a long life and hence improve the investment by the buyer.   Cisco also benefits by making the switching costs to change out to a competitor to be high; by having an established infrastructure the buyer would have to replace far more if they wanted to replace one part of their ecosystem.   That is, they may lose functionality and performance by switching out a piece (such as swapping out to Juniper routers) because the buyer may also have to replace their network management elements, negating the cost benefits.

In the golf ball market, these are expendable purchases - there is no long term investment benefit.   The clubs are expected to have a fairly short lifetime (probably a few years) and the ball is almost a transient investment, lasting only a few rounds (or perhaps only a few holes!).    Creating a bundling approach without showing a strong cost benefit just wouldn't achieve the advantages.

On the contrary, it would actually likely limit the market more for the product.   Golf companies make a lot of money on the ball side of the business, and to create a ball that is essentially limited to be used only with their own clubs greatly reduces the market size for that ball model.   Their R&D; on that ball now needs to amortized over a much smaller sales base, making it difficult to be cost competitive with that product.

It also takes away one of the marketing tools for the companies by potentially lengthening the product cycle for that ball too much.   Look across any segment of consumer products and you'll see a key marketing approach is "new and improved".   It applies in detergents, televisions, shampoos, etc.     If you had a ball designed for a specific club it makes it difficult to launch a new version in a year or two in an effort to refresh that product in the consumer's mind.

So, on the surface it seems it might be attractive, but I think the market realities are that it would actually limit the business for that combo solution and not succeed in the market.