Stix Golf
As golf equipment-makers go, Gabe Coyne shouldn’t be what you’ll name a gearhead.
Nor has he ever been a vary rat.
Rising up in Seattle, he took up golf solely after getting minimize from his highschool baseball workforce. The primary sticks he owned had been a hodgepodge second-hand set that his mom purchased at a church rummage sale.
“And I performed with those self same janky golf equipment for years,” Coyne says.
Throughout faculty, the place he studied graphic and internet design, Coyne stopped taking part in golf altogether, an abstinence he caught to all through his 20s, when he received married, had 4 youngsters and made his mark on a sequence of profitable startups. He was effectively into his 30s, and dwelling in Chicago, earlier than he dusted off his sticks once more.
Knocking it round with buddies and colleagues on the native muni, Coyne reestablished his informal — however joyful — connection to the sport. He wasn’t cutthroat about it, however he wished to get higher. He determined it was time for an gear improve, if solely he might discover golf equipment that appealed to him.
“I didn’t need an affordable starter set, however I additionally wasn’t up for spending tons of cash shopping for golf golf equipment a la carte,” Coyne says. “The market appeared to both cater to rookies or avid golfers, with an enormous hole in between.”
Lots of his taking part in companions felt the identical.
The entrepreneur in Coyne noticed a possibility: golf golf equipment aimed on the Goldilocks center. In late 2019, Stix Golf was born, producing graceful-looking, high-quality golf equipment, bought on to customers at a modest worth. Coyne and his co-founders had tapped a candy spot available in the market that was even bigger than they imagined.
Within the four-plus years since its founding, Stix has established a revered place within the trade with its “much less is extra” strategy, marrying modern, minimalist designs with most engineering prowess: straightforward on the eyes, straightforward to hit and simple on the pockets. In 2022, Stix earned a world product-design accolade — the Pink Dot Award — and the improvements haven’t ceased. The corporate’s choices have expanded to 3 completely different sequence, together with a newly launched girls’s line.
And now comes one other notable reveal: a collaboration with Nicklaus Firms to create a Nicklaus-branded line of golf equipment by Stix. The 2 manufacturers introduced their partnership this week, emphasizing their complementary objectives.
“Stix haș shortly turned heads within the golf trade by making outstanding merchandise that not solely meet our high-performance requirements but additionally present truthful pricing, serving to to make golf extra accessible to extra folks,” Andy O’Brien, president of Nicklaus Manufacturers, stated in a press release. “The loyal Stix buyer has a youthful and energetic demographic, for each women and men of various handicaps. It is necessary for the Nicklaus legacy to achieve this viewers and meet the wants of this rising demographic of latest golfers getting into the sport.”
For Stix, in the meantime, the collaboration confers the credibility lengthy loved by the Nicklaus title.
For extra on the Stix-Nicklaus partnership, click on right here.
“For all our success, we’re nonetheless a brand new model,” Coyne stated. “You be a part of forces with the revered world model of Nicklaus™, and folks notice, Oh, I’d heard of Stix. However I didn’t notice they had been this legit.”
The primary Nicklaus™ units by Stix at the moment are within the design and engineering part and can debut on the 2025 PGA Present in January. They are going to be obtainable to the general public in April, in time for the spring golf season.
And there may be extra in to return, as the 2 manufacturers plan to collaborate on quite a lot of golf merchandise within the years forward.