Unfiltered Friday: Would You Buy a $1000 Driver?

How much are you willing to spend to improve your golf game? However you answer that question — whether it be through golf lessons, purchasing new equipment, or getting custom fit — it is clear improvement comes at a cost.

What if you could gain 20 yards off the tee with more accuracy without changing your current swing, but the driver/shaft combo cost $1000? Would you buy that club?

Believe it or not, this is a real life scenario.

I recently went through a custom driver fitting at a leading brand in my area to help out a friend with content for his website. Full disclosure: the fitting was coordinated with the brand beforehand and I would not be taking home a driver that day. This was dedicated solely to spreading the word about the fitter, which was absolutely fantastic.

The focus of this piece is not about the fitting experience; that will be covered in another way. Instead, it’s about the results of my fit and what that would have meant to the consumer in terms of cost.

After comparing my current driver/shaft combo to that of many others — a process that took at least an hour and included multiple clubhead and shaft brands — we eventually found the optimal combo for my game.

My spin numbers were optimized. Launch was ideal. Dispersion was dramatically tighter. And, most importantly, I gained 20 yards off the tee on average. The improvement was drastic.

The price tag of the clubhead, shaft and grip alone? Easily $1000.

Let’s Take a Step Back

To be fair, no prices were discussed during my custom fitting session and this was not your typical situation. Perhaps the cost of the fitting would have been included in the price of the club, for example. I was there for one purpose and one purpose only: to experience the process.

However, the end result was entirely typical of what any customer could experience at a custom fitter: decision time.

The “consumer” in this case was faced with the decision of buying what would have been a club significantly more costly in comparison to something off-the-rack. But now, proven through data and guided by the educated eye of a master club builder, we have a weapon we can take to the course that’s optimal for our game.

This is the conundrum golfers are faced with every day. We at GU are huge proponents of getting custom fit, understanding that this comes at a cost. The information you learn from a custom fitter is invaluable… but we also believe it doesn’t have to be monumentally expensive.

Via our Twitter feed, our followers were mixed on whether or not they’d buy the driver described above. Many said they would not, preferring to spend their money elsewhere (some out of fear of marital catastrophe). A significant group said they would, some of whom saying it was a “no-brainer.” I suspect that somewhere between those two extremes is the general consensus.

Personally, I’m torn. On one hand the results speak for themselves. Who wouldn’t want more distance and accuracy off the tee? While this doesn’t guarantee lower scores, the custom fit shows me the potential of my skill set with properly fitting equipment.

On the other hand, that $1000 could be spent on golf lessons to fix flaws in my game (of which there are many), potentially optimizing the output of my current equipment in the process.

If I chose to purchase the driver, how long would I have to keep it in my bag to realize a true ROI on my purchase? Two years? Three? Five?

Clearly there are no right or wrong answers here, but that doesn’t make the decision any easier. What it boils down to is where your comfort level resides, and if it is defined by the performance of your equipment. For those of us who don’t play every week, our enjoyment may be defined by other factors, too.

What are your thoughts on this topic? Would you purchase the driver described above? Share your thoughts below in the comment section!