Category: Equipment

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ORLANDO – One of the highlights of the PGA Merchandise Show is seeing a new product that you can’t wait to try out. In 2014, that product was the GolfBoard, a mobile vehicle inspired by a surfboard and skateboard but designed for golf. It made waves by allowing users to strap a golf bag to the front, put a drink in the cup holder, thumb the throttle and surf the fairways.

Then, in 2018, the Phat Golf Scooter joined the fray and in 2019, the Finn Scooter from Sun Mountain Sports became the first single-rider alternative cart from a major golf company.

Golf is a traditional game and adoption of these motorized vehicles has been slow, but the single-rider revolution aimed at speeding up the game, making it more fun and attracting a younger audience seems to have hit a tipping point.

“It’s no longer ‘What is that?’ ” said Jeff Dowell, president of GolfBoard. “The acceptance has been growing every year.”

Rick Reimers has been a pioneer in the golf industry long enough to have introduced the first stand bag in 1986 and then later the three-wheel pushcart. His company, Sun Mountain Motor Sports, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sun Mountain Sports, which has been around since 1981, is trying to innovate once again.

“Everyone talks about golf being too slow, but no one does anything about it,” said Reimers.

Reimers invented the Finn Scooter, a two-wheeled vehicle powered by a lithium-ion battery (same as used in the Tesla) that charges in five hours holds that charge for 36 holes. The Scooter has a thumb accelerator and hand-grip brakes. The golf bag lays between your legs in the frame, providing easy access to clubs.To ride one at any of 72 golf courses in 28 states as part of its beta testing is exhilarating.

“When you ride it on the golf course, you immediately get it,” he said.

Bob Scott, PGA director at Meadowood Golf Club in Liberty, Washington, said he had never seen customers smile so much. He assumed millennials would be the target demographic, but the first 10 riders were all 60-75 years old.

At Eagle Creek in Norwalk, Ohio, the club calculated it brought 870 new golfers to its course and estimated that the gained revenue from green fees, cart fees, and food and beverage totaled $55,000.

One reason for the slow adoption rate within the industry may have been due to concern over injuries and fear of liability. It’s proven to be the opposite.

“I’m not going to say the Finn Scooter didn’t get into the occasional flower bed, but it is really a safe, fun thing to do,” Reimers said.

Golfers surfing the earth on the GolfBoard have played more than 1.2 million rounds of golf without an insurance claim, said GolfBoard president Dave Sowell.

The GolfBoard has evolved since its debut in 2014 – it’s faster, more stable, has improved clearance over curbs and rough terrain and this year added models with a bicycle-style seat and a cooler chair.

“What we really didn’t want people to do was sit while they’re riding,” Sowell said.

There are 3,500 boards at 325 courses and growing. Sowell said that 43 percent of users went to the course for the first time because of the GolfBoard, and the average age of the rider is 63. Peter Johnson, founder of Phat Golf Scooters, says that the ability to play every day is the reason that many of its customers trend young and old.

“The common thread is an active lifestyle,” Johnson said.

Reimers jokes that he should have retired a long time ago, but he’d like to change the game one more time.

“A two-person golf cart is like a sofa on wheels,” he said. “They sit down and that’s what they do for the rest of the day. They sit and wait.”

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