So every golf tea you've seen before, you know, typically a wooden golf
te or most golf das are a circle on top. You look at the
tea from the top down, and you've got a circle. And then performance
golf teas they come on the market and they try to reduce friction on the
tee, but they try to reduce the friction on the tea in all directions
of that T three hundred and sixty degree orientation because they don't know which direction
you're placing the tea, so they're trying to just reduce friction in all directions.
So that actually limits you because you now have to conform all the way
around. What we take advantage of here is a very simple first principle,
and that's when you're driving, when you're teeing off, you're only hitting in
one direction. So if that's the case, why not maximize as much friction
reduction as possible in that direction which leads to increased performance. Hi, this
is DJ Degala and I'm from Valparaiso, Indiana. I play the Creekside Golf
Course. This is golf Smarter number nine hundred and twenty six, proven by
science longer and straighter off the te flight Path Golf Tees with inventor doctor Daniel
Whalen. This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights from great
golf minds to help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ. Here's
your host, Fred Green. Welcome back to the Golf Smarter Podcast. Daniel,
Hi, Fred, how are we doing. We're doing great. It
is so good to have you back on because I want to hear how exciting
the year was for Flight Path Golf Tees. Yeah, we've been ramping up.
It was great talking with you about this time last year. I'm kind
of going through the background and introducing the product to you and the viewers there,
and yeah, this year has been all about growth and scale and we've
seen a lot of it through the year and it's nice to come around in
full circle and end the year with you here on the podcast. Oh.
Yeah, it's great to have you back on. It's not something you know,
it's a topic that would be like, yeah, we'll do it once
and move on with it. But I've been reading about you guys. There's
great reviews that keep coming out and there's buzz about it, and I just
you know, knowing you were a new company, I'm like, curious,
what happens next, what's going on? So let's start with the reviews that
have been coming in. I guess we start with my golf spy. Sure,
sure, yeah, And and it's what we what we really saw over
this year was a nice a nice baseline of organic growth and a nice following,
a nice loyal following, nice repeat purchases. So it's it was it
was good to see a leveling, a level playing field where our sales are
increasing and it's not necessarily from a higher marketing reach. It's just organic growth
and repeat customers. And you know, that's what every business wants to see
in their products and and especially typically you know when you when you back the
product and you rely on something that provides a value to the customer, you
typically see that growth. So it was it was a nice, a nice
win for us to see that month to month through twenty twenty three. Yeah,
and repeat customers generally means testimonials. I mean that means people are talking
about it with their friends. They're like, yeah, I'm still using these
and they're like, well, what tell me what what you got here?
Because that happened to me a friend of mine. You know, my friends
have given me a hard time about these teas for years because they've been using
him for years, and it feels like it. How long have you been
on the market now, we've been on line since of twenty twenty, I
think a mid mid twenty twenty. We really kind of came out of the
scene online. So just that three years. Yeah, that's where I first
saw it and bought a box and loved it and saw results and so my
you know, again, my friends give me a hard time about it.
But then a couple of weeks ago, friend of mine sent me an article
that he read and it was with it from fastfit dot co. And this
the title of the article was the world's most advance golf team. You may
never have seen that one. There's enough. I think there's a number of
them I haven't seen. I have. It's a nice one. I have
friends or relatives send me links to information they're seeing online. Sometimes there articles
that I've seen before. Sometimes they're ones I haven't seen that one I can't
pinpoint off the top of my head. But hopefully it was a good read
and if it's making the reach, that's you know, that's that's great.
That's great for the product. That's huge. Yeah, that's huge. And
my golf spy as well, right, yeah, Mike golf Spy. We
had that original article. They did the T test in twenty twenty one,
then they redid their same testing via video. I don't know if they chose
the same tease, but they've done a number of T tests now and we've
got a good amount of advertising through them without you know, independently, not
with any collaboration or work, just which just in their own independent testing.
So it's nice to see that, you know, recurring, and they've got
a lot of treet cred. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so are are.
What we liked most about that original article and what we had talked about
before was seeing seeing I have a picture of it. Let me see if
I can pull it up. It may not show up too well on the
video, but I have a that's okay. It's an audio podcast for the
viewers that that can see. There is a maybe you can't cannet see the
green square there. So of the of the claims test that amongst the tees
we did get a green check mark and seeing a benefit and accuracy and no
other none of the other tea's got any green check marks. But to see
an indication of performance benefit from a golf team, I haven't seen that done
on any other product independently test that. I've seen plenty of the manufacturers putting
out information that their product is the best, But to have an independent company,
of course provide that type of data was a real benefit to us.
No, that's fabulous. That's fabulous. And what other success stories have you
been hearing and getting from from your customers? What I think and you hit
home on it when you mentioned giving the teas to their friends, considering how
long it kind of takes to break the tea's and you know, you typically
if you don't break it to you lose one, maybe one or two around.
So we suspect the repeat customers initially are probably people that are giving,
you know, half the box to their friends. They go play around for
some and that somebody gives it to three of their buddies and you know,
now the half their box is gone, and next thing you know, they're
buying a second pack. So I think we're seeing a lot of that growth
and you know, spreading from there. And then those buddies that are trying
to get for the first time, liking and having a good experience, and
then making their first initial purchase. So I think that we're seeing a lot
of that growth through this year, and given that this is our third year
on the market, that's kind of trends well with with new businesses. You
know, our first year, we didn't really have any reach or any marketing.
We didn't have packaging that really got into retail stores. So it really
you know, just getting our name out there the first couple of years was
great. And now that the product is out and people have had time to
test it and try it, now we're really seeing a growth from a loyalty
and a organic standpoint. Yeah, the friend who sent me the article,
I said, well, listen, i'll next time we play, I'll bring
a tea for you and you can check it out right, because he was
always reluctant to do it, because I think he gets annoyed with me going
I gotta find my tea. I got to find when I hit it off
with a driver, especially, it can fly in many different directions. They
all call basically I don't want to go there, But I don't think I'm
slow. I'm deliberate. He cannot help with that. Unfortunately, no,
they cannot help with that. But anyway, so when we played, I
let him use the tea and he was hitting the ball right up the middle
every time, and I'm like, well, you know, towards the end
of the round, what do you think of the tea? And he goes,
well, I made some changes to my swing, so it's been better
lately, so I'm not really sure. I'm like, oh, come on,
give me a break. Then a couple weeks later we played again and
he was still using that tea and it was like, ah, so they
are durable and you are using it. He goes yeah, and I'm hitting
the ball straight. Oh that's great, like really impressed. That's great to
hear. Yeah, maybe not so good if you're if you're competing with him,
but that's that's great to hear. We do compete, and of all
the friends I play with, he and are the closest match and it's always
one or two strokes going into the last hole man, and we keep track
of match play, stroke play, and number of putts. So yeah,
we we are pretty competitive. Just for bragging, right number a fairways head,
we're gonna have to add something. Yeah, yeah, with the with
the T, we're gonna definitely have to add number of fairways. Give me
a rundown for those who have not heard about your product, flight Path golf
teas, give me a quick rundown of what makes them unique? Sure,
sure, yeah, So every every golf tea you've seen before, you know,
typically a wooden golf tee or most golf teas are a circle on top.
You know, you turn, you look at the tea from the top
down and you've got a circle. And then performance golf teas, there's a
numerous performance golf teas. They come on the market and they try to reduce
friction on the tee. But they but they try to reduce the friction on
the tee in all in all directions of that T three hundred and sixty degree
orientation, because they don't know which direction you're placing the tea, so they're
trying to just reduce friction in all directions. So that actually limits you because
you now have to conform all the way around. So this the the advantage
we take. What we take advantage of here is a very simple first principle,
and that's you've when you're driving, when you're teeing off, you're only
hitting in one direction, so hopefully, hopefully, so if if that's the
case, let's why not maximize as much friction reduction as possible in that direction,
which leads to increased performance. So we basically just provide the golfer as
much bet as we can from that wooden tea. So with that direction in
the arrow down the fairway in the point in the direction there, we remove
a friction both in front of you and on both sides of the ball to
decrease the side spin in case you're you know, you have a little bit
of a draw or you have a little bit of a fade, and then
also increase distance by removing that friction. So that's that's the premise of it.
It's a very simple concept, but when applied provides maximum benefit to the
golfer. Incredible. Listen, we're going to take a time out and we'll
be back right after this. Daniel, you said that it's a very simple
concept. Why are you the first one to come up with this idea of
creating less friction in the direction you're hitting off the d You know, that's
a great question, Fred, I think It has to do with the idea
that we typically innovate from the top down. This is within all industries,
you always go for the low hanging fruit, and the low hanging fruit is
typically what's innov first. So if we were to talk about uh, let's
take cars for example, You're going to innovate the bigger components of a car
first, the comfort of the car, the performance of the car. By
the time you get down to the tires of the car, you've probably already
looked at and innovated other components of you know, the main the main driving
force of the car. So in terms of golf, and we look at
the products in golf and what what is actually giving you, you know,
what are the components that make the golfer, you know, go from from
being at the t box to putting a ball in the fairway. They've got
their driver, which is probably other than their swing, other than their their
mechanics. Equipment wise, it's probably their drivers the majority of the performance.
Their golf ball is certainly a contributor, their golf shoes, maybe to a
lesser extent, the golf glove, and then the golf tee. So in
it's from a timeline scale. We see that you know, the golf clubs,
from the shafts, the grips, the driver head, we see tons
of innovation there. We have started seeing a lot of innovation with golf following
suit. I think in the last ten to fifteen years you now start seeing
it in shoes and in maybe the last five to ten years and gloves.
I think the golf tea because it is it was. It's down to the
very little, like the last one and two percenters and the components. I
just don't think that it was given the attention to try to innovate. And
now that we are at this point where we can grab those one and two
percenters, I think we were somebody that were able to come out and take
advantage of that and finally innovate that wood and tea that you always stick in
the ground when you go out and play. Yeah, And I would think
that people look at this and going, you know what, what kind of
margins can we make? I mean, how many teas do we have to
sell to make a living out of this? But you've got a job,
right I do. Yeah. I work as an engineer. I have a
passion in water engineering and very fulfilling and working in that space in that industry.
So you know, I pull benefit and enjoyment from from being on both
sides of the coin. So this is your annuity hopefully hopefully. But you
invented this product. You you came up with the initial design, but not
the initial idea. That is correct, That's correct. It's really a father
son's story my dad. You know, my dad got me into golf when
I was seven years old. He's the one that taught me to play.
We share that together. That's that's where him and I bond on the golf
course and we have my entire life. He has always been a tinkerer,
an inventor. He has a patent for he held the patent for a fingerprint
firearm technology. So he's gone off and you know he likes to invent things.
And he had this dream in this idea, it was physically a dream,
not a It was a you know, fall asleep and have a dream
is what it was of a completely frictionless golf ball, just kind of floating
on air and thinking, you know, that'd be really cool if we could
invent something that did that. So, being the engineer that I am,
I thought, well, let me see how far I can get with that.
We you know, we prototype some different inventions and made some made some
little protype models and realized very quickly it's going to take a lot of effort
to make something you know, near frictionless, which is where we decided to
just try to improve the standard design. What what can we do to move
the needle forward from a regular golf tee and from the performance teas And that's
really where we settled on flight path. So how did you get from a
ball floating in the air to uh, just a simple T but it gives
you directional insight and also the frictionless launch right after after trying to create something
that was near frictionless, when when you're talking about levitating with air and realizing
that the scope and scale of cost to do that with a golf ball and
the weight of the golf ball passed a prototype standpoint, which was which was
fun, but in terms of entering the market with something competitive we can bring
out and still provide benefit, it really came down. I spent some time
just thinking about what zooming into to a golf team, just looking at it
and just playing around with the metrics of well how can we improve, how
can we remove more friction? And once the thought came into my head that
well, if we can just assume the parameter that is the direction they're hitting,
we just opened ourselves up to a lot more friction percent wise that we
can remove. And since no other golf tee had done that at the time,
that just seemed like a great avenue for us to really improve and raise
the bar that on golf teas and really drive that forward. So the next
question is always going to come up, and I'm sure not just coming for
me, but everyone wants to make sure. Is it legal? Is it
USGA compliant? Can I take it out and use it on my local tournament?
Yes? Yes, a great question, and the answer to that is
yes, it is USGA conforming. We have USGA conformance on both of our
sizes, the two point seventy five and the three point twenty five. Another
opportunity for us in the market to the rules of Golf state that you cannot
have a directional indicator on your golf tea. However, the rule applies if
when you address the ball, you t up your you t up your golf
ball, and you address the ball. If you can see that indicator.
That is an illegal golf tee. You're not allowed to do that. Because
you've now addressed the ball. It shows the line of play, but because
our tr row is small and you cannot see it at address, it does
not provide that line of play at address. We were able to get USGA
conformance so you can use them in tournaments. PGA players can use them in
tournaments. Tiger can tee it up at the Masters. It's it's legal,
it's conforming. We get that question often, and we we strongly recommend if
anybody does question it, call USGA's Equipment Rules and Conformance and they will they
will let you know that, yes, it is USA conforming, so we
we we encourage that, we recommend it. We put the u SGA conformance
on our website the letter, so that we can show that we're conforming and
that people can use them in tournaments. And what about on your packaging.
It's also on the packaging conforms with the Rules of Golf. Which is the
exact statement that that is that the allowable verbiage. They do not like USJ
does not want the that's the allowable verbiage there right, the allowable verbage Yep.
They do not want their name on the packaging, so they give you
the verbage that you're allowed to put on your packaging, which we follow.
Good for you, Well, you just kind of dropped a hint here.
I'm I'm is Tiger using this? I mean, are there are there any
players on any professional tour, whether it would be the top tour, the
competing exhibition tour, or even long Drive? Are there any players that have
had success with the t or you know they're using it? Yeah, so
we we on the long Drive circuit. We did have a number of guys
using them on the Long Drive, particularly Maurice Allen uses them in his in
his events and through the long Drive circuit. For the last few years now
he has been involved with us and using the product and having some good success
with it too. In terms of the PGA and the other the other tours,
I am not familiar with anybody that is using it. If they are,
they very well could be and we don't know. But that's a great
topic. I'd love to I'd love to ask you and learn more to see
what would the psychology be behind PGA players in their golf teas. Because I
know you have this long standing stigma of well, you know the wooden golf
tee is you know that this tried and true standard and there what would be
what would lower the barrier for PGA player to try it? Because if if
I can offer them, you know, two or three yards straighter on a
twenty five yard fairway, I would imagine that's that that would be considered low
hanging fruit and a competitive edge. I don't know why anyone wouldn't want to
try that, well, considering that professional golfers don't pay for anything. They
don't want to buy a box of these. It's like, what do you
mean I gotta pay for these? It's like, come on, man,
it's a small company. Give them a break. Go ahead and pull out
your wallet. It's there, you've got. It's thick, yak some tees.
Yeah, I would say, you know, if there is a if
there are any competitive golfers and professional golfers that are looking to try it,
we would certainly be interested in providing them some product to try it out and
for themselves to see if there's a benefit that they feel that they can carry
into their game. All right, let's take another break. We'll be right
back, Okay. Well, whether the tour players and the professionals use them
or not. Let's talk about why we need to use them. What are
the benefits of flight path golf tea that you've not you know, designed into
these te's, but your research in your testing has proven why these are superior
teas to just the old fashioned wooden tea that we snap every every time we
hit the ball. And yeah, that's a great question, Fred that what
we did see a large benefit to the product that we did see that we
didn't intend on having. It wasn't built in uh directly. It came out
indirectly was the fact that you have to aim the aim the tee. And
that sounds like such a simple concept. But when you stand on a tea
box and you look out into the fairway, you know, your eyes are
attracted to the sandbox, the sand bunkers, Your eyes are attracted to the
trees on the right, the pond on the left, everything but the fairway
left. Yeah, and typically from a psychological standpoint, when you know,
when you have that thought in your mind, you typically end up hitting in
the direction you're thinking of. So, because we provide the golfer the I
guess you could call it a subconscious positive affirmation. The last thought they have
is thinking of the fairway. They they aim the t so they're aiming at
the fairway. The last thought in their head before they tee off is I'm,
well, I I aimed it at the fairway. I'm I'm looking at
the fairway. I'm not looking left, I'm not looking right. And that
typically led to a better outcome on their on their drive after that, and
so from a psychological standpoint, it did, and it meet myself included.
I I noticed when I started getting out on the course and and aiming the
to the fairway, I started forgetting about, you know, the bunkers that
I'm seeing on the left or the trees on the right, and it improved
my game something something indirect Oh in mine as well. I'm here there's You
could not convince me that these have not helped my drives. That is really
weird. And anybody who's like, no, just go ahead, try at
melse Fred like, Nope, not gonna do it, not gonna do it.
I like my clubs, I like my putter. You know, it's
like love these t's and I'm not gonna lose them. But when you have
success, like this. What inevitably is going to happen is you're going to
get competition, You're going to get knockoffs. Have you had any but you've
got patents on these things, So what have you had any problems? Yeah?
And I'm glad you brought that up. We not only we have a
US patent, we put the US patent number on the box to make it
very blatantly clear. And the US patent was the claims and the patent were
designed to make sure we cover the orientations and what we're the perform performance benefit
of the tea. So we put the US patent number on the box.
We also hold registered trademarks for flight Path. We hold registered trademarks for our
slogan and tea above all US patents and US registered trademarks. I would say,
right after our first interview Fred from last year, late December last year,
I started seeing a foreign product knockoff appearing online and by it wasn't the
golf Smarter's fault, I promise. By February of this year, that product
made its way into a number of different distributors into the US market and started
flooding the US market. And this wasn't just a knockoff. This was a
complete copycat. It was the exact same product. They took our marketing materials,
my demonstration videos and marketingterials from the website was put on this product.
So they stole the marketing materials. They the packaging is exactly the same.
They copied the style, they copied the design, they stole the logan A
tea above all, and they took every they took. They blatant patent infringement,
blatant copy of the product, exact replica, and then they put their
slogan on it. So that started flooding the market in February and we saw
I'm so sorry. Yeah, no, it was a good lesson learned.
I would say for most entrepreneurs and small businesses, if you did not protect
your product intellectually, that two to three year mark, if you have success,
that's typically when foreign markets will invade and take over. In this case
is a success story because we had the US patents. So from February to
July we spent about six months fighting this foreign product that got into a number
of different distributors online and thankfully with the US patent protection, a lot of
the US distributors and any companies that were in the US that respect intellectual property
that we filed with, we were able to cease and assist and have those
products taken down, and especially on Amazon. It flooded Amazon late this last
year. And thankfully Amazon offers an independent review. They have a third party
independent review where you can submit your intellectual property. They review the intellectual property
and if they feel that it as an infringement, they will remove products that
are infringing on US intellectual property. And thankfully that is the case. Can
you stop these competitors? Can you stop these thieves? We can. We
can do it on US soil. So if it hits US soil, it's
it's it's a blatant, fraudulent infringement on our intellectual property. We we in
their market, it's going to be difficult because we we don't have protection in
their market, but anything in the US certainly, and they've made in addition
to the exact replica, there's three or four knockoffs. There's another version now
that's not an exact copy, but it is still a blatant infringement of our
intellectual property. So now there's multiple variations of this product coming out. And
then again just taking our marketing materials and just putting their logo on it.
Wow, the product is they use cheaper materials, they use cheaper packaging.
It's not the authentic product. So I urge anybody, you know, if
you're looking to buy the true product flight Path, Go Tease, you would
be through our website, our Amazon channel, our Shopify store in those areas.
But there are there are websites that still have that product up and we're
taking you know, we send one Cson Assist letter at a time distributor takes
down and then another distributor you know, it pops up, you know,
a week later. So it's been a great you know, it's been a
big lesson in understanding and navigating intellectual property as a small business. And you
know just how how quickly foreign markets can try to take advantage of that.
Are there other markets, other foreign markets that you can go in and try
to get your patent and your trademarks or is it only work in the United
States because it's a US based product. So with US patents, when you
file a US patent and you're accepted for US PEN, you have one year
from the date of acceptance to file that patent and other markets, and there
is no international patent you can file. I believe the European Union has a
patent treaty European Pantrty, which gives you access to fifteen or sixteen different countries
there, but each country you need to file individually into those countries, so
you have one year from the time that you get acceptance to do that.
Our approval was in twenty eighteen, so if I wanted protection in a number
of different markets, it would have been by twenty nineteen. So we do
not have that. We have us intellectual property, but again international patent protection
for a small business, the amount of money that you are going to get
into you could you could sink yourself right out of the gate if you try
to protect yourself and in markets that even with the intellectual property, you're not
really going to do much. So we decided to double down on our branding
flight Path. People know the brand, people understand the brand, and once
a brand you know, once you associate the brand with a product, it's
easy to disseminate the knockoffs. Yeah, and plus with a product like this,
you need at least a year, if not two or more to like
is it going to work. Is it worth investing? You know, I
mean one year is not a lot of time that's right for you know,
a smaller product that you'd want to be able to try to protect that's right
internationally, and wow, those are the waters to navigate. I strongly urge
small businesses to file for US patent protection when they're ready to you know,
close again in the market. And just know, if you don't get that
protection and you start becoming successful, the foreign markets will identify it, they
will infringe on it, and they will try to take it over. So
we were luckily around August we were able to kind of win that battle against
a lot of these foreign distributors coming into the country with the product, so
we were able to successfully do then we've also been successful in branding the product
appropriately too, and to follow up on that as well in terms of resiliency
and given you know, the geo political tensions that we're seeing these days.
We also made a considerable effort to manufacture the product in the US, though
it would be more expensive our injection molding facilities, the product is made in
the United States, so that also helped, you know, keep us up
and running and also gave US those two or three years before the foreign markets
were able to take it over, So we manufactured in the US, we
keep it in the US, and we maintain our intellectual property here in the
US. All right, listen, we're gonna check out what's happening on Golf
Smarter Mulligans this week and to hear what you know old episodes we're bringing back
from the Golf Smarter archives, and when we come back, we're going to
start talking about what's next for Flight Path golf teas. This week on Golf
Smarter Mulligans, we go back to an interesting conversation, maybe a bit dated,
but is fascinating nonetheless, because we speak to Aubrey McCormick, who is
a multiple time contestant on Golf Channel's Big Break reality show that ran from two
thousand and three to twenty fifteen. She talks about the level of competition and
how this type of competition impacted her, along with what it was like to
come back a third time. The producers when I walked up for the third
time, they all greeted me with open arms and they welcomed me and said,
Hi, Aubrey, great to see you again. It was never that
sort of feeling of oh great, here she is again. You know,
they were very very welcoming to me, which made me feel like, okay,
wow, they remember me. The reason why I believe I got on
the show this time was because I was true to who I was, So
I wasn't trying to make anyone kick me. I was being true to my
roots, true to who I was, meaning answering questions with an honest answer
instead of what I thought they wanted to hear. And I believe that's very
important. Sure I could have gone in and been like, yeah, I
want to be everybody on this show, and I'm a tough guy. The
truth is I'm not, And I just wanted to get on show because I
thought I really deserved a chance. Originally published in May of twenty twelve,
it's episode two hundred and forty one of Golf Smarter Mulligans with Aubrey McCormick,
a contestant on Golf Channel's Big Break. So if you like the variety of
topics and guests that we provide here at Golf Smarter, then don't miss the
chance to get insights, advice, and the unique people that make golf so
compelling as you join us twice each week for Golf Smarter and Golf Smarter Mulligans.
They're both available for free from wherever you're listening right now. It's awesome
that you've got it online on your website, but you also have it available
on Amazon. I wasn't aware of that. Are there other major websites that
the teaser available? Yeah? So in addition to our own Shopify online,
our website online store, our Amazon store is very big and authentic now that
we have the intellectual property and the protection on Amazon, so that's a big
market for us. We have a number of different third party distributors and companies
that are also selling it. So as long as you see the name flight
Path, the branding flight Path, you're buying the authentic product. So we
have a number of different avenues. We are going into twenty twenty four looking
at early spring launching a line of retail packaging. So we should be in
local stores through twenty twenty four. Oh wow, And when when do you
think that's going to hit? We're hoping. We're hoping to spring. We
plan on bringing that, We plan on having the product available in early spring
retail blister packaging, and we plan on starting to get our you know,
on the ground and grassroots level, so we can get these into the golf
the pro shops at the local golf courses, the golf stores, you know,
the shops around the country, and a lot of the big box retailers
that we you know as a market that we just haven't entered yet. We
plan on doing that this year. We're at a position now where we're ready
to go there and we're hoping early spring. Oh, that's phenomenal. And
because your manufactured in the United States, your supply chain isn't that brutal,
is it. That's correct. Our supply chain is intact. We have a
good handle on that, and that allows us to go ahead and ramp up
manufacturing and meet the demand that we've been seeing. We had a big increase
in sales and a big Russian sales over the last few months. And given
that increase in sales, we still are able to diversify and develop this blister
packaging and bring it out. And why do you think you've had this you
know surge going on in you know, the end of through the end of
twenty twenty three. Yeah, I really think a couple things. I think
that the product has finally gotten to customers long enough now that they've been able
to test it, give it to their friends, your classic example, have
them test it, like it and start sharing their friends and seeing a benefit.
So I think we're finally starting to see, you know, that three
year mark where people have the product has been accepted in the market, it
has shown its benefit and its value, and people are ready to capitalize on
it. We also a lot of our sales were being cannibalized by that the
fraudulent products, and once we were able to get them off of US soil
around July August is when we really got them off of our you know,
coming in from you know, into the US. Around that time, we
were able to bring those sales back that we were losing to the four knockoff
products, those illegal products. So I think it's a little bit of both.
We this is this product has been one color, it's in white,
with two sizes and going into early spring. In addition to retail packaging,
we're looking to bring out several colors, so that's coming in early spring as
well. We're ready to diversify the product line. It's it's got it a
good organic base and we're ready to start bringing this product to your local stores.
Scoop colors. Are you going to do like a variety of colors in
a box? Are you gonna you know, like a box of or just
like orange ones and blue ones? And what are the colors and what other
options are there? You said two sizes. I know when we talked last
year, you had talked about introducing a longer version. Where do you where
does that stand? Yeah? Yeah, the products is in two sizes right
now, two point seventy five regular long tea and then use three point twenty
five long tea, both in white. So we're looking at bringing out probably
two or three colors in the spring, and then another two or three colors
going into the middle of next year. And initially those would be sold as
you know, the eight pack for that color. But I like your idea
for it. I like the idea of a mixed pack and mixing some colors
up. But they'll be available on both sizes in two to three colors early
spring, and hopefully another two to three colors after that and in the middle
of the year. Oh wow, the long teas, so we're still that
option. There would be a three point five or a four. What we
have seen though, is the large consumer market doesn't typically go for tees longer
than three point two five. So it is still that's still very much a
niche market and geared towards whether it be long drive athletes, long drive professionals.
But in terms of a consumer market, that's still that's still a smaller
market. If it is towards the end of next year or twenty twenty five,
we do, we still hope to pursue that market and and you know,
build the infrastructure necessary to sell that product. So we're thinking retail packaging
first, color, second, and then longer size is third. And what
about shorter sizes for iron play? Yeah, I I the two point seventy
five is great with irons. You can put them in the ground, right,
you can stick them down as part as if I when I break them,
when I break them, where I snap them. It's generally with an
iron with an iron yep, yep, or especially those you know if you
use like a wedge or something with a with a you know, a sharp
angle on it. But yeah, we we keep the two point seven five
for iron play. We haven't thought of of something we haven't thought of the
of bringing out something shorter than two point seven five. We haven't seen too
much feedback from our our consumers on wanting something shorter. We have seen the
feedback on the three point five that they really like, and then more feedback
on the lomergy. So that's a that's a good thought, that's something to
think about. We haven't really we haven't really seen that. Yeah, because
I know that when I use an iron and I put this tea in and
I like to tee it up for my iron play, you know, really
low, so the so that the ball is as if it's sitting on you
know, the fair way or something, just not not that high off the
ground unless I'm trying to shorten the distance a little bit, right, And
so sometimes the ground's too hard and this is so long that it doesn't go
all the way in, and I got to like pound it in there,
and I'm like, God, if I only had one that was an inch,
sure, an inch and a half. But the head is because of
the arrow and the direction. I love the indentations for the finger and your
thumb to place it in. I just love the feel of the design of
it. When I put it in, I just think it's great. Thank
you for I would really hope, you know, if there are people out
there that haven't, you know, haven't tried the product, we really encourage
them to give it a try, try it out, see how you feel
with it, give it around, give it one round the eighteen holes with
the product, and you know, after eighteen holes, if you feel that
you know there's a benefit there, you know, we hope that we have
a customer there that we can, you know, really supply a good product
too. Well, I'll tell you after one round. What I'm going to
tell you is it'll still be there. It will still be intact. These
things last a long time. I actually I traveled this year. I went
back East to play with my nephew, and I brought my shoes, my
glove, a sleeve of balls, two sleeves of balls, and one tea
and I lost it on the fourth hole and my game just deteriorated from that.
Was like, I can't find my tea. I don't want to play
with these crappy teas. And it was just like everything just went downhill from
that point on. And it's like, what's wrong with you? I said,
I lost my tea, leave me alone. We got to get you
another pack out there. Yeah, okay through the eighteen Yeah, well here
you can listen right now. Hear that that's my empty box shaking. I'm
out of tea. Well, I would love that, but also, you
know, you're encouraging people to try it out, and you and I had
a conversation before we started this recording, and I'm so excited to announce that
if you're a Golf Smarter listener and you'd like to try them out, we
are now going to be giving the flight Path golf tees away to our Golf
Smarter ambassadors who introduce a new episode of Golf Smarter. So I will pitch
this again at the end of the episode, but now our choices are going
to change. We'll have the gloves from Red Rooster Golf, We'll have the
Tony Mansony video and a box of flight Path golf tees. And I hope
that the Golf Smarter listeners will take advantage of this and introduce an episode.
Tell us where you're from, where you play, and what episode it is,
and you two can get a box of flight Path golf tees. Daniel,
I'm really excited about this and I'm so grateful that you guys are willing
to participate. Thank you very much, Fred, Oh, it's always a
pleasure being on talking with you, and you know, having the opportunity to
give you an update where we are and how we're growing, you know,
it means a lot to us and we really appreciate it. And I just
am going to keep following you guys and so excited for your continued growth and
really curious to see what colors come in the box, if there's multicolors or
just one color, and we'll make sure to fix that empty box problem you're
having. We'll take care of that going into the day. Thank you very
much. Oh, Daniel, have a happy holidays, thanks so much for
coming back on the show, and best of luck with continued success for you
and you're dead. Thank you very much for had happy holidays to you and
all the fans out there. So this week I was diagnosed with tennis elbow
carpal tunnel syndrome, a pinched nerve and the doc threw in, eh,
your age, it's probably arthritis too, and Merry Christmas to you too,
doc gee. Thanks Now, I remember a number of years ago I had
about with tennis elbow and took a lot of winter away from playing golf,
and things got better, as did my game. But a few months ago
I made a slight change in my grip where I rotated my left hand clockwise
slightly, and for the first time I was hitting a draw off the tee
with some regularity. Could that have contributed to the tennis elbow again? Sure?
Tennis elbow? Right? Actually, I'm pretty sure that tennis elbow is
when the pain is on the outside of the arm, and golfer's elbow is
when it affects the inside. But I'll get a physical therapist center a golf
fitness expert on the show in the near future to learn more about the distinction
for me, But staying away from golf won't prevent me from creating new content.
The problem is the carpal tunnel syndrome. If that continues to get worse,
then I have to curtail the amount of time I spend at my computer
creating new content. So please, let's all keep our fingers crossed that I
don't need to take a break from new episodes. But if I have to,
I guess then the winter would be the best time for that. All
that is to say that if a Tuesday rolls by in the next month or
two and there's no new episode, you know why I couldn't do it.
I want to welcome our newest Golf Smarter Ambassador, DJ Degallo of Valparaiso,
Indiana, because all he did was record this week's show opening. DJ is
receiving a free link to Tony Manzoni's video of the Loss Fundamental. I invite
you to become a Golf Smarter Ambassador with the incentive of getting a choice of
three great gifts for your effort for telling us where you're from and where you
play and what you heard in today's episode. Is pretty exciting because, along
with Tony Manzoni's video of the Loss Fundamental, a glove and glove storage compartment
from redroostergolf dot com. Our third choice is now an eight pack of flight
Path Golf tees. I know it's crazy to say this, but I wouldn't
be surprised if an eight pack lasts you an entire year. That's sturdy and
that good. Learn more at flightpathcolf dot com. Flightpathcolf teas a tee above
all, so here's your chance to try them out for free. Just write
to me directly and I'll send you simple instructions on how to record an episode
opening that takes less than one minute. Check out today's show notes to find
links about each gift you have to choose from. To see and hear the
most compelling and helpful short tips and insights of our podcast interviews for both Golf
Smarter and golf Smarter Mulligans. Please follow us on social at golf Smarter,
on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and x for our
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of golf Smarter Ambassadors who've received a free gift, write to golf Smarter podcast
at gmail dot com or click on the Hey Read button when you visit golfsmarter dot com