A bridge too far

For many people, their introduction to Tiger Woods came on August 28, 1996, when the then-20-year-old opened a pre-tournament news conference at the Greater Milwaukee Open, his first PGA Tour event as a professional, with the words, “Hello, world.” The next day, his career officially began when he shot an opening-round 67.

In many ways, those moments also marked Nike’s entry as a major player in golf.

To be sure, the Beaverton, Oregon, concern was already in the game, having released its first golf shoe in 1984. A year later, Nike signed its first golfer, Seve Ballesteros, and soon after inked footwear contracts with Peter Jacobsen and Curtis Strange. In 1988, the company that University of Oregon track coach Bill Bowerman and one of his runners, Phil Knight, founded more than 20 years prior hung its first major championship pelt when Strange won that year’s U.S. Open.

But even with that win and Strange’s victory in the following year’s Open, Nike was only a bit player in golf. Basketball was its sport. Track and field, too.

But then came Tiger, and when Woods hit his first shot in Milwaukee, he was wearing a Nike shirt and hat as stipulated by the five-year, $40 million endorsement contract he had just signed. The next day, Nike released the first of a series of cutting-edge television commercials featuring the golfer.

From there, the company and the kid embarked on a rapid rise. Tiger won 15 major championships and became arguably the greatest ever to play the game, while Nike made itself into a major factor in clubs and balls as well as shoes, hats and shirts. By most news accounts, its golf division produced more than $700 million in annual revenues for a stretch (and upwards of $1 billion at times, according to the one-time president of Nike Golf, Cindy Davis, and the division’s former head of sports marketing, Kel Devlin) and came to employ some 700 people.

Woods first put a Nike ball into play in May 2000, switching from the wound Titleist Professional he had been using to the solid-core Tour Accuracy. And he went on a roll after that, winning the Memorial Tournament and then in rapid succession the U.S. Open, the Open Championship and the PGA Championship. Two years later, Tiger started using Nike clubs after the company had made Tom Stites its director of product creation for clubs – and David Duval had captured the 2001 Open Championship using Nike irons and wedges and a prototype driver.

“It’s a fairly simple equation. We lost money for 20 years on equipment … and realized that next year wasn’t going to be any different.” — Phil Knight

Woods kept winning after making that change, and so did Nike as other golfers began employing its gear, among them Trevor Immelman (2008 Masters), Stewart Cink (2009 Open Championship) and Michelle Wie (2014 U.S. Women’s Open). Rory McIlroy won the 2014 Open and PGA Championship a year after signing a 10-year, $200 million endorsement deal with Nike, while Brooks Koepka used Nike equipment, most notably his Vapor Fly Pro 3-iron, in his five major championship triumphs.

It was a rollicking ride, for the golfers, to be sure, and also Nike, which basked in the glow those triumphs cast across the entire corporation.

But in the summer of 2016, almost two decades to the day that Tiger made his professional debut in Milwaukee, Nike announced that it was exiting the golf club and ball business. Knight laid out the reason why.

“It’s a fairly simple equation,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg. “We lost money for 20 years on equipment … and realized that next year wasn’t going to be any different.”

Around that same time, Bloomberg reported that sales at Nike Golf had fallen 8.2 percent to $706 million in the fiscal year ending that May.

For many in the game, that was startling news, and it raised many questions, chief among them: how could one of America’s most successful corporations fail in the golf equipment realm? That was a reasonable interrogative considering Nike’s financial might and marketing prowess, its devoted work force and the fact that Tiger was so talented and attractive that he transcended the sport.

What follows are some answers.

Rain falls for much of the winter in Portland, Oregon, and January 25, 1964, was typically cold and damp when Knight and Bowerman ate lunch together at the Cosmopolitan Hotel.

Knight had grown up in Portland and earned a bachelor’s degree in business from the University of Oregon in Eugene in 1959. He then went on to Stanford to procure his MBA, and it was there that he wrote his business plan for what would become Nike.

As for Bowerman, he was still running the track-and-field program at Oregon.

They met to discuss a possible partnership, and by the end of the meal, Knight and Bowerman had decided to start an athletic shoe company called Blue Ribbon Sports. Seven years later, in 1971, they renamed it Nike, after the Greek goddess of victory.

That year, they also unveiled the Swoosh logo, which a graphic design student at Portland State University had created and then sold to Knight for $35.

Then privately held, Nike generated less than $2 million in revenues in 1972. By 1991, when its primary pitchman, Michael Jordan, led the Chicago Bulls to the NBA title, the publicly traded company had grown to be the largest sports footwear and apparel business in the world, recording annual sales of more than $3 billion. Six years later, when Tiger won his first Masters Tournament and Jordan took the Bulls to another NBA title, Nike revenues came to $9.8 billion. That number had more than tripled 19 years later when the company decided to get out of golf equipment. At the end of fiscal 2025, Nike sales amounted to $46.3 billion. The company also boasted a very strong record of profitability through those decades and returned great value to its shareholders.

Woods won his third straight U.S. Amateur in August 1996 at the Pumpkin Ridge golf complex in Portland. Two days later, he put his signature on that fully guaranteed endorsement deal for apparel and golf shoes.

Thus began a marriage seemingly made in sports heaven, with Tiger becoming a part of what would become the hottest and hippest company in golf and Nike bringing on board perhaps the most exciting young athlete on the planet.

Nike is headquartered on a 400-acre campus in the city of Beaverton, a suburb of Portland. The property features 70 buildings, many of which are named after Nike athletes, among them Bo Jackson, Serena Williams and Ken Griffey Jr. Woods and Jordan, too. And the gyms, soccer fields, basketball courts and running trails that are interspersed around them are for the 11,000 employees based there to use before and after work and during lunch breaks. There is no dress code, per se, but it seems that whatever workers wear features the Nike logo. That includes sneakers and shoes, of course, though going barefoot is not discouraged. And one who has done that is Knight, the company’s 87-year-old chairman emeritus, who has been known to take meetings in his office without footwear.

He is also distinguished by the shield sunglasses he frequently dons and the scruffy, blond-red beard and mustache he usually sports.

Visitors to the Nike campus are easily awed by the positive energy that permeates. The sense of shared purpose and accomplishment is palpable, too. So is the loyalty employees feel toward the brand and the confidence and pride they exude.

Sometimes those sentiments border on hubris, as I discovered during several trips to Beaverton in the early 2000s and multiple interactions with Nike executives at major golf championships and PGA Shows in that period. One person who was particularly prone to that was a guitar-strumming, Birkenstock-wearing, F-bomb-dropping Californian named Bob Wood. One of the longer-standing employees at the time, having joined Nike in 1980, Wood was the architect of its move into golf and the first president of its golf division as well as the sport’s biggest advocate within the company. He frequently crowed about how Nike was going to bury the competition in equipment and dismissed the business skills and strategic thinking of some of the game’s most respected executives.

In some ways, that attitude was understandable given how the golf world reacted after Woods captured his first Masters in 1997 and four years later completed the Tiger Slam – and how invincible he and Nike suddenly seemed. And it was not just the tournament wins, for the company also received multiple awards for the clubs and balls it brought to market during that time.

It was also pure Nike.

Hubris, however, can cloud the judgment of even the clearest-thinking C-suiter. And most of the dozen or so sources I contacted for this article believe that it undoubtedly contributed to Nike’s lack of success in golf equipment.

… as welcome as Woods’ dominant play was, it sometimes gave the impression that he was so superhumanly talented it didn’t really matter what clubs and balls he used.

But they cited other reasons for that failure. Not fully appreciating how different the golf equipment sector was from apparel and footwear, for one. And how difficult it was to create and quickly build a business that could successfully compete with the game’s best-established brands, for another.

In addition, they pointed to a perception among serious golfers who, fairly or not, believed Nike lacked authenticity as an equipment maker.

To be sure, Tiger brought instant validation to the company when he started using its gear. But as welcome as Woods’ dominant play was, it sometimes gave the impression that he was so superhumanly talented it didn’t really matter what clubs and balls he used.

Finally, there was the fact that, according to Knight, Nike never made money in clubs and balls. To be sure, its golf division was profitable at times. But what Knight’s statements indicate is whatever Nike Golf cleared came from shoes and apparel.

So, Knight decided to focus that division instead on being the undisputed leader in golf footwear and apparel.

“In the end, it came down to Nike making better margins on a pair of socks than they did on a set of golf clubs,” said Tom Henderson, a PGA club professional and longtime elite Swoosh staff member who worked for more than three decades at the Round Hill Club in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Financial analyst Casey Alexander does not disagree with that assessment.

“Golf equipment is a brutal business,” he said. “It’s a steel cage death match for market share, and every few years, someone gets thrown out.”

Hughes Norton, the IMG executive who negotiated Tiger’s first contract with Nike and in the process came to know the company well, is among those who believes that hubris was indeed a problem.

“Nike has such an interesting culture,” he told Second Wind. “People there felt more like cult members than employees to me. There was a ‘We’re Nike, and you’re not’ attitude. To be honest, they had a lot to be arrogant about, for they were overwhelmingly successful and associated with many of the greatest athletes in the world. But with golf equipment, they were getting into an area that was completely different from shoes and apparel.”

David Pillsbury, who served as general manager for Nike Golf from 2002 to 2004, appreciates Norton’s comments.

“I enjoyed my time at Nike and admired the people there,” said Pillsbury, who has been CEO of Invited, the largest owner/operator of golf and country clubs in the U.S., since 2018. “But people sometimes acted as if all anyone had to do to create a successful product was slap a Swoosh on it and hire a great athlete to endorse it.”

Authenticity was also an issue.

“Nike had Tiger and a lot of the best players in the world wearing their logos on their shirts and hats, but they still had a hard time getting the hard-core golfer to play their clubs and balls,” said John Krzynowek, who in 1995 helped found and then run the market research firm Golf Datatech. “A lot of it had to do with Nike being a bit too avant-garde for the country club golfer and not a pure golf company like, say, Titleist or Ping. Also, Nike did not have a very strong relationship with green-grass golf professionals in the beginning because it was so new to the game. And those professionals are key influencers when it comes to getting golfers into a product or brand.”

It also did not help that Nike subcontracted its premium golf balls to an outside entity, in this case, Bridgestone. To be sure, what the Japanese concern provided Nike were top-of-the-line. But as word of that arrangement leaked out, many serious golfers found one more reason to doubt Nike’s authenticity. How could they not, the thinking went, if Nike had to go elsewhere to bring that critical product to market?

Others wondered whether Bridgestone would ever share its best technology with a competitor or react as quickly on their behalf to a development in the market.

Pillsbury well remembers dealing with the concerns about authenticity.

“In getting into golf equipment, the company may have underestimated just how entrenched brands like Titleist were with core-avid golfers at green grass,” he said of a group that tends to comprise older-generation, lower-handicap golfers who play more traditional brands. “One time, we invited a bunch of good golfers to an event in Los Angeles. All key influencers at their clubs, all with handicap indexes of 5 or below. We gave them the Nike One ball. They all played it and said they loved it. And we are thinking, ‘This is awesome.’ So, we asked, ‘Are you going to switch?’ And the answer was no. Not one person said they would change balls, and I think a lot of that had to do with their deep connections with Titleist.”

The mention of green grass reveals another hurdle that Nike had to clear when it got into balls and clubs, and that was dealing with a brave new business world. Nike had sold its shoes and apparel mostly through the off-course and sporting-goods channels. And purchasing in that area is generally consolidated within a single location. Like Dick’s Sporting Goods in Pittsburgh, for example, and PGA Superstore in Atlanta.

But the green-grass realm consists of thousands of different accounts all over North America, which take a lot more time and money to cover effectively. As a rule, those operations are staffed by PGA professionals who traditionally advise their members and players on the equipment they buy. And those roles became even more important to golfers – and made that channel more valuable than ever before – with the growth and evolution of club fitting in the latter part of the 20th century and the early 2000s.

Nike scrambled to establish a solid green-grass presence. In time, the company made strides in that area and developed a strong staff of professionals. Such as Henderson. And another notable PGA of America member, Eden Foster, from the prestigious Maidstone Club on the East End of Long Island. But Nike was never able to match the coverage that Titleist, Ping, Callaway and TaylorMade enjoyed in that channel or gain real traction among the golfers who did most of their shopping and buying there.

Another difference was in the ways the distribution channels worked – and worked to Nike’s detriment when it got into golf equipment.

“Take a big-box retailer like Dick’s,” said Pillsbury. “They would pay for a container full of shoes from Nike before the company even made them in Asia. But with green grass, the products are not paid for in advance, which means the manufacturer takes all the risk, with the golf professional not deciding how much gear he or she is going to buy until well after it has been made and shipped from the Far East.”

The challenges that Nike faced in building its green-grass presence were emblematic of its entire move into golf equipment. And that was getting good enough in just a few years to take on competitors who had been in the business for decades.

“And to do that successfully, you need to offer a product that is better or at the very least on par with the leading brands, and a strong and effective group of golf professionals who would help identify the green-grass target audience, facilitate the trial and sample process, and support the custom fitting platform,” said Wally Uihlein, who was president and CEO of the Acushnet Co., the parent of Titleist and FootJoy, for nearly two decades before stepping down from that position in early 2018. “Golf balls and golf clubs have always been green-grass driven.”

Davis appreciated the work that needed to be done.

“Golf was a whole new muscle for Nike,” she said. “It had never really been in the equipment business and was not servicing the specialty accounts, such as green-grass pro shops.

“It takes time to build and become credible in the equipment space,” added Davis, who served as Nike Golf GM from 2005-08, at which point she began a six-year run as president of that division. “But we were not naïve to that fact. We made investments, in the Oven, the golf club research and development facility we opened in Fort Worth [Texas] in 2002, and later a ball R&D facility in Beaverton. And in talent, too.”

Alexander speaks to that same issue when he states: “Golf equipment innovation builds on the innovation that comes before it. It stands on the shoulders of what a company has already done. And if you don’t have that base, that experience and the intellectual property portfolio that come from those things, then sometimes you are going to be shooting in the dark.”

There is also the matter of having the resources and managerial wherewithal to move quickly when introducing products and meeting the challenges that competitors present with their own new offerings.

Consider what happened with Nike and its Tour Accuracy ball in the spring of 2000. Woods surprised even his closest confidantes when he decided to make that switch, among them Devlin, who was Woods’ primary contact at the company, and the golfer’s caddie, Steve Williams. And that forced Nike to play catch-up as far as getting the ball to market and developing plans to market and sell it.

As for Titleist, it had been developing a solid-core ball of its own, dubbed Pro V1, in an effort that Uihlein has described as Acushnet’s version of the Manhattan Project. Titleist seeded that product among its staff professionals for the first time at the Invensys Classic in Las Vegas in September 2000 – and then brought it to retail in December, months ahead of its original schedule.

Only a company with the size, scope and experience of Titleist could have responded so quickly and completely to an advance by one of its competitors. And by doing so, it minimized the damage Nike might have done with Tour Accuracy and any advantages Nike might have gained with what was undisputedly a breakthrough product.

“We missed an opportunity when Titleist was able to do that,” said Devlin, who started working at Nike Golf in August 1998 and left in the winter of 2013.

“I have often wondered that if Tiger had been more open with us about the testing he had been doing with the product and his plans to switch to Tour Accuracy when he did, we might have been able to make that switch quicker,” he added.

Considering those factors, it is not surprising that Nike called it quits with golf equipment in 2016. But there was more than a little irony in that happening at a time when some in the industry thought the company was hitting its stride as a club maker.

“As far as hard goods were concerned, I could see that Nike was getting better. … they were producing their best when they stopped making golf clubs. And you saw tour players using Nike equipment long after the company stopped producing it.” –Eden Foster, PGA Professional, Maidstone Club

“I remember going down to the Oven that summer,” said Henderson. “I saw the new line of clubs they were making and thought that 2017 was going to be an unbelievable year. Then, a few months later, they were out of the equipment business.”

His fellow Swoosh elite staff member Foster, who has also been affiliated with Nike for the past quarter century, had a similar experience.

“As far as hard goods were concerned, I could see that Nike was getting better,” he said. “In fact, they were producing their best when they stopped making golf clubs. And you saw tour players using Nike equipment long after the company stopped producing it.”

Foster remembers a VR-S iron that Nike made initially for the Asia market, a forged cavity back he said was as good as any he ever hit.

“That was back in 2009 or 2010,” Foster added. “Nike was way ahead of the curve with that.”

He paused before adding wistfully: “I wonder if Nike would have had a better shot with golf equipment today. The game has become younger, cooler. All sorts of new people have come into it, thanks to what happened during and after COVID and to places like Five Iron Golf and Topgolf that have grown the interest in golf to a broader audience.”

Davis expressed similar sentiments.

“I was disappointed when Nike got out of golf equipment,” she said. “I felt that we had built a good foundation and put us in the position not only to compete but also take things to a higher level. But I understood the realities of being part of a publicly traded corporation that was responsible for growing shareholder value and constantly evaluating return on investment.”

A little more than seven years after Nike exited the golf equipment business, in late 2023, the company ended its business relationship with Tiger Woods when its fourth and last endorsement contract with the golfer – a 10-year agreement worth a reported $200 million – expired. Around that same time, Nike began to execute a $2 billion cost-cutting plan for the entire corporation.

After dropping out of the PGA Show in Orlando for a spell, Nike started exhibiting there again in 2025 and was back last week for this year’s edition. The company’s cavernous booth was full of shoes and shirts as well as gloves, bags and hats, all boasting the Nike Swoosh. But there was nary a club or ball in sight.

When Tiger and Nike officially parted ways, the company posted a photo on Instagram with the comments: “It was a hell of a round, Tiger.”

It sure was, even if it didn’t turn out the way both parties may have hoped.

Top: Tiger Woods holding Nike ball in 2005  (Al Tielemans, Sports Illustrated via Getty Images)

Additional photo credits: Tiger Woods during the 1996 Masters (David Cannon, Allsport); Tiger Woods after winning the 1997 Masters (Timothy A. Clary, AFP via Getty Images); Tiger Woods flings his club away during the 2001 Dubai Desert Classic (David Cannon, Allsport)

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