TaylorMade celebrated its 25th anniversary in style last week with a Pro-Am event to mark the occasion at the Druids Glen Resort in County Wicklow, Ireland. The Pro-Am was attended by twenty-one of TaylorMade’s Tour players including Sergio Garcia, Darren Clarke, Retief Goosen, Ian Poulter and Paul McGinley.
The event was the culmination of a year full of 25th anniversary related marketing activities, including in store promotions and competitions with key media partners.
The celebrations began with TaylorMade Tour Professionals demonstrating their skills during a short game, long game and putting clinic before playing 18 holes on the challenging yet beautiful Druids Heath Golf Course with consumers and trade partners from throughout Europe.
The golf was a thrilling affair with Darren Clarke and Jean Francois Lucquin sharing first place. Following the excitement on the course the guests attended a gala dinner, hosted by Sky Sports presenter Dominic Holyer. The dinner included a moving welcoming speech by vice president and general manager of TaylorMade-adidas Golf, Sean Toulon who was a close friend of Gary Adam‘s, TaylorMade’s founder and the person responsible for producing the first ever metalwood 25 years ago.
It all started twenty five years ago when Adams was approached by a man looking for an investor in a metal headed driver that he had developed. Adams made numerous modifications to the club and having developed the first ever metalwood, the Pittsburgh Persimmon, went on to establish and name his new company TaylorMade Golf – to indicate that his clubs were tailored for better players. During that same year of 1979, the original TaylorMade metalwood made its first tour appearance in the ‘Tournament of Champions‘ and the rest, as they say, is history.
Guests at the Anniversary gala dinner were in for a special treat, as Todd Hamilton and Retief Goosen had brought with them the US Open and Open Championship trophies that they had won earlier this year. This generated great excitement during the dinner as guests were invited to touch two of the most famous trophies in golf and have their pictures taken with them.
To cap the evening off, Sergio Garcia, Darren Clarke, Todd Hamilton, Paul McGinley and Ian Poulter then took to the stage for a question and answer session. It was a great source of entertainment for all the guests and gave people an insight not only to winning a Major Championship and the Ryder Cup but also the personalities of the players and the mutual respect they have for each other.
Commenting on the event Sean Toulon said, “We are extremely proud of our heritage and to have reached a milestone such as this. The 25th Anniversary celebrations in Ireland were a fitting way to mark the occasion and my thanks go out to the players who made the event all the more special.”
TaylorMade-adidas Golf at www.tmag.com
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