Eastside Golf Is Altering How Golf Appears By Being Genuine
Olajuwon Ajanaku and Earl Cooper based Eastside Golf in 2019 with the purpose of making a model that opened doorways and welcomed extra individuals into the sport that hasn’t at all times featured a number of of us that appear to be them. The 2 alums of the Morehouse golf workforce began with the mantra “Be Genuine,” trying to create a model that would not simply promote within the golf area, however would enable extra individuals to really feel snug being there.
The phrase “develop the sport” is usually overused on the planet of golf, with tournaments, sponsors, excursions, and types throwing it round with little substance to again it up. However it’s really on the coronary heart of what Eastside Golf does, they usually go about it in a couple of methods. One is making a model that individuals who aren’t from the standard golf backgrounds can see themselves in and wish to put on, which needed to begin with the brand and ensuring the model’s ethos shined via in it.
“When you consider a emblem, you actually take into consideration the environment of that emblem,” Ajanaku, who serves because the Artistic Director, defined. “You bear in mind our emblem, and you consider, what’s the environment on a … I’d say numerous gentleman, denims, sweatshirt, and Cuban hyperlink chain, however he’s taking part in golf. I wager he has a really attention-grabbing story, you understand? It’s an entire new method of seeing the golf realm, and really rising from a side of a distinct lens. Early on, once we began this, our ‘Simply Do It’ is ‘Be Genuine.’”
That emblem shortly stood out within the golf area and resonated with lots of people who haven’t at all times seen illustration within the sport of golf. Amongst them is former Giants large receiver Victor Cruz, who turned an early investor in Eastside Golf after he started his personal golf journey. Cruz picked up the sport as his daughter began to play it, and felt a direct connection to Eastside when he first noticed the brand.
“The primary time I noticed the brand, the primary time I noticed a few of the attire, I noticed myself in it. You already know, I noticed myself as the brand,” Cruz mentioned. “I noticed myself like, ‘Oh, that’s cool. I would like to have the ability to embody that emblem and be a part of no matter that brings.’ I wish to be a part of that group that’s representing that emblem and that may be like us. And I used to be like, okay, that’s what’s going to encourage individuals. It doesn’t matter what colour you have been — black, white, Spanish — you noticed your self, an inside metropolis child wanting the way you dressed within the second, swinging a golf membership. That’s cool.”
The problem in really rising the sport of golf is discovering methods to interrupt down the various obstacles of entry. The most important of these is the price of taking part in golf, from shopping for golf equipment to paying for rounds to even having attire. Funding in public golf and municipal golf, which offers areas to play and are typically rather more budget-friendly, is significant. The rise in sim golf choices and interactive ranges like TopGolf have helped create extra areas for individuals to play and be taught the sport, stripping away a few of the value of entry by offering golf equipment to be taught with and reducing the calls for of touring out to a course for these within the metropolis.
Nevertheless, the reality is that golf is a sport of funding, each when it comes to money and time. Meaning to really develop the sport, individuals must wish to spend each on golf, and that may solely occur in the event that they really feel snug and welcomed. That’s the place Eastside Golf’s influence is at its largest. Creating garments, footwear, and equipment individuals wish to put on and have with them on and off the course is legitimately necessary to getting extra individuals into the sport. Nobody needs to remain in an area the place they really feel they don’t belong — a lot much less make investments as a lot money and time as golf requires — in the event that they really feel they must turn into somebody completely different on the course.
Of their newest capsule, the tagline is “Everybody’s Sport,” as Eastside centered on making one thing that allowed individuals to customise their look and add their very own particular person aptitude. The 2 footwear they designed with Nike, a Zoom Victory Tour and an Air Max 1 ’86 OG,’ include interchangeable Swooshes of various colours and textures that give gamers the power to vary up their look from spherical to spherical. It’s the most recent step in what has been an in depth journey for the model, beginning with their first shoe, a blue Jordan that was emblematic of the brand, via their Crimson Clay assortment after which 1961 Change, which Ajakanu defined represented the transfer from the dust to the grass. Now, it’s about making it “Everybody’s Sport,” though they perceive the work in creating that’s solely simply starting.
“Once we get on the grass, that’s the place we congregate everyone, and now it’s everybody’s sport. Get everyone on the grass. Get everyone feeling snug concerning the sport. And it was, truthfully, a piece in progress to get right here,” Ajakanu mentioned. “You possibly can’t simply come out and assist as many individuals and have as many individuals perceive what your purpose is. It’s extra of a piece in progress. We’re nonetheless working in progress to have an effect on change all through the complete sport of golf. The extra that we preserve beating the drum and the louder that we get, the extra verticals we’ll find yourself stepping into. And that’s, most significantly, for us to develop. However then additionally, I might say most significantly for change within the purists within the sport and a number of non-golfers.”
Affecting change on a extra tangible stage is a harder problem to handle broadly, however Eastside golf has began with a bunch that’s close to and pricey to their hearts: the Morehouse golf workforce. Giving again to this system that gave them alternatives within the sport and giving the younger males on the workforce the experiences they wished to have, however didn’t have the assets for, is their mission.
To offer that, they’ve sought out companions which can be prepared to make that very same dedication and assume long-term about how you can influence the sport of golf, fairly than swooping in for a one-off occasion or capsule to hit a benchmark or capitalize on the model being scorching. To make sure that’s the case, the philanthropy component is the start line for Eastside after they speak with potential companions.
“Once we get on partnership calls, I communicate first,” Ajanaku defined. “As a result of I’m like, so that is Eastside Golf. What we’re about right here is really revolutionizing the sport, and exhibiting that altering the sport could be proven via a distinct lens. Now the factor is, how we received right here, Olajuwon and Earl, was any individual serving to us, and really placing forth that effort to point out us that golf could be for us. Now, that’s considered one of our most necessary issues. That’s considered one of our most necessary missions that we do. So I might begin off by saying, philanthropy-wise, what does that appear to be for you? And that’s how actually we might begin off partnership calls.”
That’s how their partnership with Mercedes-Benz happened in 2023, as the 2 discovered a pure pairing with widespread floor within the sport of golf and in Atlanta, the place Mercedes’ U.S. headquarters are positioned. As they started to speak, they discovered themselves aligned on that long-term mission within the sport of golf, and commenced to work out how their partnership would take form. For Mercedes, it allowed them to department out to a distinct viewers than the one they sometimes attain within the golf world, and supply a real alternative to develop the sport.
“We simply have been actually excited concerning the freshness of the group and their mission, and what they wished to do,” Erica Bolden, head of Variety and Inclusion at Mercedes-Benz, mentioned. “And actually nudging them to consider the alternatives and what can we do with long-term influence? So actually pushing that mission. The worth alignment, so far as what they’re doing to push boundaries within the group and to extend accessibility to the game. That was actually thrilling, after all, with me main DEI efforts. And that’s all about what that work is, proper? In order that was actually thrilling. And Monique [Harrison] and I simply carving out what these alternatives may very well be for the model alignment, not just for the visibility, so far as the Mercedes and Eastside Golf manufacturers, however what the missions are doing.
“So actually, to push the elevated entry, enthusiastic about fairness within the sport, the visibility of the model. It’s good, particularly as Mercedes-Benz, we’re making an attempt to achieve into youthful, extra numerous audiences. So it was nice alignment. After which, after all, what we’re doing simply so far as the following technology is worried. Once more, that’s the opposite half that was actually uniquely aligned, so far as what Eastside Golf is doing to get youthful of us concerned into golf, and what we are attempting to do as a model, so far as entry to training and empowering the following technology.”
For Eastside, working with Mercedes gave them a luxurious model associate with deep ties to the sport of golf, most notably as one of many 4 major company companions of the Masters. That may open doorways that might in any other case be shut, like this previous yr after they launched their girls’s line at an occasion in Augusta for the 2024 Masters and have been capable of carry the Morehouse golf workforce down I-20 to Augusta Nationwide — a dream expertise for any golfer, however notably these in Atlanta.
In September, they placed on the second annual Eastside Golf Invitational offered by Mercedes-Benz, which introduced supporters of the model out to Liberty Nationwide Golf Course for a event benefitting the Morehouse workforce. It was a celebration of the model, the influence they’ve been capable of have already, and the thrill for what remains to be to come back, all whereas staying true to their mantra of “Be Genuine.” It’s not straightforward to placed on a golf event and have sponsors, celebrities, and performances that really feel pure to each the model and being at a golf event, however Eastside managed to do exactly that.
The celebrities that got here via, from Cruz to CC Sabathia to Anthony Anderson, weren’t there merely to make an look, however have been there as earnest supporters of the model, who put on it after they play at their residence course. Anderson performed with the Morehouse workforce, as Earl and Olajuwon proceed to seek out methods to offer them the experiences they’d’ve beloved to have had as younger golfers. Fabolous rolled via for a efficiency on the after-party outdoors the Liberty Nationwide clubhouse, with Cooper serving as his hype man. For many manufacturers and most charity tournaments, it will’ve felt like a compelled and misplaced look, however on this occasion it felt, nicely, authentically Eastside Golf.
As we spoke two weeks faraway from the event, Ajanaku had only one phrase on his thoughts as he mirrored on the occasion.
“Man, truthfully, simply grateful,” he mentioned. “I imply, on the finish of the day, simply grateful at having the chance. As a result of me and Earl bear in mind what it was like rising up within the sport [of golf] and what we wished to see once we have been rising up. And now we have the chance to be that. To really mannequin that. And that’s for therefore many youngsters that look as much as us. And so many youngsters that wish to take up the sport, or don’t assume it’s cool, or simply are impressed by the work ethic. On the finish of the day, it don’t even must be something geared in the direction of golf. So having the chance to affect, I’m grateful.”
A part of the problem with the idea of “develop the sport” is how daunting it may possibly really feel to influence change on a world sport. There are systemic adjustments that must be made to completely open the sport up that may’t be tackled by a single model, however what they will do, and what they’ve recognized as their alternative, is to make that tangible influence on a neighborhood stage and scaling that up when potential. As Eastside Golf seems to be ahead to the following chapter, they’ve aspirations of increasing their attain within the school golf area past Morehouse and HBCUs, to seek out extra methods to open up alternatives for younger golfers. They’re exploring partnerships with the PGA, USGA, and LPGA to try to create a few of that systemic change.
After which there may be the extra summary change that’s the place they will have a broader influence. As a model, creating one thing distinctive within the golf area that permits extra individuals to be snug as themselves on the golf course. That’s the way in which golf turns into one thing for individuals from all backgrounds, by exhibiting there may be area within the golf group for everybody and that you may be your genuine self on the course.
Uproxx was invited on a hosted journey for reporting on this piece. Mercedes-Benz and Eastside Golf didn’t evaluate or approve this story. You’ll find out extra about our coverage on press journeys/hostings right here.
