UK company targets USA, China and other territories after acquiring brand trademarks
Lynx® Golf, the British, family-owned golf equipment company, has today announced that it has become a global golf brand following its acquisition of the Global Lynx® Trademark Portfolio from Dick’s Sporting Goods in the USA.
The trademarks have been purchased for an undisclosed sum as the UK-based company enjoys unprecedented growth during a time when many major golf manufacturers are scaling back operations or pulling out of the market.
“We are now poised to offer our exceptional brand and products to customers not just in the UK and Europe, but to the world’s largest and most active golfing territories,” said Lynx® Golf CFO and co-owner Stephanie Zinser.
CEO and co-owner Steve Elford confirmed that Lynx® Golf would now seek a return to the US market as well as open new sales channels in established and developing golf markets including Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, China, India and more.
He said: “It has always been our intention since we took over the brand in 2011 to take Lynx® back to its rightful place – at the top of the industry. Lynx® was one of the top 5 major golf brands worldwide in its heyday and we want to give the phoenix another chance to rise up.”
Lynx® Golf was originally founded in the 1970’s by John Riley Sr and Carl Ross and quickly became an iconic name, still fondly loved by those who used Lynx® equipment in the early years and into its heyday in the early 1990s, when it chalked up Major wins at the 1992 Masters and 1994 US Open.
More recently, in the UK in 2011 Lynx® was licenced to Charles Claire LLP, a family business based in Weybridge, Surrey, owned by husband and wife Elford and Zinser. Then, in 2013 Charles Claire fully acquired the Lynx® marque for the UK and Europe from previous owner, Chester Hunt.
Under the new UK ownership, Lynx® Golf has gone from strength to strength, with double-digit annual sales increases every year since 2013. The company has over 550 live retail accounts and operates in 15 European countries.
Lynx® Golf will be exhibiting its full 2018 range at the world’s largest golf trade exhibition, the PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando, Florida, January 24-26th, 2018, where it will be identifying partners to facilitate its global expansion.
Added Stephanie Zinser: “Several of our staff have been with us since we re-started Lynx and the excitement within our whole team to be able to reach the world with our products, not just Europe, is palpable.
“It’s also not lost on us that with Brexit and Britain’s place in Europe so uncertain at the moment, it makes good business sense to be able to open up new markets for ourselves. We have invested too much personally and emotionally to not give ourselves the best chance of success, and our hard-working, loyal and superb staff deserve that too.
“However, that was not what drove us to want to acquire the worldwide marks - it’s something that we have been quietly and tenaciously pursuing for nearly four years now, well before Brexit started! We’ve always been very circumspect about our long-term plans for Lynx® Golf and happy to sail under the radar until we had everything lined up – but we are now delighted to announce the growth of the brand and our genuine intentions to make it a global player in the golf market.”
Only last year, Steve and Stephanie received a personal letter from former Lynx® Golf president, Carl Ross, who is now semi-retired and working as a successful realtor in Nevada, USA. Said Steve: “He wrote to us about to say how he was watching what we were doing with the brand, and how well he felt we were representing the iconic name that he founded. It was one of those moments that make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.”
Lynx® Golf concentrates on developing high quality, technologically-advanced but affordable golf clubs, backed up by great customer service. In the UK, it has gained a strong foothold in ‘green grass’ golf accounts – retail operations typically run at golf courses by PGA Professionals - with clubs designed and assembled in the UK at the company’s Weybridge, Surrey, headquarters.
Note: Lynx Golf has acquired the ownership of certain Lynx trademarks that were owned by Golfsmith Inc in the US and in many other countries throughout the world. The marks were acquired by Dicks Sporting Goods who acquired the marks when they acquired Golfsmith in 2016). Lynx Golf did not acquire the Lynx business from Golfsmith as a going concern and has therefore not acquired contracts with customers or other third parties that Golfsmith or Dicks Sporting Goods had. Lynx will be making its products available in these territories in the coming months and those interested in our products can contact us using the link below.
For more information visit www.lynxgolf.co.uk, or follow @LynxGolfUK on twitter.
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