Gilalogy 101

GOLF GILALOGY 101
Here is Gilagolf’s Gilalogy 101, understanding the simple relationships of golfers needs and wants, coupled with limited resources, to obtain the best possible equipments, and ultimately to stop playing like a epileptic twit on the golf course and win back some semblance of Pride.

The Gilalogy is not about just about improving your golf, but rather revealing the myth of expensive equipments, expensive training and maximising efforts, money and time into getting better at this darn game.

Gilalogy is broken into 3 basic foundations:

1) Equipment

2) Technique

3) Character

As we go down the list, the importance increase. Hence, bad equipments can be offset by good techniques, and bad equipment and techniques can be offset by good character.

OK, let’s start the lesson!

FOUNDATION 1: EQUIPMENT

Gilalogy Equipment philosophy is further broken down to several concepts

The Obsessive Buying Of Golfers (OBOG)

OBOG is a habit developed by golfers to constantly and obsessively collect golf clubs whether it is needed or not. Go to a golfers home and you are guaranteed to find clubs collecting dust, sets that are hardly used and hundreds of new balls that are not out of the box yet, bought years ago and kept religiously in their golf shrines. There is a meaning to this madness, and here is what golfers intersect with women. In the compulsive retail theraphy of women, they would buy and stock up clothes and shoes and handbags even though they don’t need them. It is for that ‘one day’, ‘one occasion’, ‘just in case’, and they end up stockpiling cupboards upon cupboards of stuff they don’t need. Likewise, golfers are like that. Hence, you hardly see a golfer being very petulant when their wives and girlfriends go on a shopping spree. In fact, they welcome it, because then they can meander off to the golf department and spend endless hours there oogling at the new G10s or TM Quads.

The Limited Supply Of Cash (LSOC)

Unfortunately (or fortunately) , the OBOG concept is directly offsetted by the LSOC factor. That all golfers have limited supply of cash for golf equipments. Ask the richest man in the world about buying the new G10 driver and he would grimace and say,”Got money, but must ask wife first.” Hence LSOC is not just the physical limitation of spending power, but the intangible pressure of budgeting from the finance manager of the household (wife, girlfriend, mother, or in some cases, the family cat). With OBOG and LSOC directly opposed to each other, the golfer is pressured to go for golf sales and bargain down prices and scurry around looking for RM1 golf balls by the streets.

The Dilemma Of New Acquisitions (DONA)

DONA states that while the golfer would love to buy everything available in the golf shop, he is constantly conflicted by the separate pressures of OBOG and LSOC. I.e the equation for golfers pressure is as follows:

DONA = OBOG + LSOC

This is primarily due to the ridiculous prices set by retailers in Malaysia for golf clubs. Can you imagine a TaylorMade Burner driver going for RM1,700? The average pay of a golfer is about RM3,000 a month, so a purchase like that is more than 50% of the pay! No wonder nobody is picking up the game!

The Solution to DONA

Like second hand cars, the moment you hit the first ball with that brand new driver of yours, the value decreases 50%. Your Burner that cost you RM1,700 has fallen to RM850 just for hitting a RM1 ball. The rapid decrease in value represents one of life’s worst bargains: buying new golf equipments.

Here are the numbers Gilagolf sees:

RM 1,100 for Clevehand Hi-Bore Driver.

RM350 is what Gilagolf will be willing to pay. (68% savings)

RM1,280 for TaylorMade R7 Draw Driver.

RM350 is what Gilagolf will be willing to pay. (73% savings)

RM1,500 for R5 Dual N Driver.

RM300 is what Gilagolf will be willing to pay. (80% savings)

Here is the simple philosophy of golf merchandising.

Would you pay thousands for something that is worth only a quarter or at most half the price? Import duty, retailers markup, everything contributes to jacking up the prices of golf clubs. I mean, we’re already paying through our collective noses to play golf, need we go through the humiliation of forking out RM1,500 for a driver and still play like crap?

There is a way to bypass the markup, summarised in one of the most powerful words in English: Ebay.

Before you start choking, our philosophy is simple. Through our analysis, (which consists of sitting at driving ranges, drinking milo ais and commenting about other people’s swing), the difference between holding a new driver and a second hand driver (given all else is the same: shaft, torque, clubhead, kick, length, grip), is probably 0.0000000001 deviation. I.E, we’re gonna hook the ball anyway whether it’s new or second hand.

Is Ebay safe?

Well, like everything in this world, there will be risks. Generally, you’ll need to purchase via PayPal, a middle agent that protects your information being exposed directly to the retailer. The concept of a trusted third party has been around for a long time, and as far as I am concerned, having shopped in Ebay for years, it is safe enough for me.Besides, most of us have are not multi millionaires, so how much can they cheat us? If you’re a multi-millionaire, do you want to sponsor the GilaGolf Portal? Please Email us, we’re desperate.

Is Ebay risky?

Another question is that will you be getting what you bought? Here’s the advantage of buying new.

It’s new.

From ebay or second hand sources, there is a slight risk in getting a club that might not suit you, or is fake etc. That’s why I only exclusively buy from one ebay retailer with a 100% positive feedback: 3balls Golf. They might not have the most variety, but they are the cheapest delivery, the fastest (3 days) and the most honest in their descriptions. I’ve bought more than a thousand worth of equipments from them and don’t have one single complaint. I like 3 balls because they consolidate bulk purchases. I.e I buy 1 club, it cost me US35 delivery. I buy another one for a friend, it cost me US40. So I can divide it between us and end up paying US20 each for delivery.

The fact is, you’re chopping off close to 50-75% of the price, hence the additional price saving needs to be taken into account the increased risk of purchasal.

OK, I am sold. How do I do it?

Also, to buy (win an auction) in Ebay requires some technique. Start by deciding what you need to get (putter, driver etc). Then set a price. Usually I check the current price in MST/RGT or any golf retail. For instance, the old Callaway Big Bertha 2004 fairway wood is being sold now for RM450. I decide to knock off 60%, so my limit is RM180-RM200. Then head to http://stores.ebay.com/3balls-Golf.

Identify the club you want then click on ‘Watch this Item’ and note the time it will expire.

From here you can do 2 things:

1. Straight away set the highest price you want to go, RM200. (i.e US25 for equipment, since 3balls charges RM35 for shipment), so it’s about USD60. This is the easiest, you just set it and check back later. But you don’t know if you will get it, since some crazy guy might be willing to pay more.

2. The more guaranteed but much more troublesome way is to wait till the auction is almost ending (say 30 seconds left) and then bid for US25. This way, it doesn’t give enough time for others to outbid you. In fact, I often do this with 15 seconds remaining. The problem here is that most of the auction ends in the morning our time, i.e 8 – 11 am, the time we’re supposed to be working, so, it does require some skills to avoid detection from your boss.

But it’s all worth it! By the way, I bought my Callaway Big Bertha 2004 5 wood for US19, and bought in bulk for other friends, so we saved on the delivery, and I ended up paying only US40, i.e RM132, or 29% of the retail. It had minor scuff marks but again, it made no difference to the effectiveness of the club!

Which brings us to the final conclusions:

1. Most of us hackers do not have the requisite skill to tell the difference between a new club and a second hand. In fact, we’re likely going to perform the same anyway, with a RM1,800 driver, or a RM350 driver.

2. The miniscule (or illusionary) disadvantage of a second hand equipment can be offset by allocating the savings to improving your technique.

3. Technology has pretty much plateued, and new equipments can only offer very very small advantage over last season’s equipment. I.e My R5 dual can still routinely outdrive my peers using newer technology.

4. Nobody should ever pay more than RM400 for a club. We think there are better use for money, like improving technique, or if you’re a nice person, donating to charity, or buying better food for the dog.

Final Note:

Ebay equipments are often made for Americans, hence it will be challenging to find a club that is suited for extremely slow swingers. For me, the Tour Stiff shafts found in ebay suits me better than the shafts catered for Malaysians.

Again, with a 75% savings riding on the the acquisition, I can reshaft to an Aldila NVS for RM300-RM400 and still save almost RM1,000 on the purchase.

So, think twice before forking out the $$$ for a new club. Have a visit to http://www.3balls.com/ first and see!

The second and third foundation, Technique and Character will be explored once we publish our book, Golf Gilalogy. You probably need to wait some time for that, since we’re only at the beginning of the book writing process, i.e opening up a Word Document.

For now, I hope you have a look at our Gila Sale section to see if you can find any bargains of stuff we want to sell. Otherwise, remember, the new equipments in Malaysia is NOT WORTH the price you pay to golf retailers. This game has already sucked up so much of our money, it’s really not wise to continually funnel our funds to greedy retails simply to appease our OBOG. Remember to let our LSOC police our spending!

Happy Hacking!