• by John Gaffney , April 14, 2003

This Putt's For You: Watching the Masters tournament without commercials was an education in the new era of advertising as far as I'm concerned. Even if you're not a golf fan, or even of you tuned out when Tiger Woods dropped off the pace, it was a compelling experience watching three plus hours of sports TV with no TV spots. Those spots were verboten by the Augusta National Country after the National Council of Women's Organizations announced it would protest at this year's event. Augusta, which controls all rights except protesting, told CBS Sports it could not allow any sponsors. It's thinking was that the NCWO would then target those sponsors. So what you ended up with was a telecast that begged for a crawl at the bottom. It cried out for product placement dropped in among the gallery. Made the Nike emblem on Tiger's shirt look like exclusive sponsor messaging. Made the Ford logo on Phil Mickelson's shirt look like the most brilliant placement of an ad I'd ever seen. So hold the TV spots for golf. The ad business has developed plenty of ways to convey a message.

Whispers: Downturns begin with whispers. So do comebacks. I've been talking with a few friends that do a lot of business travel recently, all who claim they have never seen so many flights so full. I also talked recently with a guy who does a lot of executive training and he says business is "maxed out" after being at his lowest threshold. Travel and training, you must believe, are a sign that businesses are addressing their fundamentals. And you must believe they belie a new uptick.

In The Clubhouse: Getting back to The Masters, I used to watch golf and feel less than fiscally fit because I didn't have any money to dump into all the stock brokerages that advertised on golf programming. This year, without those spots, I had one overriding thought: How do I get my daughter and son to start playing golf as soon as possible?