Quiet On The Course: Golf Carts To Bear Ads

• by Amy Corr , Staff Writer @MediaPostOTL, May 7, 2007

Golf is one of the few televised sports containing minimal advertising. Unlike baseball, football, and the worst offender, NASCAR, where ads are positioned in every feasible nook and cranny, golf ads are limited to small logos on a player's hat or shirt. Until now.

This latest "medium" won't change the way you watch televised golf, but it might catch your eye the next time you're playing nine holes.

Static Media Group created non-rotating discs (I prefer the term hubcaps) that attach to the wheels of a golf cart.

The discs are stationary so that Nike ads, for example, won't move around and around while the cart moves; it remains upright.

If the space is not sponsored, it will bear the logo of the golf course.

Static Media Group currently has a ten-course network in Atlanta and is rolling out networks in Tampa Bay, Fla.; Houston; and southern California.

There are roughly 70 carts per course with ads, or, for the current network, 2,800 "cart wheels."

The company claims the ads garner more than 4 million monthly impressions. It charges anywhere from $71,000 for a month-long sponsorship to $165,000 for a quarterly sponsorship.

In addition, advertisers have the option to display brochures in the Club House and Pro Shop, and apply product decals to the inside windshield of the golf carts.

Will the next move onto golf courses be NASCAR-themed golf carts? What other untapped resources exist for potential advertisers?