Golf Entrepreneur Kept His Eye On The Ball

The Dallas Morning News:

Barney Adams will tell you he’s never sold a product in his life.

That might seem strange coming from the guy who invented the Adams Tight Lies fairway wood, one of the best-selling golf clubs in history, and the founder of Plano-based Adams Golf Inc.

But it’s entirely plausible to those who’ve watched this iconoclastic entrepreneur battle high-dollar marketing odds and turn a newfangled club into an almost $100 million enterprise.

He just thinks differently than most.

“No one sells a product. Everyone sells a service,” the 69-year-old said over lunch recently. “I’m also a devout believer that you have to identify exactly what that service is.”

Now he’s written a book, The Wow Factor, which chronicles the evolution of his business philosophy.

Many execs are keen on writing highly glossed how-to biographies. Mr. Adams offers an unvarnished what-to-avoid, quick-read tale instead.

Hence the title and core message of his book: A finely focused service creates a wow.

“People will blow off the idea because it seems simplistic. It’s not,” he says.

“When you create a wow, you immediately raise the bar for yourself and have to innovate again,” says Mr. Adams. “That’s the beauty of the Wow Factor. It isn’t a system. It’s an attitude, and one that you have to ingrain throughout your organization.”

And it keeps you from playing the lowest-price, thinnest-margins game, he contends. “Wow supersedes price, absolutely.”

Read more.

Photo by Skyhorse Publishing.

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