Good Good Golf CEO Matt Kendrick and president Joe Flannery have left the company in the wake of an outcry over an advertisement for a new Callaway driver that showed a man shoving a woman to the ground and telling her not to touch the club, according to multiple reports.
Good Good co-founder Nahid Giga will serve as interim CEO, according to an internal memo, the contents of which were first reported by Business Insider.
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Good Good was launched as a YouTube channel in 2020 and now is among the largest content creators in the sport, featuring eight men and four women competing in golf and various challenges. It has made-for-TV shows, apparel and other merchandise.
The company had said the controversial video was meant to parody the horror movie “Obsession.” But the criticism was immediate and relentless.
The video was deleted the same day it was posted on Aug. 20, but it continued to make the rounds on social media and apologies from Good Good and Callaway had little effect.
“We were disappointed with what we saw,” PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp said last week of the response from Good Good. “The PGA Tour believes in golf’s ability to bring people together and create a welcoming environment for all.”
Good Good pulled its title sponsorship of a new PGA Tour event in Austin, Texas, this fall. The tour said the tournament will still be played.
Callaway ended its relationship with Good Good, and retailers including Golf Galaxy and its parent company, Dick's Sporting Goods, removed the company's merchandise from their shelves. Golf Channel canceled a new season of its “Big Break” reality series in which it partnered with Good Good.
Garrett Clark, a Good Good founder and the man who shoves the woman in the video, posted an eight-minute video in which he called the commercial in question “the worst ad known to man” and “not what we stand for.”
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