Jill Spiegel Takes Over As PGA Tour Superstore President In Major Move For Male-Dominated Golf Business: Q&A

Jill Spiegel has been promoted to President of PGA TOUR Superstore, a move that positions her as one of the highest-ranking female executives in the golf industry.

The longtime merchandising chief for golf’s leading retailer, Spiegel has been with Superstore since 2011. She assumes greater control of the company’s day-to-day operations from Dick Sullivan, who adds Executive Chairman title to his CEO role and will focus on growth strategies going forward.

Spiegel previously was Superstore’s Senior Vice President and Chief Merchandising Officer, meaning she oversaw all merchandising as well as financial planning at the venue level. She now takes control of operations and planning for Superstore’s 54 U.S. locations as well as ecommerce, marketing and construction. Here’s some of what Spiegel had to say about the opportunity to assume what PGATSS owner and chairman Arthur Blank calls the “critical daily operations of the business”:

You’re a 37-year veteran of the retail sector, but how excited are you for what’s next – for both you and PGA Tour SuperStore?

“When Dick hired me 11 years ago, we had just opened store No. 11. We’re at 54 today and 58 in the next few months and 70 by the end of the year. To be part of the growth over the past decade, especially over the past three years, has been really fun and rewarding. When I came here, there were 30 people in the store support center and we now have over 150. So, we really built a foundation; not just me, but Dick and the leadership team. We’re at a point where we can handle that growth and open all these stores. It’s been wonderful. To get the promotion, I’m very excited about it. And we’re still in growth mode. We’re not slowing down, if anything, that growth is going to accelerate to an even greater degree. I look forward to taking on a bigger leadership role as we continue that growth.”

Golf has been diversifying its participant base, especially among women, and we’re also seeing that more in the C-suite ranks among golf companies. How meaningful is this promotion, which puts you in very select company in the sport?

“If you look at my background, I was in the department stores (including Belk and Macy’s), which is really female-based. When I came here, I was the only woman on the leadership team for quite a long time. It was never an issue for me and I wasn’t treated any differently. The (golf) manufacturing side is much more male dominated, so that took some getting used to. But it was actually a benefit for me in the beginning — I felt I brought a different point of view to the table. And now there’s been a lot of change in the last decade. There’s another female on the (PGATSS) leadership team. We have a lot of women in director positions in our company and, if you look at the mix of our store support center, we’re almost at 50/50 split between male and female. There’s been a lot of really good change and a lot of positive momentum for women in these male-dominated industries. It’s really nice to see and it does make this promotion extremely meaningful. There aren’t a lot of women leaders across the golf industry, in general.”

Being heavily involved in the merchandising end, you’ve seen, and helped push forward, some of the notable evolution within golf. What do you see as some of the most significant changes on the retail front?

“There have been a lot. Our core brands will still make up the lion’s share of the business. But I have really good apparel merchants with the same kind of background I do. They’re always out there looking for new brands. I remember when we first dabbled in Under Armour and they went from brand No. 8 to No. 1 in just a couple of years. Jordan Spieth had a little bit to do with that. But you never know what the next big brand is going to be. Printed polos are a huge trend the last several years. We’re not so big that we can’t test-case things and the minute we get traction, we really maximize it. We see a lot of brands in our store like Bad Birdie, William Murray, Chubbies, and our apparel merchant was one of the very first ones onto shorter inseams. We’re selling 7-inch shorts in men’s and who would have thought that? Several years ago, everything was down to your knee. She was on hoodies and she was on joggers. That’s the fun part of it. It’s become much more casual and you’ll even see that on the course. Outside the apparel pieces, there’s a lot of technology and you’re hearing more music on the golf courses. We’re selling a lot of (Bushnell) Wingman speakers and all those fun gadgets. In general, there’s just so much awareness around the sport and not only seeing women and youth, but young adults. It’s a ‘cool sport’ at the moment. Hopefully that will continue.”

Golf is very much of a lifestyle activity and those who are really avid or committed play and spend like no other participation sport. What has that opportunity meant as golf has enjoyed a real renaissance the past few years?

“We’re comparing everything to 2019 (pre-Covid), and we’ll be up over 90% (in 2022 revenue) compared to 2019. Everybody went into 2022 kind of holding their breath because we had such significant growth in two years. We did more business the first half of 2021 than we did all of fiscal 2019, which is pretty staggering to think about. But you’ve seen a lot of retailers outside of golf giving back 20% to 25% and we haven’t seen that. For the rounds (played) to be hanging on to a 20% increase just shows the sport isn’t slowing down.”

How do you see the split between the company’s physical retail and online presence?

“Our E-comm business tripled from 2019 to 2021. What’s great to see in 2022 is that it’s contracting a little bit. Our brick-and-mortar business is really healthy and it’s great to see people coming back into the stores. We’re very focused on ecommerce as well and we want to grow that channel, but we don’t want to grow at the sake of our brick-and-mortar store. We want that customer to come in and experience our fitting capabilities, take lessons, putt on our putting greens, hit in our hitting bays. So, it’s a huge priority, but we don’t want to shift that business from brick and mortar. We want our ecommerce growth to be incremental.”

Where would you like to see PGA Tour Superstore five years down the road?

“We’re going to continue to grow. We opened three stores in the midst of Covid. We continued to put our foot on the gas. We’ve taken advantage of real estate opportunities the last couple years and we’ll continue to do so. We know there’s still a lot of white space. All eight stores we’re going to open this year, they’re in new markets: Charlotte, greater D.C., Philadelphia, Fairfax in Virginia, Milwaukee. We’re going to be opening stores in Boise and Kansas City next year, and there are a lot of markets we haven’t been in. One of our goals is also to help grow the game of golf and, when we go into new markets, we’re not just stealing share from our competitors. Yes, we might get some of their business, but we’re lifting the whole market. It’s nice to see it’s not just a shift from one retailer to another, it really brings more awareness to the sport.”