This month we interview Sean Arey, recipient of the 2023 PNW PGA Merchandiser of the Year in the Public category. As one of the few pros who owns his golf shop, Sean’s commitment to excellence shines through in every aspect of his merchandising operation at Trysting Tree. Demonstrating exceptional sales, margins, and efficiency, Sean’s retail success stands out prominently. Despite limited space, Trysting Tree leads in retail sales per square foot. Sean’s strategic buying practices, particularly emphasizing college sports near Oregon State University, showcase his innovative approach to merchandising.
Facility: Trysting Tree Golf Club
PGA Member Since: 1988
Who or what inspired you to become a Golf Professional?
Pat Welch, PGA at Sham-na-pum Golf Course in Richland, WA was my mentor who inspired me to be in this business. As well as many cribbage games with his father, the legendary pro, Bill Welch. He shared stories of his time with Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, and Harvey Penick from back in Texas.
What key strategies do you employ in your golf shop?
It all starts with creating optimal margins. We use a close out buying strategy to maximize the margin potential. This also allows us to offer a more economical price point for our golfers.
Oregon State merchandise is essential to our pro shop. Being in Corvallis and associated with the university, we offer polos and Outerwear pieces with the Beaver branding. Specifically, our Nike line with the old Benny the Beaver logo.
We provide our customers with many different fitting cart options from a variety of brands to complete custom set orders. We carry many different styles of wedges in the shop, as well as putters.
Our golf ball market heavily relies on the budget ball, and then the premium tour ball, and of course the used golf ball, $1 jar is always popular.
We also have a full-service club repair shop that provides shaft repairs, lie loft adjustments, and many different grip options in our shop.
Do you see any useful or interesting trends for golf shop merchandising in 2024?
One trend that we capitalize on at Trysting Tree is fun graphic logos. We do several pieces with what we call our “mascot logo.” We will be releasing several variations in 2024, but they all have a common theme. The logos always include a beaver, golf, Trysting Tree, and est.1988. We do these logos on hats, shirts, and outerwear apparel. These logos are not intended to replace our original course logo. The objective is to make fun merchandise that people wear to various activities that still represents the Trysting Tree Golf Club.
