Jun 27, 2010 By Rich Conwell for The 3 min read

I was looking around my golf shop the other day and a thought hit me pretty powerfully: golf clubs are expensive. I started thinking about this in a somewhat objective manner and realized that they are made of steel, graphite, rubber and the like, so why are they so expensive. At the risk of sounding like a shill for the golf companies, or original equipment manufacturers, I thought I would try to explain why these items are so expensive.

The first reason is Research and Design. There is no real way to qualify or quantify how many people are involved, how much testing is done and ideas thrown about in the R and D departments of these companies. I know for a fact that there are several people employed by these companies who are solely responsible for including and excluding materials from what can be used in a golf club.

Now I am talking about materials, not exactly how to use those materials, just if the item can be used in a golf club or not.

I also know that the amount of discards of golf clubs is overwhelming. There really is no way to put a specific number on the amount of clubs discarded or destroyed by these companies, but maybe the fact that the Ben Hogan Company took a band saw to over $500,000 of equipment in 1955 should tell you how high the bar is set. These companies work so hard on reputation that there is no way that anyone can fathom how many mistakes are made and how many clubs are destroyed.

Now for the last reason clubs are so expensive: because people will pay a lot of money for them. I am not saying that I do not like selling these golf clubs, because I do, but I am also honest about this. If the market did not bear $400 for a driver or $150 for a putter, then these clubs would not be priced at that amount, regardless of R and D and waste. If the companies could not get that number on the price tag, then they would not charge that.

I realize that this article is not really about golf or golf swings, but hopefully it does provide some insight into what makes a golf club what it is and why they are so darn expensive. Not to rub it in, but Tour Players get all that equipment for free, as if they could not afford the new putter, huh?

Rich Conwell is the PGA Head Golf Professional at Uniontown Country Club. He has extensive experience in teaching players of all skill levels, including beginners. Feel free to contact him at richconwell@atlanticbb.net with any questions, comments or suggestions.