Most Important Golf Book of 2008: Wow Factor from Barney Adams

Amid the grandeur and tragedy that is 2008, golf books don’t rate very high in a global sense. Within their own universe of golfdom, however, certain ones stand out for their importance. If you have The Wow Factor on your shelf or desk and have yet to open it, do so today. If you haven’t purchased it, I’m certain that you can find it locally or online for under $20 (including shipping.) I finished reading it last night and need you to understand one important thing: this book is the most important and necessary golf read of 2008.

Before I go any farther, if you wish to hear the preacher discuss the book, click this link for a TravelGolf.com podcast with Dave Berner.

Barney Adams is the Adams behind Adams Golf. If your memory goes back ten years, you’ll remember his informercials and the original Tight Lies product that revolutionized the fairway metal sub-industry. If your memory goes back twenty years, you’ll remember feather lite clubs and the original three-ball putter (both of which were colossal flops from a sales standpoint, yet worthwhile evolutionary moments from a technological perspective.) If your memory goes back thirty years, you’ll remember Gary Adams, founder of Taylor Made, the first company to broadly produce and market the metal wood. Gary and Barney are no relation, but I needed a 30-years-ago tie-in.

Barney Adams takes you through a chronology of his failures and successes as a businessman, reminding you at every step of his unquenchable and inextinguishable passion for the golf club industry. He escorts you through the rise and fall of Pelz Golf, along with the highs and lows of Adams Golf. At every step he unveils the human side of the biz, often forgotten, ignored, or camouflaged.

At a certain juncture, he breaks with the history to remind you of companies that have disappeared or been absorbed, of the history of golf club (and the similarities of modern and ancient equipment). He cautions the reader on the steps needed to establish a company in the golf world today (emphasizing the massive difficulty and the extremely low odds of success.)

Barney Adams is able to weave golf, business and life into a wall-to-wall carpet of intoxicating value. I have not felt this enthusiastic about a golf book since reading The Wicked Game. It too, was a golf book of the year choice, for what that’s worth.