23. Building a Golf Apparel Business from the Ground Up with Founder of Golftini, Susan Hess

Tori sits down with Susan Hess, Founder and Head Designer at Golftini, a luxury brand of fashionable and functional women's golf apparel.  Listen in as Susan looks back on starting Golftini in 2004, motivated by her own annoyance that women’s golf wear at the time was either functional or fashionable, but never both!  The first skort she ever designed, for herself, instantly caught the attention of the other women at her club, and for the next year she made and sold product to her peers with no intention to make a “real” business out of it. That was until she was invited to set up a booth at a PGA Tour a year later in 2005. She went home with a $70,000 check, and she never looked back.  Susan shares how she learned the ropes of business ownership, gaining almost all of it from practical experience in the trenches day by day as the brand grew. And the name “Golftini”? She says it came to her almost on a whim amid the martini craze in mid-2000s New York.  She wrote the name, along with the martini logo, down on a napkin, and it stuck!  Key Moments ?      (32:03) Susan talks about her Spring and Fall lines and what to expect in upcoming seasons. ?      (39:13) Learn which skort lengths Golfini offers and what length to expect based on your size. ?      (41:44) What does Golftini offer tennis and pickleball players? ?      (44:14) Susan explains what makes Golftini products so high-quality and long-lasting. ?      (46:48) Why is women’s golf apparel so expensive, and why aren’t there larger sizes? ?      (54:07) Susan shares why there are currently no plans to go exclusively ecommerce. ?      (56:10) What would Susan tell her 2004 self, and to other moms?  Connect with Our Guests: Golftini: Instagram | Website | <a href= "https://www.tiktok.com/@golftini" target="_blank" rel= "noopener noreferrer" ...