About Pinemeadow Golf:
Founded in 1985 and located in Portland, Oregon, Pinemeadow Golf was one of the first companies to focus on building "legal clones" or "knock-offs" in the golf industry. Just like the computer, automobile, and fashion industries, golf is an industry of product leaders and product followers. Pinemeadow is a "smart follower." They look at what is hot and analyze whether it really works as advertised and then tend to follow the concept at a much less expensive but no less effective result. Clones are not to be confused with the branded products they may seek to flatter, but they are made from essentially the same materials and design principles, use many of the same shaft and grip suppliers, and perform similarly to (or even better than) the name brands.
Pinemeadow buys its heads, shafts, and grips from the same small community of golf manufacturing foundries and suppliers as higher priced competitors, providing the same performance at a better value. Pinemeadow keeps the price of its products down by eliminating the costs associated with advertising, avoiding the overhead associated with excess management, and cutting out middlemen in the form of fancy retail environments. The amount actually spent for research and development by the golf club industry is not nearly as large as the money spent for advertising and the retail markups. Up 70 percent of the cost on brand name products goes to support advertising, and the majority of retailers mark up their products by 60 to 100 percent from the wholesale purchase price. Pinemeadow offers its products factory direct to save the consumer money.
