Good Good and Callaway Golf knew they had a problem. As a jarring clip of their short-lived, now-infamous driver ad began circulating on social media Friday, the blowback was swift, widespread and unrelenting. How, legions of commenters wondered — many angrily — could these companies possibly have produced, approved and published a video that depicted a man (Good Good co-founder Garrett Clark) shoving a woman (Clark’s fellow Good Good creator, Alexis Miestowski) to the ground?
Whatever your virtual town square of choice — X, Facebook, Tiktok, Reddit — you could find scores of critics decrying the spot as, among other things, tasteless, insensitive and tone deaf (commenter remark: “Threw my Good Good hat in the garbage”). Which isn’t to say everyone was aghast. You didn’t have to scroll long to find observers who thought the video was, if not cinematic genius, no big deal (commenter remark, written facetiously: “How many woman [sic] will be harmed because of the @goodgood_golf add?” [sic])
At 3:21 p.m. Saturday, by which time the social backlash had reached a fever pitch, Good Good, which was founded in 2020 and has more than 2 million YouTube subscribers, expressed regret for the ad by way of a three-sentence message on X: “We posted a video to our channels that ultimately depicted actions that are not aligned with our values as a brand. We have since taken that content down, and sincerely apologize. Good Good has always stood for making the game of golf more inclusive to all, and we will continue to ensure that is our mission moving forward.”
A few hours later, Callaway, which was founded in 1982 and is worth north of $2 billion, issued a two-sentence statement of its own that served more to distance the company from Good Good’s decision-making than to shoulder any responsibility: “We are disappointed by the content that was posted, and are appreciative of Good Good for addressing this. We look forward to working together to ensure a more inclusive space in golf.”
The statements did little to quell the outrage, and by Monday morning, Good Good and Callaway were in full-blown crisis-management mode, fueled in part, three crisis-management experts told GOLF, by the companies’ inadequate first responses.
“They had a serious situation on their hands, and they put out a statement that was passive, it was nonspecific, it didn’t attach a human to it,” Julie Parker, who runs a Wilmington, N.C.-based firm that specializes in crisis communications, said of Good Good’s initial response. “It just felt like they were under pressure and they rushed out with comments that they thought would calm the storm. I think it illustrates that when you’re under fire and you’re facing a major reputational crisis, if you don’t handle it well, then you compound your misery. That’s what we’ve seen play out in subsequent days.”
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WHAT HAS PLAYED OUT has been stunning in its scope. By Monday, Callaway had pulled the driver listing from its website. At 1:17 a.m. ET Tuesday, Callaway issued an apology from its CEO, Chip Brewer, which was followed by Good Good’s second mea culpa, this time from CEO Matt Kendrick, which he posted to his LinkedIn page. Later that day, the ripple effect widened when PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp ominously described Good Good’s status as a Tour title sponsor — the Good Good Championship is scheduled for November in Austin — as “fluid.”
On Tuesday evening, Golf Channel announced that it was postponing the debut episode of its “Big Break” reprise after a show sponsor, reportedly Golf Galaxy, said it wanted out. Golf Galaxy is owned by Dick’s Sporting Goods, both of which have pulled Good Good merchandise from their shelves. Ditto at least two other major retailers, PGA Tour Superstore and Target. By Wednesday, two of Callaway’s competitors, PXG and Takomo, had launched cheeky counter ads for their own drivers that winked at Good Good and Callaway’s gaffe. At 7:40 p.m. Wednesday, Good Good shared a video of Garrett Clark apologizing for his role in the ad and explaining how it came to be.
Could the fallout have been avoided? Hardly. Mitigated? Maybe.
“In our turbocharged, default-to-outrage society where the news cycle is 24/7 and social media never sleeps, it is inevitable that every organization is going to face some sort of a controversy,” said Evan Nierman, founder and CEO of Red Banyan, a strategic communications firm specializing in reputation management. “The problem here is you typically get one good bite at the apology apple. And if you botch it, then you have to go back for a second, which is exactly what happened to both Callaway and Good Good. And that becomes problematic. Then you’re mixing your messages. People are seeing the first statement, they’re not seeing the second one. Whereas if you get it right the first time, you save yourself a lot of misery down the road.”
Still, those second statements were necessary and meaningful, the experts said, because the CEOs’ names were attached to them, and the bosses’ claimed ownership.
“I own the mistake,” Kendrick wrote on LinkedIn, noting that the concept was intended to be a parody of a scene from the 2026 horror film “Obsession.” He continued: “The execution missed the mark. I understand why people found it insensitive, and I want to be clear that neither I nor anyone at Good Good condones violence of any kind. Regardless of what we intended, we are responsible for what we put into the world and how it is received. We got this one wrong.”
Brewer wrote in part, “While the video was produced by Good Good, it was approved by Callaway prior to posting. That approval should never have happened. Mistakes were made and we are taking the matter very seriously.”
“I thought the Callaway apology hit the right tone, the right notes and he accepted responsibility, it humanized it,” Nierman said. “The one thing that I would have liked to have seen was a little less of the play-by-play about how quickly they acted to take down the ad, and they should have infused it with some positive messaging about what the company is actually doing to advance women in golf.”
Parker, the Wilmington-based PR expert, had another quibble — with the notion that all of the audience would understand that the ad was spoofing “Obsession.” The movie has been a runaway hit, but Parker felt the reference, even if geared toward younger viewers, would still be lost on many.
“It’s not exactly ‘Top Gun,’” she said.
Melissa Agnes, a crisis-communication expert based in New York City and author of “Crisis Ready: Building an Invincible Brand in an Uncertain World,” said she likens crisis management to confronting strife in interpersonal relationships: If partners don’t expose a problem and address it head on, it can fester. For that reason, she said, she would have liked to see Kendrick and Brewer’s apologies be more direct still.
“From the research that I’ve seen, in the golf community there’s a sentiment around women feeling like they’re not being taken seriously,” Agnes said. “So to not connect those dots at the forefront and go, ‘OK, I can see why people are upset. This relates to that. And, oh my gosh, we actually put something out that is completely against our core values, or we can understand how people are feeling about that.’ To not address that first and foremost, the rest of the communication doesn’t matter.”
Agnes continued: “Most leaders, most organizations, shy away from emotionality because it’s so uncomfortable. It’s uncomfortable to step into people’s anger and hold space for that and to meet them in it. It’s so much easier, at least it feels so much easier, to dance around it and just move past it. But you can’t move past it until you actually address it. And they did a very, very poor job at addressing it.”
Most leaders, most organizations, shy away from emotionality because it’s so uncomfortable.
Melissa Agnes, crisis-communication expert
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GOOD GOOD’s LATEST damage-control measure came Wednesday evening in the form of Garrett Clark’s 8-minute apology and explanation of how the video came to life. In what appears to be a self-shot phone video, Clark apologized on behalf of himself and Good Good’s marketing team, which he said conceived the “Obsession” theme for the ad. “Looking back, super-dumb ad concept,” Clark said. “Terrible ad in general.” He added, “Once I watched it back and it got posted, my skin was crawling. I was cringing, just even minutes after I saw it get posted.”
Clark said much of the negative reaction to the ad was “very justified” but also that the “hate” Miestowski has received by way of pointed and threatening direct messages has been “completely uncalled for.” He closed by saying that the outcry to the ad had “spurred important conversations that need be had” around ensuring women, who now are the fastest growing demographic of new golfers, feel welcome in the game. Good Good, Clark said, has been trying to do its part on that front, most notably through the 2025 formation of a spin-off channel called Good Good Girls. “Hopefully we can move on and grow the women’s side of golf,” Clark said.
Two of the PR experts, Nierman and Agnes, said they felt Clark’s message largely was effective in that it felt authentic and heartfelt.
“The video is unscripted, so you can really feel that the message is coming directly from him,” Agnes said. Though she also noted that in spots he came off as too defensive. “An apology is not the moment to self-defend, because that defensiveness counters the apology,” she said.
Nierman’s only critique was that Clark should have spoken up sooner. “It took multiple rounds of apologies and continued derision online and beyond for them to ultimately record this video,” he said.
Parker was less accepting, saying Clark’s statement was too informal and “clumsy at best.” She said, “Casual and off the cuff may be their culture, but this is not at all an appropriate response. It actually sheds light onto how this ad ever happened in the first place.”
So, what now?
For one, Nierman said, further fallout is likely. The golf world is small and deeply interconnected, and brands need to look out for their own interests. “This is the problem with internet outrage and cancel culture: Everybody wants to make sure that they don’t attract the ire of the mob,” Nierman said. “So you’ll see vendors, partners, investors, people who are connected with your brand fleeing for the exits because they don’t want to get tarnished.”
Still, eventually the heat will recede and Good Good and Callaway’s decision-makers will turn their attention back to their day jobs, and Good Good’s creators will return to creating content and posting online. Both Brewer and Kendrick said they are assessing their creative processes to prevent another such misstep, with Kendrick pledging to “personally review content being released through our content and marketing teams.”
Agnes said it will be up to Kendrick and Brewer and their respective deputies to continue steering their brands through these choppy waters. “It’s so easy to lead when times are good,” she said. “It’s so challenging, it takes so much courage to lead when you’re in a situation like this.
In these moments, Agnes said, interpersonal skills and openness can be far more valuable to a leader than knowing how to balance a budget or hire a new VP.
“It’s vulnerability and humility and cognitive empathy that carries you through that,” she said. “And it’s such an opportunity to connect so much more deeply with your stakeholders in such a powerful way. That’s the courage piece, because it takes great courage to actually get there. But once you do, there’s an opportunity to build so much deeper trust and credibility with your market and with your stakeholders. Obviously there’s more repair that would now need to happen based on the fact that they did something wrong and then they just kind of dug their hole a little bit deeper. But it’s never too late.”
