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40. Building the Sport of FlingGolf One Golf Course at a Time, with FlingGolf CEO Alex Van Alen

Writer's picture: Matt FarrellMatt Farrell

40. Building the Sport of FlingGolf One Golf Course at a Time, with FlingGolf CEO Alex Van Alen


Summary

Episode 39 - In this episode of the Farrell Sports Business podcast, the host Matt Farrell talks with Alex Van Alen, the CEO/Founder of FlingGolf by New Swarm. They discuss the innovative sport of FlingGolf, its origins, development, and the challenges faced in promoting it within the traditional golf community. Alex shares insights into the business side of FlingGolf, including player engagement, course partnerships, and the importance of community building. They also explore the global reach of the sport, the establishment of the World League FlingGolf, and entrepreneurial lessons learned along the way.


About the Farrell Sports Business Podcast

Interviews with news makers from sports business to talk leadership, entrepreneurship, industry news and their unique career paths. Hosted by Matt Farrell, President of Farrell Sports and former Golf Channel, USOPC, USA Swimming and Warner Bros.


Watch it on YouTube - www.youtube.com/@farrellsportsww


Listen in Podcasty Places - Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio and more


Matt Farrell (00:00)

On this week's Farrell Sports Business podcast, we're going to talk about an emerging sport. Now it's been around for 10 plus years. It uses a golf course, but it is not golf. It is called fling golf. So think golf meets lacrosse. And if you're watching on YouTube, you'll see, my guests show the actual stick of it's more of a throwing motion, utilizes a golf course, diversifies revenue for a golf course.


The founder and CEO of Fling Golf is the guest on this week's Farrell Sports Business Podcast, and I'm the host, Matt Farrell


but don't call him a disruptor. He's actually trying to build community and, work together with the golf course community. And especially golf courses have been very open to this new product called fling golf. So our guest this week is the CEO and founder of fling golf. He's an entrepreneur, a shark tank, veteran Alex Van Allen.


Matt Farrell (01:11)

Alex, welcome. so great to see you again.


Alex Van Alen (01:13)

It's great to be here, Matt. Really appreciate it.


Matt Farrell (01:16)

Well, there's so much about fling golf we're going to get into. I would like for maybe you, and this can be really, really brief, just describe the game as it is right now.


Alex Van Alen (01:29)

Yeah, the fling-off, one way to think about it is really like lacrosse golf. Instead of hitting a golf ball, you use a single fling stick. You put the golf ball in there and you throw the golf ball. So this is the whole stick. And that's all you need. You don't need 14 clubs to get around the course. So it's just one stick. You're throwing it. It's not just popping it down the middle. It's really you're able to shape your shots different ways so you can be very athletic about it. But it's a little more intuitive than golf. And you play with the golf ball on a golf course.


We've been at it for a bunch of years as you know and we just surpassed 2,000 golf courses that we know of in 39 countries that it's been played on.


Matt Farrell (02:09)

Well, we first connected, I was at the golf channel and somewhat charged with identifying alternative forms of golf. And then world events and pandemics kind of changed that direction. but it's impressive of what you've built. I, I want to know like, where did it start for you?


Alex Van Alen (02:22)

Yeah.


Yeah, I started, I played a little bit of lacrosse back in high school and I played golf growing up, you playing golf. My dad's a big golfer and so plenty of time on the golf course. And, you know, I guess my brothers and I, when I was in high school, we would come home and we would take our lacrosse sticks and throw golf balls around the backyard and, you know, count strokes to hit a tree. So that was sort of the very early origins of it, but didn't think much of it. And then,


about 10 years ago, maybe a little more, I started thinking about throwing a golf ball and really what were the sort of dynamics of being able to throw a golf ball as far as possible. And so started building things out of toys and highlight baskets and lacrosse sticks. And over time, sort of came up with the Duffling stick and that was a sort of two year period to develop that. But as I was developing it,


I thinking if I could get 200 yards, I could go out on the golf course and play at the same time as golfers. But I also, it was at that point in time where golf courses were really struggling to get new players. This is pre-pandemic and as you know, the pandemic was the best thing happened to golf, got everybody out on the course. They really closing it, rates of 200, 250 courses a year were closing in the US. So I realized there might be business opportunity from a golf course.


Matt Farrell (03:31)

Yeah.


Right?


Alex Van Alen (03:55)

owner's point of view as well to bring new players onto the course. And really I've modeled, you know, I think you and I can both remember when snowboarding came onto the scene, you know, back in the 70s, 80s, 90s. I talk to younger people now and they're like, what? It was never like that, you know, there was a time when you couldn't snowboard, but as I was saying to you earlier, I went to the University of Colorado. So I saw snowboarding coming into the, you know, onto the ski slopes and


And I thought, well, maybe I could do that with golf. And this is a new way to bring new younger people onto the course, a new vibe. And so that's really where what I've modeled sling golf off of since then.


Matt Farrell (04:41)

So we're definitely going to come back to other emerging sports and where you drew inspiration or paths you didn't want to go down. I actually want to, before we go there, I want to hit you. And I won't do pure justice to your background, but a few things that I didn't know that you're sitting there with somewhat of a land conservation type professional roles and background.


not the typical path that you would see of entrepreneurs and sport leaders.


Alex Van Alen (05:11)

Yeah.


No, I did not get an MBA. I went to school for environmental conservation. I have a master's degree in ecology and that's my, you know, that's a passion of mine and certainly the outdoors, the natural world is a passion of mine. But this opportunity for whatever reason, I just sort of started running with it and it got its own steam. You know, I wasn't sure how long it was going to go and you know, I had big visions for it from the beginning, but didn't know how long it was going to go and it just keeps on building steam. We build the community and it's...


So yeah, it wasn't in my playbook when I was going to college or grad school, but it's where I am now and I'm having a fun time doing it.


Matt Farrell (05:57)

Oh, well, it's really good stuff and exciting to see. Um, so let's maybe reset a little bit on just on the business side of fling golf. What, what are generally some of the numbers you mentioned 2000 courses, players, countries, how do you kind of like reset, you know, listeners on where the sport is right now, just from a numbers perspective.


Alex Van Alen (06:12)

Mm-hmm.


Yeah, can say that our player numbers are in the tens of thousands, not hundreds of thousands or millions yet, but that's coming. It's certainly accelerated in last few years. We have played on 2,000 courses that we know, and those are courses that are reported back about, excuse me, on our map, where we know we've been played. And so the number is actually likely closer to 3,000, maybe even 4,000. Just we don't know where everybody plays, because we don't.


We said, you know, player buys a fling stick. We don't know where they're going to play. You know, they go out to their local course and go play and hopefully they report back to us. have sort of a try and keep in touch.


Matt Farrell (07:00)

That would have been one of those. When


we first met, you sent me a stick. I played it, of course, in Orlando. But probably you wouldn't have known that. So I'm with you. I think your numbers are probably much higher.


Alex Van Alen (07:12)

Yeah, yeah. that really says something too. You know, one thing we did when we started out, got, I really started out with the National Golf Course Owners Association. And I knew that I had to educate them about that and look for their support. And so that was a really important thing to do, was start there. And they've been fantastic. It's a great organization. And the golf course owners have been extremely welcoming. Very early on, the president of


was then Billy Casper Golf said to me, look, if you bring the players, we'll let them play. Why wouldn't we? You're paying the same price. You're not doing any damage to the course. You're not slowing anybody down. More accurate than beginner golfers. So it's really, why would they not let you play? And that's what we've seen consistently throughout the few years that we've been doing this.


Matt Farrell (07:55)

Yeah.


Well, it's funny. mean, I'm a lifelong golfer, love it, passionate about it. But I would, I would say that's not sometimes the fastest evolving industry, sometimes not the most receptive to change industry. What were some of those first meetings like? they, were you pleasantly surprised or were you beating your head against a wall at times?


Alex Van Alen (08:30)

I know I was I was very surprised and really when you look at it, know God this is talking to golf course owners Golf course owners are I look at them as farmers right there. They own 200 acres They got to make their money off of their 150 200 acres, whatever it is, you know, what crops are they gonna plant and They've been planting corn for the last 200 years And now say hey wait, how about some soybeans or how about some you know, throw something in there in between the rows?


Matt Farrell (08:56)

That's


it.


Alex Van Alen (08:57)

And to them,


they're like, well, that makes sense, right? Why would I, I've got empty tee times, why wouldn't I let someone come walk on, do no damage and fill up those empty tee times? So it's really just gravy for them. We're not, we're not out to convert traditional golfers, right? We're bringing, certainly not the avid traditional golfers. We're bringing new people to the course that have, have not gone on a course for intimidation reasons, or they don't, you know, getting off that first tee is hard.


Matt Farrell (09:25)

Yeah.


Alex Van Alen (09:27)

with fling golf you can get off that first tee in half an hour. One bucket of balls, the right instructions, and you can get off, you're not going to be a pro, but you're getting off well enough to have fun, down the fairway, get to the green, finish up and move on to the next hole, and not make a fool out of yourself, and not be intimidated, not be stressed. So that's really a great selling point from the player's point of view. From the golf course owner's point of view, certainly, why wouldn't they allow people to come play?


And of course then we do have those examples of golf course owners or managers that have taken the ball and run with it. And some of them are getting 2,000 extra rounds a year, just gravy from fling golf. So it sort of makes sense from that PGA perspective, the golf course owners perspective, why not bring more money in when you've got the fixed asset of the golf course just sitting there.


Matt Farrell (10:20)

No, just totally makes sense. And your farming analogy, that's hilarious. It's just so appropriate. I mean, going back to some of those early days, or maybe even today, was there an area that you looked at of like, wow, this is going to be hard? And it just wasn't. Or it lived up to the hype of how hard it was going to be.


Alex Van Alen (10:25)

Yeah, you're right.


Yeah, a lot of it.


You know, I would say the biggest obstacle for us has been, it hasn't been the golf course owners won't let you play like we talked about, is that people think you can't play, you won't be able to play on a golf course. So convincing them that yes, you will. That's where our marketing dollars need to go, showing people, and we're normalizing it. Like we went to the PGA show just last week.


Matt Farrell (11:06)

Interesting.


Alex Van Alen (11:16)

And you can see already, it used to be, you know, from the PGA perspective where they're like, oh, what's that, you know, what's that thing? What do you describe that to me now? Most of them have heard about it and they've seen people play it. They've seen people come to their courses. It's reaching that sort of normalization like snowboarding did at one point where it's like not the weirdest thing to see on a golf course. It's, know, now it's like, okay, we've seen that before and it didn't do any damage. And, and so it's reaching that, that point.


where I think both course owners, PGA pros and players are starting to see, and potential players are saying, hey, well, look, we've seen that on ESPN, we've seen that on Shark Tank, we've seen that on social media, and I'm pretty sure I can go out and play on a golf course.


Matt Farrell (12:06)

How about the opposite side of that? Anything that you woke up and you're like, this is gonna be the easiest part. I'm not gonna have to worry about this because that part's gonna be easy and it didn't end up that way.


Alex Van Alen (12:18)

You know, so when I you know all entrepreneurs start off with like this thing like oh this is gonna be a piece of cake or this is this makes so much sense to me why wouldn't it make sense to them but it was the I figured the golf course owners and managers would take it and Really run with it to actually do the promotion for me and in essence like and some have like I said some done very well, but That didn't really happen. I mean a few we sold to


actually a couple hundred courses probably and some of them really run with it and it really just came down to whether they had that one manager that one champion at the course that was said this is cool I'm gonna run with it and that didn't happen as much as I thought it was so that was a interesting we got to we started off the first few years really focusing on golf courses we knew we needed to educate them again hoping that they were going to run with it more they also had turned back to us and said


you you bring the players and we'll let them play. And that's where we changed our focus about 2019, 2020, really changed our focus into we need to grow this community. It's our job to build the player base. And also if you think about it, golf courses are really focusing on their customers or golfers. We focus on the non-golfers to the, you know, 10 or 12 million.


Casual golfers who why why are they only going out one or two times a year? Why aren't they going out ten times a year and you put a fling stick in their hand and maybe they're gonna go out those ten times Because it's you know, they're less just easier to get out. It's more a little more casual It's just a more fun way to be out there for a lot of people


Matt Farrell (13:54)

Yeah.


You know, this is probably a topic for another day, but in my other part of my consulting life, I work with a baseball company and in the same, you've just described sometimes dealing with it like a batting cage owner. think, my gosh, so of course they're going to promote this. They're, you know, we've, we've put it on a silver platter for him to play a game, but the reality ends up that they're a small business owner. They've got a teenager who didn't show up to work that day. They're


Alex Van Alen (14:19)

Go.


Right.


Matt Farrell (14:31)

cleaning the facility there and it's just another thing sometimes.


Alex Van Alen (14:37)

Very


few people I've realized are looking for something more to do in the day.


Matt Farrell (14:41)

You're right.


so, you know, in things I've seen about fling golf, things I've seen about you, the word disruption often comes up. And I just I'm just curious, do you like that word? Is it an appropriate word? Because it just tends to get used a lot.


Alex Van Alen (15:03)

It's way overused and I don't like it anyway because we're really not disrupting golf. We're growing a sport. I just look at it like We've created this incredible fun thing for people to do and that's it. We're just creating this thing We're not trying to disrupt anybody It's way the term is way overused and unless you're trying to talk to a VC who's like looking for you to use the word I don't know, you know, we're just growing a sport and we're having fun doing it


Matt Farrell (15:08)

Yeah.


Yeah.


You


Well, when, you, you know, along the way you've mentioned snowboarding. and I would say just even off the top of my head, newish type sports, like even spike ball or cornhole has been an activity for ever, but it's relatively new as a sport. Are there other


Alex Van Alen (15:46)

Mm-hmm.


Matt Farrell (15:55)

newish sports that you looked at along the way and say, they've they've really got it dialed in. And maybe the inverse of that or you're like, you know what, I just don't want to go down that path. But what what others did you model? Did you benchmark against?


Alex Van Alen (16:02)

Yeah.


Yeah, mean,


you know, we've really looked at, you know, we really wanted to grow community and that's been a real focus of ours. I think Pickleball has done a good job with that. They started with a


Matt Farrell (16:18)

Yeah.


Alex Van Alen (16:23)

Excuse me, they've been at it for, pickleball's been around for 60 years, people don't really realize that, but it's been around for a long time. It's only the last 10 years that it's been sort of focused and an energy behind organizing it and all that. So, we definitely look at what pickleball's doing now with our league, sort of similar to Major League Pickleball. We've got the World League Fling Golf and the interest in that, really owning the sport by...


Matt Farrell (16:29)

Right?


Alex Van Alen (16:52)

by creating these competitions, but also developing that community, because the community for us is everything. look at it, you my partners and I really look at our job is to support our community, is to provide them the platform to succeed in whatever way they see success, whether that's, you know, being a world-league fling-off champion and getting sponsorships and going that way, or whether success is


Matt Farrell (17:10)

Yeah.


Alex Van Alen (17:21)

Being a dad who can get out with his daughter on the course for the first time, a dad can play golf, daughter can play fling golf, they're out having fun, that's success. But whatever we can do to support the community and give them the platform for success, that's what we want to do.


Matt Farrell (17:38)

So what's happened in the equipment space in fling golf? is it something that you've wanted to be the sole manufacturer of? Are you seeing other equipment manufacturers would, is there any type of a industry being developed?


Alex Van Alen (17:49)

Okay.


We, no, we are the soul. Excuse me.


We are the sole manufacturer. I developed it, we patented it, and so right now we are that sole manufacturer. There may be a time where we license that out, if it makes sense, but we're really developing the brand, the product, and the league as well. But we are that sole manufacturer at this time.


Matt Farrell (18:14)

Yeah.


Yeah.


Mainly US focused. What are you seeing around the world?


Alex Van Alen (18:31)

Yeah, mean, largely US, although we've been played in 39 countries to date, which is pretty cool. All six continents with a golf course, not Antarctica. And that really shows the, not the, someday. That really shows how easy it is for fling golf to be played because it's, you we have people that are taking their sticks whenever they travel and they go play.


Matt Farrell (18:44)

Not that you know of, right?


Alex Van Alen (19:01)

And so that's, and then they report back what country they played. So some of those courses, countries may have only been played one time, one course, but it's just like people are, you're able to bring your fling stick with you and go play. And actually one of the coolest things just last November, one of our players played St. Andrews, played the old course of St. Andrews. And which was really cool. Again, just sort of a feather in our cap, you know, the world didn't fall apart. The traditional golf didn't.


Matt Farrell (19:19)

I saw that.


Alex Van Alen (19:30)

You know didn't fall into the sea it and they he showed it to them. You know he got the lottery to get on Showed it to them. They were like this is fantastic. They watched him go off the first tee thought it was awesome and You know so if you can play the whole course of st. Andrews you should be able to play pretty much anywhere, right?


Matt Farrell (19:49)

That's so good. Because I saw that article and I was thinking the same thing of did that take weeks of preparation of this is what's going to happen. Because you had one of the St. Andrew's caddies there in the in the same in the same photo of the news article. And I was just fascinated of I because I actually had the chance to play there early last summer for the first time. So bucket list and and I don't know, I'm nervous just to


Alex Van Alen (20:14)

Well, nice.


Matt Farrell (20:19)

you know, walk out on the wrong sidewalk there.


Alex Van Alen (20:22)

Yeah, no, exactly. Exactly.


No, he said it was, I mean, he was playing in November. He said it was very casual and the golfers he was with were, you know, very into what he was doing and they played their game. He played his. Actually, I think when he got back, I think this is right, the manager asked him to come in and talk to him for a while in his office. I think he might've even left his fling stick there at the manager's request. So they have his first fling stick played at St. Andrews.


Matt Farrell (20:47)

Smart.


That's smart. I love it. That's awesome. Well, you mentioned the World League Fling Golf. Can you expand on that, what that is and how that came about?


Alex Van Alen (20:52)

Isn't that cool? Yeah.


Yeah, so we started off, you know, by obviously the equipment, developed the equipment, build up a community of players. And then there was a certain point in 20, we planned to do it before the pandemic, but then about 2022, we, uh, we actually got a call from ESPN. Excuse me. They had seen, um, one of our YouTube videos for a competition. said, Hey, next time you do a tournament, you know, let's partner together and we'll show it.


And so we put together our first tournament as quickly as we could, and that was in May of 2022. And really the idea was you want to build this league so that you're, obviously to provide that platform for your players, but to own the sport, own everything about it. Provide that platform for your players and showcase.


the sport in the best possible way. And that's what gets on ESPN. That's what gets on, you know, the other regional sports nets that we're on. It draws a lot of attention to the sport. And so we developed the league. did two courses, or two tournaments, the first year, five, the second, five in 2024, plus a Britain's Cup, which was a Ryder's Cup style over in England, where we sent a team USA of eight players over to play eight players, eight British players.


and we're going to do that again this year in June. I think we're doing 10 players now. I think it's six men, four women on either side playing against a British team over there. it's fun to see that. Yeah, putting the league together was a really important step, one we'd always thought we would do. But again, it really showcases the sport in the best way.


Matt Farrell (22:40)

That's great.


You know, when I think most of us, when you think of entrepreneurism, somebody's invented the, the, the next widget, there's, there's not a huge collection of people who are really starting a sport. So any lessons learned or advice for entrepreneurism for the path you took, that's really not like most of the entrepreneurs.


Alex Van Alen (23:07)

Right.


Matt Farrell (23:21)

entrepreneurs out there that are just trying to make a new device or product.


Alex Van Alen (23:28)

Yeah, I I guess, you know, I always envisioned it. I was in it for the long haul. I mean, in a way, I had a big vision for where it could go. So there's a difference between developing a backyard toy or, you know, a backyard game where you just sort of try to sell as many as you can. But I really wanted to create a sport and which means creating community, creating grassroots, really putting in the effort and time to reach out to the courses.


Matt Farrell (23:46)

Yeah.


Alex Van Alen (23:57)

Find out who your players are. I mean, I didn't really know who my players were going to be when I first started out. We're seeing more and more narrowing down who it is. I mean, it's still very broad. be ready for the long haul if you're going to start something like this. It's a long game, definitely. But it's fun. mean, not many people get to create a new sport and bring a new product to market.


Matt Farrell (24:03)

Yeah.


You


Alex Van Alen (24:26)

and see it succeed, but it is, it's challenge to start and to change minds and to, you know, you got a lot of haters to start to, particularly honestly from the traditional golf, traditional golfer's world. They're like, get that off our course or whatever, that's just so, you know, you just sort of take it in stride.


Matt Farrell (24:48)

Those are the


same people who don't want beginners out there that, yeah, like, come on.


Alex Van Alen (24:52)

Right,


if you think about it, a traditional golfer's perfect thing is a golf course to himself. they don't want anybody else out there, but you're looking at a golf course owner or families, they want to be out there having a good time.


Matt Farrell (25:10)

So last, anything that I didn't ask you that I should and where should people go find more information, try it out.


Alex Van Alen (25:20)

Yeah, mean take a look at us. can find us all over social media, FlingGolf, at FlingGolf and certainly FlingGolf.com is our website. No, think we covered a lot, Matt, and I really appreciate it. Yeah, I just say if people want to go out and have a good time on the course, if they feel like they're intimidated or they've been driving by a course and they don't play golf so they never thought about going on it, well, a Fling Stick in your hands will get you out there.


and said go give it a try.


Matt Farrell (25:53)

Well, Alex, thank you so much for joining. This is great and I've tried this myself and love it. And so wish you the best of luck and I really appreciate you joining.


Alex Van Alen (26:03)

Alright Matt, thanks a lot. I appreciate the time. It's fun to be on.

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