By Mark Stewart

OF THE JOURNAL OF BUSINESS

HAYDEN, Idaho--Randy Henry wanted to change the world one golf swing at a time.

The co-founder of Henry-Griffitts Inc., a 21-year-old golf club maker here in Hayden, Idaho. Randy, along with Jim Griffitts, created a business building custom fit golf clubs for the average golfer who would otherwise buy one-size-fits-all clubs off the rack.

"I truly wanted to change the way golf clubs were sold in America," Henry recalls.

Back in 1983, when he and the late Jim Griffitts launched the company, people bought golf clubs solely because they were the same brand that Jack Nicklaus used. Today Randy says, "Over half of the clubs sold are custom fit to the player. Not one company had a fitting division before us."

Henry-Griffitts still fits every golf club to the individual buyer, and assembles clubs by hand at its facility at 827 W. Prairie, near U.S. 95 right here in Hayden, Idaho. They have sold about 760,00 individual clubs - and has customers across the U.S., Australia, Europe and Asia.

"We'll never be very big because we still make one club at a time," Henry says. " We have our niche. It's not bad for a little company from Idaho."

Henry's partner in the venture, a one time Hayden Lake Country Club pro, passed away in 1991.Henry isn't involved in the company's day to day operations, choosing instead to focus on researching and developing new clubs and playing golf.

Henry-Griffitts is a private concern, owned by Henry and a group of about eight investors. The company is managed now by Jim Hofmeister, its CEO, who is also a former head professional, at nearby Avondale Golf and Tennis Club, and a long time PGA teaching pro. He joined the company two years after it started.

Henry-Griffitts, which employs 34 people, "had sales last year of about $3.5 million, up about 10 percent from 2002," Hofmeister says. It expects similar gains this year.

The company sells its clubs mostly through pro shops, where it has signed up 700 licensed vendors who usually are head golf professionals. The clubs aren't cheap. Made from steel, graphite and titanium, and sold only after a thorough fitting and swing analysis of the buyer, they sell for between $1,000 and $2,500 for a set of clubs.

"Things are going pretty well," Hofmeister says. "We're focusing on some things, including better brand identification, and our training process."

The company contends that what makes its clubs different from mass-produced clubs is that those big-name clubs aren't designed for the average player.

"The clubs are too strong," Henry says. "They're designed for professionals who bring more speed when they swing down on the ball. So what happens is that the average player compensates by hitting off his back foot, or hitting up on the ball. It's the only option they have. It creates bad habits, and their swing is not consistent."

Henry-Griffitts answers that by assembling each club's head, shaft, and grip to match the characteristics and swing of its customers.

Each customer takes part in a two hour fitting process conducted by a vendor for Henry-Griffitts who is also a head pro at a golf course. During the fitting, the buyers swing is analyzed using specialized equipment, and questions are asked about their health-- since back and knee injuries can have an impact on a swing--and about the buyer's golfing abilities and experience.

"We look at 17 different things," Henry says. "Lie angle and deflection points are the two big ones."

The "Lie angle" is the angle between the club shaft and the bottom edge of the club head. When the club head impacts the ball, its bottom edge should be square with the ground. With most golfers, though, that's not the case. Each person is different and each club can be different as well.

The teaching pro who sells the clubs uses a "lie board" to determine the proper angle. The board is placed on the ground and the customer takes several golf swings. The club strikes the board, leaving marks on the bottom of the club. Those marks are analyzed by the teacher to find the correct lie angle for that club.

The deflection point is where the shaft of a club bends when the club is swung, which is determined by the golfer's physical traits. A golfer is fitted with a shaft that bends at the most advantageous place for them.

The teaching pros who sell Henry-Griffitts clubs pay the company a $5,000 setup fee and $500 annually. They are trained by the Hayden company and are given the equipment they need to do fitting, including a cart filled with a large assortment of shafts, grips, and heads.

Henry-Griffitts has an exclusive license with True Temper Sports, the big, Memphis, TN., maker of golf shafts, to use what is called the Fast Fit Interchangeable Clubfitting System, which Henry developed and sold to True Temper.

The system enables fitters to mix and match club heads to shafts simply by screwing and unscrewing the heads. "This saves time, and avoids fitting a golfer with the wrong club," Hofmeister says.

"We have more than 4,500 club combinations," Hofmeister says and "We can fit just about anybody." He adds, "After a fitting, the customer will say it's the best lesson they have ever had.

Along with the True Temper shafts, which are made in factories in Missouri and California, Henry-Griffitts uses heads that are made under contract for the Hayden company by manufacturers in China. The grips come from a variety of sources in the U.S. and Asia.

After a customer places an order, it takes Henry-Griffitts about 12 days to assemble the clubs, test them, and ship the to the customer.

The shafts, heads, and grips are weighed to the gram, workers also use machines designed to test the flexibility of each shaft to ensure it will bend correctly when it's swung.

"We send a lot of them back," Hofmeister says of the shafts it buys. "They have to be perfect."

Club heads can be manipulated up to six degrees for lie, loft, and face angle. Workers perform those tasks with grinding machines. The clubs aren't made with screw-on heads such as those used during fitting. Instead the heads and shafts are glued together by hand.

After the grips are put in place, the clubs are weighed and tested again. A computer measures how straight the shaft is and whether the club head is in the proper position for a customer.

Vendors are required to have a follow-up session with each customer about a month after they receive their clubs. "If a customer isn't satisfied, the company will modify the clubs until they are." says Henry

"We take care of our customers," he says. "There is no difference between a tour players clubs and the amateur's clubs."

The company claims its clubs have been used successfully by players on the PGA, LPGA, and Senior PGA tours. Hofmeister says professional golfers Peter Jacobsen, Scott McCarron, and Tracy Hanson are just a few of the golfers who have used the clubs.

"We have 30 wins on all the major tours," says Hofmeister. "I can't mention everyone who has used them because we don't have endorsement deals with them."

Henry, who grew up in the Spokane area, and was an aspiring professional golfer saw his life change dramatically after a severe car accident in 1974. He was a passenger in a vehicle that was hit head-on by a drunken driver. Henry's back was broken in nine places, and his sciatic nerve was nearly severed.

"They thought I was going to be paralyzed," Henry says. "It was one of those things. I was in the hospital forever."

A team of doctors placed four steel rods in his back during several surgeries. Henry was in a body cast for months until he got sick of being confined. Eventually, he took of the cast and headed back to the links.

He found himself stiff and in pain. His golf swing was changed forever. "It wasn't the one I grew up with, that's for sure," he says. "But I was still able to do it.

Henry started tinkering with his clubs by adjusting the strength of the shafts, the lie, and the loft angles of the heads, to play better.

His play improved and eventually he became the head pro at Kellogg Country Club.

"I recognized the potential for the business when I got into teaching," he says. "I was confident I could tell a good swing motion from a bad one but better motion wasn't equating to better ball flight. From that I started looking into the club end. I realized then that everybody wasn't standard sized. It was a good deal for the guys selling the clubs, but not a good deal for the people learning to play the game of golf."