Callaway Sells Struggling Topgolf To Los Angeles Private Equity
I'm not a golfer but was introduced to this place by my FIL who is a golfer, it's a nice concept but I could see several years back it would come to this. It's a nice place but far too expensive for regular visits. You can't make it off everyone being a one-and-done or only special occasions here.
Have been to the one in VA Beach a couple times and the new one in Valley Forge, PA (King of Prussia) and it was HUGE and beautiful...and also nearly deserted both times I went:
quote:
Callaway Sells Struggling Topgolf To Los Angeles Private Equity
Zero Hedge Tuesday, Nov 18, 2025
We raised the question back in 2023: was the Topgolf mania just another consumer hype bubble?
Turns out that may have been the case. Topgolf Callaway Brands had been trying to unload or spin off the Topgolf unit for some time, and now they have.
Bloomberg reports that Callaway has sold a 60% stake in its Topgolf and Toptracer division to Leonard Green & Partners in a deal valuing the business at about $1.1 billion. This means the 60% stake will generate about $770 million for Callaway.
Callaway originally acquired Topgolf in 2020 for about $2 billion. After the sale closes in 1Q26, the company will rebrand itself as Callaway Golf Company under the ticker "CALY" and refocus on its core golf equipment brands, stepping away from the struggling golf-experience chain.
In September, Golf Digest published a report based on conversations with former Topgolf executives Devin Charhon and Michael Canfield, revealing that Topgolf never achieved a stable flow of returning customers (cost was a major factor).
The former execs left the company to start Blue Jeans, which created the "Golf Ranch" brand, modernizing aging driving ranges and making it more of an actual practice facility for golfers rather than the Togolf experience of fancy screens and lights. It turns out golfers just want to practice.
"Someday I hope to be half the man my bird-dog thinks I am." looking forward to 4 years of TRUMP!
November 18, 2025, 01:24 PM
tatortodd
I go about once a year on my own dime when family is in town for the holidays. An hour is about the cost of 9 holes of real golf and even more so if you order alcohol.
It's near work so once a year I go on company's dime for some sort of team building or celebration.
Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity
DISCLAIMER: These are the author's own personal views and do not represent the views of the author's employer.
November 18, 2025, 01:27 PM
Prefontaine
It’s a gimmick and gimmicks rarely last. I don’t play golf but have friends that do. They’d rather get on the golf course and play 9 or 18. Place is a one trick pony. Someone thought hey Dave and Busters, but golf! It has run its course.
What am I doing? I'm talking to an empty telephone
November 18, 2025, 01:32 PM
Perception
I agree with you and the Golf Digest article cited. I really enjoy top golf, but it's too expensive for anything other than a one off special occasion. Even then I have a hard time stomaching the price. I think it also hurts that it's basically a group only establishment. You could go alone, but if you're going alone you might as well just go to a real driving range instead.
"The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people." "Odd," said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy." "I did," said Ford, "it is." "So," said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't the people get rid of the lizards?" "It honestly doesn't occur to them. They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates the government they want." "You mean they actually vote for the lizards." "Oh yes," said Ford with a shrug, "of course." "But," said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?" "Because if they didn't vote for a lizard, then the wrong lizard might get in."
November 18, 2025, 01:35 PM
P250UA5
quote:
Originally posted by tatortodd: I go about once a year on my own dime when family is in town for the holidays. An hour is about the cost of 9 holes of real golf and even more so if you order alcohol.
It's near work so once a year I go on company's dime for some sort of team building or celebration.
The last few times I've been, it's been someone else [work, vendor, etc] covering the bill. I'm not a golfer in any respect [would rather be on the gun range], but TG is fun for a bit, if someone else it footing it.
The Enemy's gate is down.
November 18, 2025, 01:58 PM
Sig2340
It came out of LA, and will go back to LA.
From a movie in 2003:
Nice is overrated
"It's every freedom-loving individual's duty to lie to the government." Airsoftguy, June 29, 2018
November 18, 2025, 02:30 PM
PASig
quote:
Originally posted by Sig2340:
It came out of LA, and will go back to LA.
Technically Japan, no?
Weren't those type of driving ranges invented in Japan due to their lack of land/space? Topgolf just made it fancier and added the lights and the target holes and all that stuff I thought?
November 18, 2025, 04:22 PM
YellowJacket
Top Golf was not invented for golfers any more than Axe Throwing places were invented for lumberjacks.
They are fad adult-party venues and when the fad is over, they will go out of business.
There ain't much difference in the man I want to be and the man that I really am.
November 19, 2025, 09:36 AM
flesheatingvirus
quote:
Originally posted by YellowJacket: Top Golf was not invented for golfers any more than Axe Throwing places were invented for lumberjacks.
They are fad adult-party venues and when the fad is over, they will go out of business.
And good riddance. They put one up in north ABQ; the giant nets stick up like a sore thumb. Awful. Plus, I'm not a golf fan. Something more useful could go in that space like an indoor shooting range or a Zaxby's.
________________________________________
-- Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past me I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain. --
November 19, 2025, 09:45 AM
chellim1
quote:
They are fad adult-party venues and when the fad is over, they will go out of business.
That's about right. You can't survive on "one off special occasion" revenue.
Callaway was right to pull the plug and lucky to get half what they paid.
"Some things are apparent. Where government moves in, community retreats, civil society disintegrates and our ability to control our own destiny atrophies. The result is: families under siege; war in the streets; unapologetic expropriation of property; the precipitous decline of the rule of law; the rapid rise of corruption; the loss of civility and the triumph of deceit. The result is a debased, debauched culture which finds moral depravity entertaining and virtue contemptible." -- Justice Janice Rogers Brown
"The United States government is the largest criminal enterprise on earth." -rduckwor