So you’ve finally made the leap of faith and have decided to build your first set of single length irons by contacting your local golf club fitter/builder.
Unfortunately, what you may experience next will test your resolve and perhaps your patience as well.
“If it’s isn’t broken, don’t fix it.” — Anonymous Club-Fitter
Nearly every club fitter that you are likely to contact has built “traditional” varying length golf irons for their entire career. Even if the club fitter has heard about single length irons, he may not have personally built a set.
On top of this, he may be resistant to the whole idea of single length irons based on a lifetime’s worth of experience building and playing with “traditional” varying length irons.
Here are some things you are likely to hear from your club-fitter and how to respond:
Q1) “If traditional irons are good enough for the Pros, then they’re good enough for you, right?”
Club fitters rightly believe that varying length irons work well for PGA tour players, which is entirely true.
The difference between a professional golfer and an amateur golfer is about 10,000 hours of practice mastering the multiple swing planes, swing tempos, and ball positions that varying length irons demand.
For the other 99% of us who are not professional golfers, we don’t have the time to master all those different swings and need the simplicity of single length irons. We need to maximize our consistency with the limited amount of practice time that have have.
A1) “As an amateur golfer, I’m not hitting 4-irons into 235 yard par 3’s, so I need more consistency at hitting my 4-iron 190 yards since I can only practice at most once or twice a week.”
Q2) “Why don’t you let me build you a set of new (Brand Name Here) irons instead?”
Most club fitters have an arrangement with one or more name brand golf iron companies where they get the club heads at a big discount, so that they can make more money selling you that brand vs. building a set of single length irons from the heads that you bring with you.
A2) “I would like to try single length irons, and can build an entire set for $250, which is a fraction of the cost of your (Brand Name Here) clubs.”
Q3) “You don’t need single length irons, you just need some lessons – why don’t we schedule some lessons and I’ll show you that you don’t need them?”
The best selling strategy is to mix some truth in with what you’re selling.
You probably do need lessons, but your improvement with single length irons will be much greater and faster than with your traditional set since you’re learning a single swing plane, swing tempo, and ball position.
A3) “Lessons sound good, can we bundle them with what it costs to build the single length set to get a deal on both?”
Q4) “Single Length Irons are a gimmick – why do you want me to build a set of those for you?”
Single length irons are not the “latest thing” in the golf iron market — in fact, the concept of single length irons were the standard until the 1920’s-1930’s.
In the modern era, single length irons have been available for nearly 20 years from niche manufacturers, and in January 2017 Cobra became the first major OEM to release a set of single length irons.
Single length irons are not protected by Intellectual Property and they contain no “silver bullet” technology — they are simply irons with 2 to 3 degree stronger lofts that are designed with the same head weight regardless of the iron number (i.e. the 4-iron head weighs the same as the PW-iron head, whereas a traditional 4-iron head weighs much less than a PW-iron head).
It’s really that simple.
A4) “I want to enjoy my time golfing and beat my friends with accurate iron play rather than spend time looking for my ball every other hole and losing skins.”
