Becky Stevens 
A contemporary method to membership apparel
Jennifer Glaspie launched Chicago-based Aphira golfware to develop apparel for the social golfer who wants to face out on the inexperienced, not in form into the membership.
by Carolyn Schwaar
When beginner golfer Jennifer Glaspie was kicked off the environmentally pleasant at a Florida golf membership for sporting a sleeveless, collarless sweater, she didn’t know then that girls’s {golfing} apparel would grow to be her life’s enthusiasm.
From the runway to the golf green
In 2000, Glaspie, a profitable company firm advisor on the prestigious Chicago-dependent agency of Baine & Co, began off studying {golfing} on the ask for of her boyfriend (now husband). However as her golf swing enhanced, this petite and fashion-savvy urbanite recognized her clothes choices didn’t.
“{Golfing} clothes is up to now guiding the curve trend-sensible and the options for the style-conscious golfer are minimal,” she claims. Nevertheless it took an excellent Oct morning with a tee time looming and “nothing in any respect to have on” that lastly pressed Glaspie to movement.
Satisfied that there was glorious potential in a significant-conclusion line of ladies’s {golfing} outfits that was trendy and comfy nevertheless refined, Glaspie put her job on keep, and set her Kellogg MBA to make use of growing a small enterprise method to begin a classy line of ladies’s golf apparel.
“I’ve always skilled a like of vogue, however I thought-about shifting into the aggressive attire sector can be simply outrageous,” remembers the 32-yr-old Michigan native. Even so, exploration confirmed that, although the clothes sector is slash-throat, substantial-close niches these kind of as trip resort ware and specialised sports activities attire, have their private, much more accessible and far much less aggressive sector. “I uncovered some trend-ahead strains that ended up executing completely, however the present market completely was not saturated, so each little factor pointed to ‘go,’ ” she suggests.
Glaspie and her tradition-bucking designer, Cassy Clark, got down to produce golf apparel that was enjoyable to don, hip, and a little or no bit fascinating, hoping from hope that they’d have a strike. And so they did.
Aphira debuted on the 2005 PGA Merchandise exhibit in Florida. “There we had been going for walks mainly 3 miles again to our minor sales space earlier these massive company cubicles,” remembers Glaspie. “We felt completely overwhelmed, however from the commencing, individuals commenced declaring good objects. An individual women defined ‘I respect this line, that is my favored line proper right here out of 1,000 exhibitors. It felt promising. We felt truly, significantly glorious.”
The duo wrote dozens of orders on the show for his or her to begin with line. And when their preliminary shoppers acquired their cargo and beloved it, they began to think about that they could simply have a bit of one thing. “One shopper claimed people the place getting it proper out of the field previous to she may get it on the rack,” claims Glaspie.
Now in it’s third yr, Aphira is acknowledged in nearly 150 golf shops in america, Europe, and Asia. However accomplishment did not arrive devoid of some missteps.
“I assumed we needed to be significantly numerous after we preliminary launched,” remembers Glaspie. The debut line was scorching and edgy with closefitting tops and tennis-size skorts. “However we now have toned that down a bit as we now have lengthy gone on.” The change in design and magnificence displays the corporate’s exploration into simply who’s acquiring their trendy line, which in quite a lot of markets is basically retirees in there 50s and 60s.
“Nike and Addidas construction sportswear for the athletic golfer,” states Glaspie. “Our shopper is much extra socialite than athlete. She is not going to have interaction in 4-instances every week, she performs together with her girlfriends on the weekends, and she or he’s one other one that’s normally set collectively.”
Like a great deal of enterprise individuals, Glaspie is operator, marketer, gross sales rep and even mannequin. “One explicit time at a gathering with the proshop proprietor on the Ravinia Eco-friendly Nation Membership I ran and set on a pair of shorts to show the client how they wholesome,” suggests Glaspie. Every piece within the line is designed in her dimension for merchandise testing. “I have to have to try all of it on. I swing a membership and I stroll about it in. I am a golfer and I do know the performance that the garment desires to have.”
The Aphira line is manufactured fully in The usa. The material is customized made dyed and shipped to a producing facility on Chicago’s north side for meeting.
For now, Aphira apparel is simply accessible in golf outlets, and which is simply nice with Glaspie. “We wish to preserve focused on {the golfing} business. We all know every particular person greenback invested will likely be a number of {dollars} return within the {golfing} market however it might purchase too considerably capitol to crack into the larger clothes retail market.”
While you wouldn’t see Aphira in workplace retailers, you may get a glimpse of it on the favored Golf Channel truth exhibit The Giant Break: Females Solely, which can aspect Aphira clothes on golfer Valeria Ochoa this spring. And the brand new Hollywood film “Who’s Your Caddy?,” billed as “an metropolis select on the comedy {golfing} movie” choices a scorching character donning Aphira in the middle of the movie.
The chancy job hop from guiding the strategic development of Fortune-500 companies to creating golf skorts has unquestionably compensated off, says Glaspie. “It has simply been a whirlwind however I’m definitely buying enjoyment. In consulting I had peeks and valley and superior weeks and horrible months, however when it is your very personal company your highs are actually superior and lows are actually decrease. Each factor requires on so considerably further significance when it actually is your possess.”
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Callout or boxed product:
Aphira: a-anxiety-ah. A time period invented by golfwear entrepreneur Jennifer Glaspie taken from the Latin time period ephiro, which implies to exult.
Sidebar:
Can vogue attraction to further girls of all ages to {golfing}?
Whereas it may appear shallow to say much more trendy golfware will get extra girls of all ages to play golf, Jennifer Glaspie, proprietor of Aphira girls’s golf attire in Chicago, suggests it truly is definitely real. “I’ve a pal who I requested to contemplate some golf courses with me however she stated ‘I take part in tennis as a result of the cloths are cuter.’ Buying further vogue on this sport does change its picture.”
Simply contemplate a look at internationally televised girls’s {golfing} tournaments just like the Lexus Cup by which groups direct by Annika Sorenstam and Grace Park ditched the masculine polo prime for trendy designer golfwear to endeavor a enjoyable and trendy graphic for ladies’s golf.
And youthful gamers, these kind of as tank-top sporting Michelle Wie, are bringing their youthful attitudes and completely free spirit with them to the inexperienced — and this consists of their method statements.
“One can find an excellent deal younger individuals having fun with the game,” claims Glaspie. And with youth, she says, comes new ideas that buck the traditions and set a brand new design.
