HAYDEN, IdahoRandy 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, created a business to build custom golf clubs for average players who otherwise would buy one-size-fits-all clubs off the shelf.


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 because Jack Nicholas used them, Henry says. Today, he says, over half of the clubs sold are 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 here. It has sold about 760,000 individual clubsand has customers across the U.S. and in Australia, Europe, and Asia.


Well never be very big because we make one club at time, Henry says. We have our niche. Its not bad for a small company from Idaho.


Henrys partner in the venture, a onetime Hayden Lake Country Club pro, passed away in 1991. Henry isnt involved in the companys day-to-day operations, choosing instead to focus on researching and developing new clubsand 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 also is a former head professional, at nearby Avondale Golf & Tennis Club, and a longtime 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 arent 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. Were focusing on some things, including better brand identification, and our training process.


Custom clubs


The company contends that what makes its clubs different from mass-produced clubs is that those big-name clubs arent designed for the average player.


The clubs are too strong, Henry says. Theyre 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. Its the only option they have. It creates bad habits, and theyre not consistent.


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


Each customer takes part in a two-hour fitting process, usually conducted by a vendor for Henry-Griffitts whos also a head pro at a golf course. During the fitting, the buyers swing is analyzed using specialized equipment, and questions are asked about his or her healthsince back and knee injuries can have an impact on a swingand about the buyers 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, thats not the case, Henry-Griffitts says. Each person is different, and each club can be different.


The teaching pro who sells the clubs uses a lie board to determine that 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 right 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 golfers physical traits. A golfer is fitted with a shaft that bends at the most advantageous place for him or her.


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 fittings, including a cart filled with a large assortment of different shafts, grips, and heads.


Henry-Griffitts has an exclusive license with True Temper Sports, the big, Memphis, Tenn., maker of golf shafts, to use whats 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 combinations of golf clubs, Hofmeister says. We can fit just about anybody. He adds, After a fitting, the customers will say its the best golf lesson they 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 them 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 its swung.


We send a lot of them back, Hofmeister, the CEO, 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 arent made with screw-on heads such as those 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 he or she receives their clubs. If a customer isnt 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 amateurs 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 cant say everybody who has used them because we dont have endorsement deals with them.


The beginning


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. Henrys 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 off the cast and headed back to the links.


He found himself stiff and in pain. His golf swing was changed forever. It wasnt the one I grew up with, thats 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, and the lie and loft angles of the heads, to play better.


His play improved, and eventually he became the head golf 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 motion from a bad one. But better motion wasnt equating to better ball flight. From that I started looking into the club end. I realized that everybody wasnt standard. It was a good deal for the guys selling the clubs, but not a good deal for people learning to play golf.