Several irons in the fire
Golfer Al Wagner sits in his Rancho Murieta home, just a 6-iron away from the nearest fairway, and adjusts his bandaged leg on an easy chair.
The 76-year-old is nursing the leg because surgeons cut out his old knee and inserted a stainless-steel model a few weeks ago. It's the penalty for twisting the original on a Belgian course.
Wagner, who started swinging clubs shortly after he learned to walk, is hot to get back on the links. "I told my doctor I will not pay him if this doesn't work," he growled.
When he does tee off again, he will definitely be swinging clubs made by his own firm, DiamondheadGolf Club Manufacturing Co. Inc. in Rancho Cordova. The 37-year-old firm vends clubs in the mid- to high-end range, averaging $700 per set.
In the 1950s, Wagner was a pro golfer and clubmaker in Southern California, outfitting celebrities like Bob Hope, Dean Martin, Willie Mays, Lawrence Welk and the Lennon sisters.
More recently, after moving to Rancho Murieta in the late 1970s, he's outfitted actor Leslie Nielsen and pro golfer Chi Chi Rodriguez.
For decades, Wagner has more or less coasted, making clubs for duffers who call in after hearing about Diamondhead on the links. But now, Diamondhead is in the middle of its first serious expansion. It has not only discovered an international market, but plans to franchise a chain of custom club-makers.
During the past two years, company sales have nearly doubled, going to more than $40,000 per month from $22,000, Wagner said. That's mainly because golf is taking off in places where it hasn't been big -- such as Korea, Iceland and Ghana.
But it's also because golfers like the Diamondhead computer that analyzes their swings, telling them where they're going wrong, and offering possible remedies.
Those factors are likely to bring about big changes at the small, six-employee firm. Diamondhead -- named after the Hawaiian volcano -- is part of a "second-tier" of golf-club manufacturers. It sits between big companies like Wilson Sporting Goods Co. and tiny custom club-makers, said Jim Fitzpatrick, a prominent Rocklin-based golf artist who, like Wagner, has played the game for a long time.
There are a couple of similar firms around, according to local golfers, including River City Golf and Par 72 Golf.
Over the years, Diamondhead has perfected its own manufacturing techniques. Like some of the larger companies, Wagner designs club heads and has them forged to his specifications. Custom makers typically don't get involved in designing basic components, ordering them instead from companies that do, Fitzpatrick said.
On the other hand, Diamondhead, like many custom makers, buys its shafts from club-component firms that design and build them. And it custom fits most of its clients, using a computer to analyze individual swings.
Diamondhead also designs its own putters -- the result of Wagner's inveterate tinkering. The Vice Versa putter, for example, puts a forward spin on the ball so it will roll straighter, Wagner said.
"One night I was in the garage at 4 a.m., dreaming up ideas," he recalled. "I looked at this water pipe and put a shaft on it and it felt good. I tried it in a tournament, and the guys were looking at me like they're thinking 'This guy's out of his mind.'
"But it worked. So I made 12 and brought them to the next tournament and put $25 tags on them, laid them around the putting green and sold them all in 10 minutes."
It's that combination of inventiveness and marketing that has given Wagner a comfortable living. His other creations include the Blizzard Wizzard and Big Headed Retaliator putters.
Although Diamondhead distributes standard clubs to its foreign dealers, fitted sets are more in demand, said Larry Landis, company president.
Other local firms take different approaches. River City Golf -- probably the largest of the big local custom-club makers -- doesn't use a computer or design and forge its heads, said owner Wayne Foster.
The computer just doesn't give enough information, he said, so it's not worth the expense. River City uses experienced staff members and video to analyze individual swings, an approach Foster said does the job at least as well.
River City long ago gave up making its own heads. It costs something like $30,000 to develop a new head, Foster said. Yet, almost as soon as it is brought onto the market, it faces competition from some "deep-pockets" manufacturer.
Par 72, which is smaller than the other two firms, combines instruction, video and customizing to sell its clubs, said owner Michael Gluck.
Demand is burgeoning, Gluck said, and Sacramento is one of golf's hot spots. By some estimates, the number of golfers nationwide has risen by 7 million during the past seven years.
Although there was a dip in sales industrywide this year, Gluck is going ahead with plans to franchise his little venture. He plans to charge around $65,000 to franchisees.
Wagner, of course, believes his own approach is paying off. Although Diamondhead doesn't advertise abroad, people looking for a custom fit sometimes hear about the company and call.
Some of them eventually become Diamondhead dealers. A South Korean tooling-company owner, for example, recently worked out a tentative deal to buy 250 sets a month if he became the country's sole Diamondhead distributor, Wagner said.
Despite its success overseas, Diamondhead doesn't have outlets in the United States. Wagner, admitting that the competition is overwhelming, said he has been satisfied vending to a small, steady line of customers brought in by word-of-mouth.
But now he sees a glimmer of high-tech opportunity in Diamondhead's golf-analysis computer. The machine, set beside an indoor driving cubicle, measures the characteristics of a player's swing.
One golfer was told he sliced the ball into adjoining fairways -- something he already knew. But it also told him he could hit harder with a more flexible shaft, which he didn't know.
It's this machine that has helped bring Diamondhead its clients. And it's this machine that is the cornerstone of Wagner's franchise notion. He plans by next year to sell it and the rest of his method to franchisees, who will then order from Diamondhead custom clubs for their clients.
But Wagner continues to experiment. He's currently fiddling with designs for both titanium and brass club faces. Titanium is the latest craze because the superhard metal is believed to hit the ball farther.
But Wagner suspects brass may have virtues of its own. "I'm experimenting with brass inserts in the irons," he said. "I like the idea because it doesn't take off as fast, because brass is softer than steel or titanium, and the shots may be straighter because it's softer in the center."
