Nearly five months after announcing that it was divesting itself of its non-core businesses, Callaway Golf Co. has sold its stake in a fledgling golf-book publishing company to its former partner, Callaway Editions. Callaway Golf had planned to publish golf books in partnership with Callaway Editions before a slump in business forced the company to shed some 700 jobs and focus on its core businesses.
Under the agreement, Callaway Editions will have the exclusive right to use the Callaway Golf trademark on approved golf books and book-related products. Ed Brash, who is heading the golf publishing program, said he expects the new line to launch in spring 2000 with a list of at least three highly illustrated titles. Unlike the initial plan for the book operation that called for a large staff, the new unit will have a small in-house staff supplemented by freelance writers and photographers, including writers Jaime Diaz, Dan Jenkins and George Plimpton, and photographers Maurice Harmon and Walter Iooss Jr.
Callaway Editions is coming off a good year, in which it posted operating profits of $1.5 million on sales of $10 million, according to a profile of the company in the March 29 issue of Fortune.
