John Ashworth says he occasionally looks back on his three decades in the golf apparel business and wonders, “Wow, how did I get here?”
Where Ashworth is today is in a place where he can pursue his passion – on multiple fronts. He’s the founder of Linksoul, the hip California clothing company that’s blended golf and the surfing culture into a popular lifestyle brand. The Oceanside resident is also one of the driving forces behind the preservation and restoration of his local Goat Hill Park short course. It’s an effort that’s gained national attention and in some ways is symbolic of the industry’s attempts to halt similar development plans at older public facilities and instead keep them as places for recreation and socialization.
“There are a handful of courses where the people are taking a stand against re-development,” Ashworth says in this interview in the National Golf Foundation’s newsletter. “But we really stepped up here because we went up against some developers that wanted to take this golf course that’s been around since 1952. It’s a green space and it was close to being paved over into some kind of concrete jungle that you can never come back from.
“It’s been a lot of work; I’m not going to lie,” Ashworth adds. “It’s an ongoing fight every day to make it better and make ends meet, but at the end of the day it’s very well worth it.”
Spend a couple minutes chatting with Ashworth and it’s readily apparent he appreciates the social and soulful nature of golf.
Yes, he built the Ashworth golf clothing brand into a national name; Ashworth started the company in the late 1980’s at a studio in Los Angeles, going from “0 to 90 in 10 years” behind the matinee idol popularity of endorser Fred Couples, before leaving the eponymously-named business in 1997. The one-time PGA Tour caddie pursued several creative endeavors – from course design in Scotland to creating another golf apparel line, Fidra, for Quiksilver – before starting Linksoul.
Ashworth had coined the term more than 20 years ago: “links” referring to the spot where golf began –the sandy dunes that connect the land to the sea – and “soul” relating to the spiritual nature of people. For Ashworth, the name epitomized what he wanted to create in the golf world.
“I feel like golf is such an important game and has this rare ability to link souls together - a lot of times complete strangers - on a playing field that’s really built around virtues and sportsmanship, and is out in nature and fresh air,” Ashworth says in his Q&A with the NGF newsletter. “All these great things work together for recreation and socialization. The game itself really has such a broad appeal. It just brings people together and that’s always been important to me.”
Ashworth says the appeal of the Linksoul brand is transitional, comfortable apparel created for the guy who doesn’t necessarily want to look like a golf pro.
“Timeless and classic, and yet hip,” Ashworth explains. “Now that I’m getting a little older, I want to make clothes I want to wear, but yet I want my 20 year old son to be happy with it.
“There are plenty of athletic brands that make the ‘golf uniform,’ and that’s great for me because I’m trying to make things for just the regular guy who has a job,” he adds. “I want to make clothing that transitions really nicely from the work place to the golf course, so it would naturally blend into a lot of environments and you wouldn’t have a second wardrobe to play golf.”
Linksoul is in its sixth year of shipping products and sales have more than doubled over the past two years, with especially strong growth through their e-commerce channel, although there's been a concerted effort to build relationships with men's specialty stores, resorts and green-grass golf facilities. Many of the company’s customers have come from outside the world of golf and, for Ashworth, that’s just more inspiration.
“Nothing makes us happier than introducing new people to the game we love,” he says. “Our product collection continues to evolve with this in mind.”
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