Jozi whizz kid has golfing success right down to a tee
September 28, 2003
 By Quentin Wray
Johannesburg - A young South African inventor has set out to prove poet Ralph Waldo Emmerson's famous assertion that "if a man ... make a better mouse-trap than his neighbour, tho' he build his house in the woods, the world will make a beaten path to his door".
Four years ago, Jason Crouse, then a 22-year-old industrial design student at Wits Tech, dropped out to develop a new type of golf tee conceptualised years before by his father.
Hundreds of design hours and millions of rands later, golfers in Europe, the US and Japan are able to buy a golf tee that looks like an oversized electric toothbrush bristle attachment and supports the ball on a "cup" of bristles.
It is said to allow golfers to drive the ball further and straighter than the old-fashioned wooden tees.
And while it is still very early days, and the 2.1 million units that have been sold since April this year are only a tiny drop in the huge golfing accessories market, Crouse says that sales are ready to soar.
The tee is now being placed in the US retail chain Wal-Mart and has an infomercial running in that country where there are "potentially millions and millions of dollars in sales - those are the dreams that kept the business alive".
According to Sports Marketing Surveys, there are 61.1 million golfers worldwide; 6.9 million in Europe, 13.6 million in Asia, 1.7 million in Australasia, 1 million in South America and 500 000 in South Africa. There are 37.1 million in the US alone.
The US is seen as such a serious market, that Brush-T has set up a subsidiary company there.
Now, still only 26 and a very part-time player, Crouse is the managing director of Brush-T Innovations, a one-product specialist company with a turnover of about $80 000 a month, patents pending in the world's major golf markets, production facilities in China and distributors on all five continents.
It has not been an easy four years, and only the deep pockets of Johannesburg's famous Krok brothers - well known developers, serial entrepreneurs and family friends - have kept the company from going to the wall on several occasions.
Five container loads of defective sets were shipped to the US last year after an ill-advised change in manufacturer, and the company had to take the knock. "It killed us ... we came right in November when we went back to the original manufacturer."
There is an ongoing legal battle with the manufacturer of the defective products, but Crouse says the company is now moving forward.
The company's first real break came in 2001 when South Africa's top golfer and world number two, Ernie Els, used the tee in the Dunhill Cup.
There was 90 seconds of televised discussion on it that led to pro-shops and sporting goods stores being cleaned out of stock in 24 hours throughout the British Isles.
And although it is still hard to spot on the US and European Tours, Golf Digest has reported Korean SK Ho using the Brush-T as he led the British Open in July this year.
Crouse says the design changes, especially for the packaging, which were done in conjunction with Brian Steinhobel, a top South African-based international designer, changed the way the product looked and felt and led to Brush-T winning two industrial design awards from the SA Bureau of Standards.
He says he would love to get the product endorsed by a top name, but this is expensive and will only be looked at when the company grows.
Crouse has not ruled out selling the company to a major supplier, but says that the price would have to "make sense". But, if he doesn't sell, the company will branch out into other products that could use its distribution networks.
"We have a couple of products in the pipeline - they are not totally new, just a new take on old ideas."
The company is still based in Johannesburg, even though neither the production facilities nor the product's major markets are here and Crouse says he has no intention of moving.
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