We recently connected with Sammy Berger and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Sammy, thanks for joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

We started Prio Golf while golfing 9 holes after work. While we were talking to our balls, we began discussing one of our more pivotal questions: “where on earth do you buy your golf clothes?” It soon turned into a comical comparison of shopping horror stories – everything from buying men’s XS sizes, to wearing clothes from middle school, to going into golf stores where leggings zipped all the way up your leg (revealing far too much).

We both noticed there was more wrong than just the lack of options in female golf attire, but massive fundamental oversights; no pockets, awful colors, and even worse patterns.

After our golf round concluded and feeling inspired, we both went home and began thinking about what the right solution would be. In this brainstorm, we found ourselves agreeing on what we’d want to wear, and how to make it happen. Suddenly, the creative brainstorm session and ideation turned into a “wait a minute, we can do this.” Thus, Prio was born.

The basic concept of Prio Golf is to offer the growing golf market more options. Options that are calculated for sexy and not-so-sexy curves. Options where you don’t have to sacrifice fashion for function. Not only do 5.5 million women currently golf in the US, but the sport is seeing a rapid rise in female participation year after year. No matter the level of play: whether you are new to golf, go all the time, or only go on the occasional work event, we think there should be an option that makes all women look good & feel good.

Eventually, we would like to grow Prio Golf into a women’s golf empire that encourages thousands of female golfers worldwide to start and/or continue playing the sport. All of course, with our clothing being the “go-to staple” in every female golfer’s closet.

Prio’s first clothing collection launched in June 2022. 

Sammy, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Prio Golf’s mission is to inspire confidence in potential and current female golfers through fashionable & functional attire, camaraderie, and education.

Prio Golf is named after the first woman to wear trousers at a major ladies’ championship in 1933, Gloria Minoprio. Her decision to wear pants (and show her ankle) caused quite the stir and was deemed inappropriate. Golfing organizations feared this attire would result in a slip in standards of golf etiquette. Gloria’s ground-breaking fashion choice led to more freedom of choice for women. Beyond her fashion influence, she was a phenomenal athlete – winning the ladies championship with ONLY ONE CLUB (yes, you read that correctly).

It is only right that our company nods to this absolute legend, who led the way for many women in the sport from her fashion decisions to her club choices.

Prio Golf aims to continue this legacy of pioneering women’s golf fashion by providing relevant and practical clothing athleisure pieces. The concept of “athleisure” has shifted to be more than gym attire – it’s a staple part of a wardrobe meant for hiking, hitting farmers markets, working, napping, whatever your activities may be. Prio’s clothing will not only fit most course dress codes and have subtle golf features, its items are designed to be versatile for the women to balance it all.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

It’s no secret that starting a business can be terrifying. It can be especially challenging when both co-founders are launching into a new industry. We both always wanted to start a business but didn’t know what it would be. We have business backgrounds and have worked in consumer insights, data analytics, business development, market research, and tech startups. See something missing from that list? Correct. Keywords you’d expect to see are retail, merchandising, and fashion.

Instead, we launched into the world of retail based on a gap in the market we saw for female golf clothing. Together, we learned how to design, create fashion technical packages, source fabric, communicate with global manufacturers, and ultimately fulfill a sample clothing collection set to launch in Summer 2022.

Apart from navigating a new industry, this also is a side-hustle for both of us. We love our day-jobs and get to leverage Prio as our ‘yay-job.’ It’s a new world for us that we’ve enjoyed diving into and figuring out what works best for our business.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

It started with selling pastries and cinnamon rolls. Prio Golf’s unconventional start to fundraising was led by our desire to raise a little capital for hats, begin networking, shop the idea of Prio around, and learn more about the fashion scene in Denver. Thus, we began a Butter Braids fundraiser.

A natural conversation with friends, coworkers, and loved ones about baked goods soon transitioned into introductions and connections to other females who love to golf, and community members who are knowledgeable about the world of fashion. This was the catalyst Prio needed to learn and grow. The amount raised not only covered our first round of hat merchandise, but also provided pivotal contacts we needed to complete our sample collection.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.priogolf.com
• Instagram: @priogolf
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PrioGolf
• Other: Tik Tok: @priogolf

Image Credits
The golf cart with 2 girls in quarter zips titled Celia and Kate, credited by Dylan Nelson (Instagram: @dylonelson)