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LEASING REACHES GOLF CLUBS
By Jacqueline M. Graves

(FORTUNE Magazine) – Tired of schlepping your golf clubs around with you when you travel? Odyssey Sports is willing to bet that you are. This Carlsbad, California, company has just launched a golf club leasing program that lets players away from home use top-of-the-line equipment without paying top dollar. A full set of Odyssey's graphite-shafted irons, wedges, woods, and putters goes for $1,521. But the company now leases these sets to golf pros at country clubs and resorts for $21.95 a month, with a two-year minimum, and the pros then rent them to guests like you. Bob Hitzel, head professional at Lake San Marcos Country Club near San Diego, charges a typical $10 a day. Says Hitzel: ''The program gives us the ability to use a high-class club as a rental club.'' High class, indeed. Arnold Palmer used an Odyssey putter in this year's Masters tournament. Hitzel signed up for the program in January and has since averaged 30 to 40 rentals per month on his ten sets of clubs. At $10 a day, he only needs a couple of rentals a month to turn a profit. Odyssey President Michael Magerman says that the company is in the process of signing up some 200 new leasing accounts. These include test runs with the Hilton, Hyatt, and Four Seasons hotel chains.