A letter from the Jones'

We couldn't be more excited to launch In the Rough (ITR). We thought we'd give an overview of why we came up with the brand and invite you along on this journey with us. 

During the pandemic, Cory Jones was looking to fill his time with a new hobby productively. As an ex-D1 athlete growing up in a competitive, sports-minded family, he quickly thought golf might be a great, easy-on-the- joints sport to try out. With many coworkers also involved in the sport, he started to go to the range, practicing on the par 3 and finally hitting the big 18. As every golfer knows, there is a moment when you're learning to golf (and quite frankly, every time you play), you hit a great shot that brings you back for another round. When that happens, you're hooked and forever attached to the game. That's precisely what happened to Cory.

Tessa Jones started playing golf in high school, playing her Junior and Senior year and then never picking up a club after. When Cory began to play, Tessa picked up the game with him, and it became an activity they both enjoyed doing together. She works in ecommerce, where many deals are made on the course, and quickly realized it was an asset to be a female golfer in the type of work she did. Not only does she work in ecommerce, she works at BigCommerce, running the agency program that supports small to large enterprise merchants design, optimizing, and launch their websites. Her background is also in retail and customer service, working at Nordstrom for half a decade. The combination of ecommerce and retail has always been a passion for her. 

Cory is the brains behind the name of the brand. Everyone can relate to hitting in the rough. Most can also relate to wanting to look good no matter how good or bad you may be at hitting the ball. The pair started to think about expanding the idea into a formal brand. They came up with the tagline, "you don't have to play good to look good," Although this is probably not the best grammatical sentence, it's incredibly true - especially with golf. And so In the Rough was born. The couple wants everyone to come back for another round of golf, even if you're hitting every bunker and blasting it into the water. The logo resembles and fade on the "n" and a slice on the "g"; even with consistency and practice, golf can be the most frustrating sport out there, but it teaches so many lessons we don't have enough time to go through them all. For that reason, they hope the brand is relatable to every golfer that just goes out there and tries their best day in and day out. Or just enjoys a ride in the cart and a hot dog at the turn. 

Finally, the pair wanted not only to create a comfortable, classic, trendy, and relatable brand but also want to promote diversity in the sport. Cory is black, and Tessa is female. They would look around when they would play and realize that in both cases, black males and females were predominantly missing from the majority. Cory would play with his brother and discover that when he would retrieve a ball from someone's yard after he sliced or even show up at the tee, they would find that many would look a bit longer to see what they were doing or if they even belonged. For Tessa, it's common to golf and be the only female on the course. Sometimes playing with seven other males, she wants to see more females in business leverage the game to expand business opportunities, and female's simply to feel confident to golf in a male dominant sport. We hope that our brand can be a catalyst for that. 

We'll end by saying we're so excited to share our brand with our family, friends, and the world. It's been a labor of love, and we can't wait to hear what you think and how you play wearing it. 

Here's to hitting in the rough, 

Cory & Tessa Jones