Market Overview

Yano Research Institute conducted a new survey on the size and trends of the golf gear market in Asia from 2020 to 2024, including projections. The survey revealed that the projected market size in the region is projected to reach 838.11 billion yen in 2024, a decline by over 20% from the previous year.

Since 2020, the pandemic has caused a golf boom worldwide, not just in Asia. This golf boom was called the “Pandemic Bubble” in Japan. While the golf gear market in Japan shrank significantly in 2020, the market size in the overall Asia remained 99.4% of the previous year’s size, reaching 765.61 billion yen. From this temporary decline, the recovery in market size was enormous, compared to Japan.  

Noteworthy Topics

Direction of the South Korean Golf Gear Retail Market after the Pandemic

A significant amount of golf equipment inventory stalled in South Korea's golf gear retail market due to a decline in demand after substantial growth during the pandemic. However, many Japanese golf gear manufacturers relied on on-site agents to develop their business, which delayed their ability to recognize this situation. (In fact, there was a possibility that these agents intentionally hid this information from the manufacturers.) This appears to have inflated provisional demand rather than real demand. The tremendous growth of the global golf gear market may have resulted from this unique business practice in South Korea. The dramatic shift from prosperous expansion during the pandemic to significant shrinkage has changed the business structure of South Korea’s golf gear market. Specifically, independently owned specialty stores have experienced shakeouts, while mass merchandisers, such as Golfzon Commerce and AK Golf, have increased their market share. These retailers have taken proactive steps by exploring new, post-pandemic business models for the golf equipment market in South Korea.

What are these business models? Simply put, they involve fitting and customizing golf clubs, which improve profitability through increased spending per customer and improved customer satisfaction. Many existing workshop-type stores in South Korea already provide these services, but major mass merchandisers did not. They only sold ready-to-use golf clubs. This caused tremendous market growth due to stalled inventory, as mentioned above. In the future, the South Korean golf gear market will likely resemble the current Japanese market. Our on-site research supports this, as we received many inquiries from golf gear businesses about trends in the Japanese golf club market, as well as about customizing and fitting trends in Japan. We also received requests for training systems for fitters, including seminars and workshops, to help strengthen their in-house customizing and fitting businesses. They also requested more communication with Japanese golf gear part and shaft manufacturers. These types of inquiries and requests were not seen in previous golf gear surveys.

Future Outlook

Our last market size estimate was for 2024. Since then, no quantitative research has been conducted on countries other than Japan. However, the trend in Japan's golf gear market shows that, since 2025, businesses have shifted from volume-based (selling ready-to-use clubs) to quality-based (offering fittings and customization) in the golf club market in the Asian region, centered on South Korea.

Research Outline