Well I thought this was a pretty unusual place to find challenge coins but who knew? Just when I thought I had seen everything… My late business partner, Dave, was an ardent golfer. He lived for golf, was active in his local golf course, and played to a very low handicap. In addition to being one of the world’s best people and my best friend, he was someone who liked to leave places better off than how he found them.
One day he and I were playing gold. (Actually he was playing golf and I was mostly swearing but then I digress.) To mark his ball he pulled out a challenge coin we had made for someone. It was big but made quite a statement. I asked him why he had chosen that Military Coin and he said that he had always considered it his “lucky challenge coin“. I looked at it and could easily see why he felt that way but we will not go into that here. The other two guys we had been paired with really liked the coin and thought it was funny to use as a ball marker. When we finished playing I hooked the other two guys up with a few sample challenge coins and they were happy campers. Needless to say, Dave and I had a discussion about golf course coins after our round. “Dave’s score that day was 75 and mine wasn’t.)
I do not know the rules of golf so I went to the greatest expert of all, Google. I found this quote:
The position of a ball to be lifted should be marked by placing a ball-marker, a small coin or other similar object immediately behind the ball.” While there’s no penalty for using an object that’s not similar to a plastic ball-marker or a small coin, you’ll rarely — if ever — see a PGA player use anything other than a small, flat disc to mark a ball.
You can decide if this is true or not. I don’t want to be “that guy” who goes running to the rule books every time someone uses a foot-wedge…but I am getting off of my subject..
Challenge Coins During Golf Tournaments
The military coin tradition is so ingrained in the military system that it was no surprise to me when, playing in a military golf tournament I found the commander’s coin being used to mark the “closest to the pin” hole. The winner got the commander’s military coin as a prize.
Sometimes fun tournaments allow players to ‘buy mulligans’. This is a feature of a tournament of which I highly approve. Why not have coins struck for the tournament participants and allow them to buy extras to use as mulligans. They will have to think twice about using their mulligan that way. (Unless of course they own a coin company but who does that….;)
Challenge Coins for the Winners
OK. So you are having golf tournament coins made to give or sell to everyone. You have them made in antique brass or antique silver. The design includes and engraving plate in the design on the back. All of the challenge coins are the same dies and design. In addition to the ‘generic coin’ you have a copper one with a diamond cut edge engraved “closest to the hole”. You have a Gold one (or several gold ones if you have flights) engraved with ‘winner’. You have some shiny nickel ones with the diamond cut edge engraved “second place” or “low average” or….you get the point. For one relatively small investment you can replace the expense of all or some of those trophies. Maybe one big one for the winner but your coins can serve for the rest. And this will save you a bunch of money. You are already buying swag for everyone anyway. In time your Golf Challenge Coins will become an annual tradition.
Tournament Coins as Fundraisers
Every major golf tournament ought to have a coin. These can be used by tournament leaders to reward volunteers, award local dignitaries, recognize the professional golfers and just come in handy in every way. If we really think this through, golf coins would also be super things for tournament attendees to buy as souvenirs. You are buying a boat load of that souvenirs to sell already, here is a way to add to the exchequer and fund your volunteer awards at the same time. Brass for sale to the public….silver for volunteers…..you get it by now. We are happy to design and produce Golf Tournament Coins for your next event.
Though I love the game of golf I can assure you that I am a far better coin maker than I am a golfer. Give me a call and we can discuss your golf coins. If you can turn my fade into a draw you just might get a heck of a discount.