2015 State of Disc Golf: Manufacturer’s Overview

The results are in, and once again this series of blogs will examine the numbers, the changes, and the interesting aspects of our opinions about disc golf. We sincerely appreciate everyone who took the time to share a little bit about yourself so that we can get a better picture of the disc golf community.

We will begin by looking at the brands we like and the changes from the last survey.

 

Our BFF!

With the certainty of Paul McBeth sinking a 10-meter putt, Innova dominated the category of ‘Favorite Brand’ again this year. Last year they not only led the category, they also had an increase in percentage of respondents from the previous year. This year’s survey showed a little different picture. The undisputed champion (pardon the pun) of the disc golf world slipped a little bit, dropping from 48% to 43%. But, that’s still higher than the 2013 survey (38%). The next few positions experienced a few changes, but not big numbers. Discraft dropped from second place at 12% last year, to fourth this year at just under 10%. Dynamic Discs gained some ground, going from fourth last year with 6%, to second this year at nearly 12%. In third place, Latitude held steady at 10%.

When taken as a whole, the three members of the Trilogy brand (Westside, Latitude 64, and Dynamic Discs) were the favorite of 26% of respondents.

It is interesting to note that nearly a third of us changed our favorite brand from last year. With that much change, there is potential for some big swings in numbers. Yet, other than Dynamic Discs’ 6% increase, none of the changes were drastic.

Favorite Brand

 

 

Fav Brand Change

 

Just Can’t Wait!

Although it is interesting to explore our favorite brands, there are other statistics in the survey that give a clearer picture of which brands are important to us. For example, the question “From which brand do you most look forward to new releases” showed a lot more even distribution of votes across manufacturers. According to the survey, 22.5% of us look forward to new releases from Innova. They are still number one in this category, but that is nearly half the number of respondents that chose Innova as their favorite brand. The second-most anticipated release is from Dynamic Discs at 15.3%, and rounding out the top three is Latitude 64 with 11.9%. Incidentally, nearly 12% of us don’t really look forward to new releases.

Anticipated Release

 

Innova-tion

Is Innova going to lead every poll category? Nope. For the question, “Which brand is the most innovative?” MVP edged out Innova for the lead spot, 23.2% to 22.6%. MVP gained in percentage about what Innova lost. The two companies have been trading positions for the last few years. The third and fourth positions were held by Dynamic Discs and Latitude 64.

Innoative

 

Respect

Innova isn’t just dominating nearly every poll category, they are garnering respect from more than their die-hard fans. In the category asking which manufacturer has the best reputation, Innova took a huge lead over second place, getting 58.2% of the votes. The next closest was Dynamic at 12.9%. Perhaps people know how long Innova has been involved in the sport. Maybe it’s their sponsorship of so many events. Maybe it is the fact that they sponsor the four-time world champion, and other world-class disc golfers. It could even be their thorough selection of discs. This does not seem to be the type of category that would be inflated because of Innova’s wide and varied distribution channels. It just appears to be a nod to an old, established company. Whatever the reason, the number of respondents who voted for them far exceeds the number that chose Innova as their favorite brand. That’s pretty impressive.

Reputation

 

One-brand Warriors

Similar to last year, about 6% of us have only one brand in our bags. Most of us are happy to throw discs from a variety of manufacturers, but these loyalist only throw a single brand. Innova aficionados make up 54% of the single-brand supporters. Discraft devotees come in second at 14%, and Prodigy proponents come in third with 8%. The survey didn’t ask for how many of each brand people had in their bags, so there could be a good percent of us who could be close to having a one-brand bag. However, most disc golfers love to experiment with brands, discs, and plastics (or rubber!).

Single Brand

 

What are you throwin’?

Now it’s time to turn away from how we feel about certain brands and turn to one of the most interesting and telling indicators of what manufacturers we like: what discs are in our bag. As I mentioned before, indicating which brand is our favorite, or which disc company is most revered, does not paint a clear picture of what we huck. So, let’s take a peek inside the bags of the thousands of people who responded. Spoiler alert: Innova won this category, too.

It won’t come as a shock to anyone that most of us have at least one Innova disc in our bag. Again, they are one of the oldest manufacturers, host the widest selection of discs, can be found in a bigger variety of stores, etc. Over 83% of us are carrying around at least one Innova. That number is down ever so slightly from 86.8% last year. That is not a huge decrease, but it will be interesting to see what the future holds for the disc giant.

The second-most common disc manufacturer in our bags is Discraft, with 62.8% of us toting around the brand. Last year 69.2% of us carried Discraft, which is a lot bigger year-to-year drop than Innova. Whose discs are poaching the bag space from these two giants? The members of the Trilogy are. Latitude 64, Dynamic Discs, and Westside, in that order. Latitude 64 went from 42.3% last year, to 49.6% this year. Dynamic Discs experienced a bigger gain, shooting from 35.3% to this year’s 48.6%. Westside also experienced a large increase in fans, moving from seventh place at 26.1% last year, to fifth place at 36.5 in this year’s survey.

Brands in Bag

 

The Winner?

As we’ve seen in the past couple years of conducting the survey, the numbers among the top companies ebb and flow. The growth of the sport creates opportunities for smaller disc companies to stake out their position in the world, and try to create a few more chinks in the armor of the big boys. Newer golfers may be more willing to try different brands, perhaps even with an attitude of rebellion against the “establishment” of older companies. Although the market will prevent too many new competitors from emerging, several existing companies are making headway into what was formerly the domain of Innova and Discraft. Whether newer companies can overtake the top brands remains to be seen, there are a couple of factors that I assert will affect the chances of growth for smaller companies:

  • Becoming the discs that beginners start with. Most of us have a soft spot in our hearts for our first discs. I suspect they affected our buying habits for a long time. By actively introducing new players into the sport, manufacturers stand the chance of becoming their go-to brand.
  • Find the plastic/mold that becomes popular. Okay, it is a lot more difficult to find the next hot model than just releasing a bunch of new discs. But, by continuing to experiment with new materials and molds, the chances of hitting a popular disc goes up.
  • Sponsorship certainly helps keep their brand in people’s minds. Especially if you get lucky and sponsor a world champion.

It is fun and interesting to look at how we view the companies in the disc golf world. Although we can only speculate as to what is driving some of the numbers, it is still interesting to look at data from the survey and see what is the most current snapshot of our preferences in brands. In the next few blogs we’ll continue to look at who we are and what we like.

 

 

What is in OUR bags?

In the past few blog posts concerning the State of Disc Golf Survey, we have established that Innova is the most popular manufacturer in the disc golf world. It was chosen as the favorite brand in every demographic. However, even though Innova led all other manufacturers in popularity, according to our survey, less than 4% of us throw exclusively Innova. As we all know from interacting with other disc golfers, even though we may favor one brand, most of use throw discs from a variety of manufacturers. This blog will explore the variety of brands we throw and give us a good snapshot of what is in our bags.

 

OnlyThrowOneBrand

 

First let’s look at the popularity of the brands that are in our bags. The survey didn’t ask how many discs we had of each brand ­— that would have been too time consuming. It simply asked which brands could be found in our bags. Not surprisingly, the brand that most of us throw is Innova, with 87% of us keeping at least one of their discs in our bag. The next most popular brand is Discraft at 69%. Latitude 64 has 42% of respondents throwing their brand. Dynamic Discs is the fourth most popular disc in our bags at 35%. Rounding out the top five was Prodigy at 28%. Westside, Gateway, and MVP were just a couple of percentage points behind Prodigy, sitting at 26%, 24%, and 23% respectively.

 WhichBrands

Although we can say that Innova was the clear winner with this survey question, it is important to point out the significance of the Trilogy brands (Westside, Latitude 64, and Dynamic Discs) taken as a single entity. Although these three companies are separate, they work together to avoid duplicating efforts, such as manufacturing, distribution, and sometimes disc design.

 BagsWithTrilogy

 

In our survey we asked about the “Trilogy” brands (Latitude 64, Dynamic Discs, and Westside) individually. These are three separate companies, from three different countries, who work together to share some of the manufacturing and distribution workload. Although separate, they market themselves as members of Trilogy. Taken as a single entity, 58% of us have at least one of the brands in our bags. A significant number of us, 15%, have all three Trilogy brands in our bags. If disc golf sales are any indication of Trilogy’s popularity, we have seen their disc orders increase in the last two years so much that they rival Innova’s. Yes, that is counting the three companies as one. It will be interesting to see if the trend continues in the coming years.

 

InnovaDiscraftTrilogy

It is certainly important to consider everyone’s favorite brand as we explore the current state of disc golf. If we favor one brand over another we are more likely to buy and follow that brand to the exclusion of other brands. However, taking a peek inside the bags of thousands of disc golfers can tell a slightly different story than just asking which manufacturer we prefer. Yes, Innova is still the king of the bag. But, with the knowledge that few of us are dogmatic about brands, other disc manufacturers can take solace (pardon the pun) in the knowledge that many of their discs are nestled comfortably alongside the undisputed champ. The question of how much competition in such a relatively small sport is too much may be a subject for another blog. For now, it appears that the competition is good for us as disc golfers. Let the manufacturers develop new molds or materials as they fight for their share in the disc golf market. Meanwhile, let’s go huck!

State of Disc Golf 2015: Do Our Demographics Affect Our Choice of Brands?

In a previous blog discussing the results of the 2015 State of Disc Golf survey, we focused on which disc golf brands we like the most and how that has changed from last year. (If you missed it, click HERE) This blog will look at who we are and whether that affects what brands we throw.

Who are we?

According to the survey, we are male (94%), live in California (7%), are 30-35 years old (23%), consider ourselves Intermediate disc golfers (45%), have been playing for 5-9 years (25%), played 10-15 different courses in 2014 (29%) and have a Bachelor’s Degree (35%). Half of us are currently married, while 43% have never been married.

We also belong to disc golf clubs (57%), own either 21-30 discs or 41-60 discs (tied at 14%), bought 10-14 new discs last year (18%), lost 1-3 discs (48%), chose disc golf as a favorite sport to play (85%), and football as a favorite sport to follow (35%. Disc golf was second at 27%).
After examining all the demographic statistics, we wanted to see if there were trends based on certain aspects of the demographics. For example, does the age of the respondent affect which brand they consider their favorite? Or the skill level? Or the education?

We considered most the attributes of the average survey respondent, listed above, and compared them to the overall list of favorite discs. And, spoiler alert, the results were kind of boring. Regardless of the demographic, nearly all of the results were within a point or two of the overall favorites. There were only a few exceptions, and even those were not extremely far from the overall numbers. They are worth mentioning, though, because of possible long-term ramifications.

Just to recap the previous blog, the top six favorite brands were: Innova (48%), Discraft (12%), Latitude 64 (10%), Dynamic Discs (6%), and MVP and Prodigy tied at 5%.

Disc golf experience

The first question we looked at was “When did you start playing disc golf?” We wanted to see if the length of time we have been playing had any effect on which brands we preferred. The biggest variation from the average results occurred among players who have only been playing a year or less. This was not a large sample size, representing only about 1.5% of the total respondents, so the overall significance of the results carry less weight. Still, this will be an interesting group to watch over the next couple of years. Players from this experience group still chose Innova as their favorite brand, but by a much smaller margin. Only 31% of respondents in this group picked Innova as their favorite, compared to 48% overall. Discraft and Latitude 64 results stayed close to the same as the total results. MVP, Dynamic Discs, Axiom, and Discmania all bumped up several percentage points (see chart for numbers).

Near the other end of the experience spectrum were those who have been playing between 35-44 years. This group made up 3.2% of the respondents. Among them, 42% listed Innova as their favorite, while 15% of them chose Discraft, 3% more than overall. MVP, Dynamic Discs, and Prodigy all held 8% of the vote in this group, which represented an increase for all three brands. Westside was consistent with their overall score.

FirstHeardofDiscGolf

Skill level

The survey asked respondents to list what division best represented their skill level. The four choices were: Beginner/Recreational, Intermediate, Advanced, and Professional. For the most part, this category also followed the Favorite Brand category nearly exactly. The Pro’s, representing 8% of the total respondents, had the biggest differences. For them, Innova sat at 46%, Discraft and Latitude were 10%, and Dynamic Discs, MVP, and Prodigy held 7% of the Pro vote.

DiscLevelSkillLevels
Gender

Since men represented 94% of the respondents, it’s pretty obvious their statistics would duplicate that of the overall results. For women, there were a few slight differences. Innova was the first choice with 46%, which was 2% lower than overall, Discraft took second with 11%, and Dynamic Discs rounded out the top three, finishing 9%, up from the overall 6%. Latitude 64 and Westside traded a couple percentage points, with Latitude 64 2% below the overall results and Westside 2% above.

Gender of Disc Golfers
Age

The final demographic we’ll look at in this blog is the choice of Favorite Brand by age group. While all of the age groups between 18-40 years were close to the overall percentage, there were other groups with a few different numbers. Again, the differences were never huge, but enough to mention.

We will start with the youngest age group, 12-17 years old, which represented 2% of the total respondents. Like the newer players that we mentioned at the beginning, it will be interesting to see how or if the numbers in this demographic changes over time. The youngest players chose Innova as their favorite by 5% more than the overall respondents. The increase came at the expense of Discraft and Latitude 64, which were both down a little. Westside was chosen 3% more frequently, while Dynamic Discs was the same percentage as overall, 6%.

The next group to look at is disc golfers 41-50 years old, representing 14% of respondents. This group chose Innova at a slightly lower 43%, compared to 48% of average. Discraft was up to 14%, Latitude 64 was up a tick at 11% and Prodigy was 7%, which was 2% higher than overall.
The 51-60 year olds were a little more favorable for Innova, with 53% of the group choosing the brand leader. Discraft and Latitude 64 were a little less popular, while Dynamic Discs and MVP matched their overall numbers.

The most senior group we will look at is the 61-70 year old disc golfers. They make up 2% of the total and only 39% of them favored Innova. The extra percentage points went to Discraft (16%), MVP and Westside (9% each), and Dynamic Discs (8%). The fact that Discraft is higher is not surprising. But, if we were going to bet on a demographic that would have the highest loyalty to Innova, we would have gone with this one. Innova and Discraft have been around longer than the other brands and people in this age group grew up throwing those discs.

AverageAgeofGolfer

Conclusion

When we were looking through all of the data, we were hoping to find a few statistical anomalies that could be analyzed and discussed. Although this particular set of data did not have the extremes we were hoping for, just knowing that we as disc golfers are consistent throughout a variety of demographics is good information to have. We will certainly keep an eye on those groups that did vary from the norm to see what changes take place in future surveys.

In an upcoming post, we will look specifically at which brands people are throwing. Remember from the first survey result blog that only 6% of us throw a single brand. The rest of us have two or more brands in our arsenal. We will look at which brands people throw and which new discs people know the most.

The State of Disc Golf: “Extracurricular Activities” on the Disc Golf Course–Marijuana

Disc Golf and Marijuana

“I saw a drug deal when I was on a disc golf course with my nine year old boy.”

This was told to me by a disgruntled fellow player as we were making our way to our tee time at a PDGA event. He went on to express the sadness and disappointment he felt when he found out many of the local disc golfers that his son looked up to regularly smoked marijuana illegally during their rounds at the local course. This was not my first and it definitely has not been my last conversation like this. It seems that the use of drugs and other substances are intertwined with disc golf.

Just the Facts Please

In our 2015 State of Disc Golf Survey, we asked the following: In 2014, I have participated in the following on a disc golf course:

  • Drinking Alcohol
  • Vaping
  • Smoking Tobacco
  • Smoking Marijuana
  • None of the Above

We allowed participants to select more than one option. The results were as shown in the chart below:

2015-01-29_1521

(NOTE: Totals do not add up to 100% because participants could select more than one option.)

We found this data very interesting, and we would like to spread this topic across several articles to give each aspect of it the attention it deserves. This article will focus strictly on the use of Marijuana while playing disc golf.

Well, Isn’t it Pretty Much Legal?

Unlike the other three substances, Marijuana is the only one hazed by a variety of possession and usage laws (excluding local public smoking and drinking laws). The main question at hand is recreational use, which has only been legalized in 2 of 50 States (Washington and Colorado). How does this impact the way we should look at our data? Here is another interesting chart that looks at where the disc golfers who had smoked marijuana were from:

2015-01-29_1550

So is it safe to assume that 92.7% of the disc golfers who took our survey chose to smoke marijuana illegally? Not necessarily. A handful of states have legalized marijuana for medical purposes, and our survey did not not ask where the pot smoking took place. (Maybe all 92.7% went to Washington or Colorado whenever they smoked marijuana on the course?) Even with the benefit of the doubt, it is safe to assume that a good portion of the marijuana smoking  that occurred on the disc golf course during 2014 was smoked illegally.

Marijuana and Disc Golf: Best Friends or Worst Enemies?

Now to the debate that rages like wildfire in the disc golf world: Does marijuana on the course harm the sport, and therefore need to be burned elsewhere so that disc golf can thrive? Or should we all just learn to get along and embrace the “counter-culture” as an inseparable part of disc golf forever?

Of course, to give these questions the proper attention, we need to answer another question. Where do we want to see our beloved disc golf in the future? Do we want to see Paul McBeth and Ricky Wysocki battle in a play-off for the World Championships on ESPN? Or do we want to keep disc golf to ourselves–free to play and low key?

Another question from our survey asked, “Would you like to see disc golf become a mainstream sport?” And this leads us to another chart:

2015-01-29_1650

And in case you were wondering how only those who smoked marijuana on the course answered this question:

2015-01-29_1656

And naturally everyone else’s chart would look like this:

2015-01-29_1701

So What Does This All Mean?

We’ll let everyone draw their own conclusions from this data, but there were a few things that caught our eye.

It would seem natural to assume that a greater majority of disc golfers who don’t smoke marijuana would want the sport to become mainstream, but this spread was only slight (a difference of only 7.9%). So, it seems safe to say, all disc golfers regardless of drug use, want to see the sport grow into the mainstream. This raises even more questions: Do we want to bring the pot with us? Should we? Can we wave the flag of “Grow the Sport” and keep our stash of weed in our back pockets?

Some have fought to make this type of scenario a reality (we all remember the Vibram Four20 release from early 2014), and with at least two more states making marijuana legal in 2015 (Oregon and Alaska), the possibility of a mainstream society embracing disc golf and marijuana together is looking more and more plausible.

Of course, this potential reality still faces a lot of friction (we all remember the Vibram Four20 discontinuation also from early 2014). There are many who have expressed a desire to keep disc golf drug free and “family friendly.” And the one huge barrier: Marijuana use is still illegal in most of the United States.

This brings us back to my friend and I on our way to the tee. He not only was upset about his boy witnessing a drug deal while playing a sport they both loved. He also shared with me an experience he had when attending a city council meeting where he was lobbying for the installation of a new disc golf course on public land. He was all but completely shut down when the city council informed him of the alarming rates of drug related crimes reported in the area surrounding their existing disc golf course. Naturally, they were more than hesitant to approve another disc golf course.

But as Bob Dylan once said, “The times they are  a changin’.”

Will Disc Golf make it into the mainstream? We sure hope so (at least 75.8% of us). Will Mary Jane make it too? Well, at least some of us hope so (69.8% of 24.5% of us).

Only time will tell.

State of Disc Golf 2015: Most Popular Brands Worldwide

This year we had enough respondents to determine which brand is most popular throughout the world. We actually didn’t bother making a map for the most popular brand, because it would look like this:

It’s true, Innova is the most popular brand in every state and region of the world. We knew that Innova was dominant from the responses in the survey, but to find out they were the favorite brand in every region. We are amazed. Even across the country in “Scandinavia” Innova was still #1. Had we asked specific countries, perhaps Sweden would have been Latitude 64.

We know that from interacting with others, they may disagree. We have seen the comments that say “everybody throws such and such brand where I live.” Our response to that is, you may not know everybody in your state that plays disc golf. In some cases, the sample size should be larger to strongly say that we are strongly confident in these results (more specifically, the results below). For example, we awarded no 2nd place in Wyoming because there is not enough data to determine.

Where things start to get interesting is when we look at where the second most popular brands are found in this image:
2nd-Most-Popular-Brand

Here’s what stood out to us from the image above:

  1. This is a colorful map. Many different brands (outside of Innova) are strongly favored in different parts of the world.
  2. The closer a brand is to its headquarters, it tends to be more highly favored in that area.

Legacy is headquartered in California. What is California and Nevada’s second favorite brand Legacy? DD is in Kansas, and is dominant in the midwest. The exceptions start to come with MVP, where disc golf manufacturuing is

Before you comment:

To understand how Infinite Discs has come to conclusions in this article, please read our State of Disc Golf 2015: Introduction post. After you understand the statistics and methodology of the survey, feel free to post.

State of Disc Golf 2015: Popularity Around the World

We had some fun digging much deeper into the data to do some per capita comparisons and are super intrigued by what we have found. According to the data, Maine has more disc golfers per person than anywhere else in the world! Below is information about how popular disc golf is in each state, and region of the world.

For the images below, we did not make a world map, just a United States map. The shades of the lettering on the actual name of the territory (such as Canada) indicates how popular disc golf is in said area. For exact details, scroll to the bottom of this post; we published the number of responses from every region. Africa, South America, and Antarctica were not options in the poll; they will be included next year.

Where today's disc golfers are (number of respondents/ divided by population). The more popular areas are shaded darker.

Where today’s disc golfers are (number of respondents/ divided by population). The more popular areas are shaded darker.


Disc golf popularity according to Google Trends. This graph adds validity the previous graph, by comparing search data to where respondents are located. The graphs look incredibly similar.

Disc golf popularity according to Google Trends.
This graph adds validity the previous graph, by comparing search data to where respondents are located. The graphs look incredibly similar.


Region # Respondents Population in Millions
Respondents per Million
Alabama 62 4.78 1.30
Alaska 21 0.71 2.96
Arizona 57 6.39 0.89
Arkansas 33 2.92 1.13
Asia 4 4,427.00 0.00
Australia 30 23.3 0.13
California 353 37.25 0.95
Canada 151 35.16 0.43
Colorado 132 5.03 2.62
Connecticut 37 3.57 1.04
Delaware 15 0.9 1.67
District of Columbia 1 0.6 0.17
Europe 67 722.38 0.01
Europe – Scandinavia 133 20.12 0.66
Florida 134 18.8 0.71
Georgia 133 9.69 1.37
Hawaii 7 1.36 0.51
Idaho 52 1.57 3.32
Illinois 174 12.83 1.36
Indiana 107 6.48 1.65
Iowa 82 3.05 2.69
Kansas 101 2.85 3.54
Kentucky 67 4.34 1.54
Louisiana 29 4.53 0.64
Maine 50 1.33 3.76
Maryland 40 5.77 0.69
Massachusetts 124 6.55 1.89
Michigan 273 9.88 2.76
Minnesota 148 5.3 2.79
Mississippi 26 2.97 0.88
Missouri 146 5.99 2.44
Montana 11 0.99 1.11
Nebraska 20 1.83 1.10
Nevada 17 2.7 0.63
New Hampshire 36 1.32 2.73
New Jersey 32 8.79 0.36
New Mexico 18 2.06 0.87
New York 101 19.38 0.52
North Carolina 232 9.54 2.43
North Dakota 9 0.67 1.34
Ohio 157 11.54 1.36

Before you comment:

To understand how Infinite Discs has come to conclusions in this article, please read our State of Disc Golf 2015: Introduction post. After you understand the statistics and methodology of the survey, feel free to post.

State of Disc Golf 2015: Manufacturer Overview

Before you read:

To understand how Infinite Discs has come to conclusions in this article, please read our State of Disc Golf 2015: Introduction post.

Which brand is the favorite in 2014?

Innova ran away with the title of most popular brand again in 2014. While that fact may not be surprising, what stands out is the amount of increase in popularity from 2013 to 2014. This year, nearly half of all respondents chose Innova as their favorite brand of disc (48%). According to last year’s survey, 38% of disc golfers chose Innova as the favorite brand. That is a sizable increase in one year.

[one_half]Coming in second place  is Discraft at 12%. That percentage is down slightly from 2013. Third place belonged to Latitude 64 with 10% of respondents listing them as the favorite. Dynamic Discs came in next at 6%, followed by MVP and Prodigy, with 5% each. The top six manufacturers stayed in the same order from 2013, with their percentages changing only slightly.

It isn’t surprising that Innova remains at the top of the disc golf world. They have a long, thriving history, the largest selection of models and plastics, they are made in America, and they sponsor three-time World Champion Paul McBeth. They are an established institution in disc golf.

Because of its dominance, Innova is also sold in department and sporting goods stores, in addition to specialty disc golf shops. For that reason, many respondents are only familiar with Innova.

2014 Survey Change

Last year, in many of the survey questions, several brands were combined and listed as a single manufacturer. For example, Latitude 64 manufactures Dynamic Discs and Westside (also known as Trilogy). This year, “Trilogy” brands had 19% of this pie.

Likewise, MVP and Axiom are made by MVP and 6% of the pie.

This year, and in future surveys, each individual brand will be considered separately so its changes are clearer from year to year. In this summary, we will mention the combined statistics for comparison.

Brand Loyalty

Only 6% of disc golfers are so loyal that they will only throw discs from one manufacturer. Most respondents choose from a variety of brands. That’s important because it says that even though people have their favorite brand, they are willing to try different ones. Of the 6% who only throw one brand, 61% of them chose Innova, while Prodigy and Discraft loyalists represented 14% each. Vibram came in at 3%, Legacy just over 1%, and all other brands less than 1%.

Not surprisingly, when asked if you HAD TO throw only one brand, which you would choose, the results were nearly exactly the same as the favorite brands. Only a percentage point at most separated this category from the favorites. Last year Latitude 64 was selected by 20% of the respondents, but included Westside and Dynamic Discs brands. This year, adding the numbers from those three brands, we get 21%, which is nearly identical.

What does the future hold?

While Innova remains the undisputed king of disc golf, several smaller brands are releasing popular discs and working hard to claim their share of the market. That is good, because competition among manufacturers is healthy for the sport. Several statistics indicate that smaller companies are making headway.

Most Anticipated Releases

To start with, in addition to the fact that most respondents throw several brands of discs, the survey also indicates that they like to know what discs will be released from many different manufacturers. Which brand’s releases are people looking forward to the most?

Innova still leads at 33%. After them is Latitude 64 at 11%. Dynamic Discs was the third most anticipated brand with 10%, followed by Discraft, MVP, and Prodigy with 9%, 8%, and 7% respectively. Westside rounds out the top seven with 5%. Even though 48% of disc golfers chose Innova as their favorite disc company, only 33% anticipate its releases more than other brands.

Last year, Innova received only 16% of the votes, showing a major increase this year. On the contrary, MVP was the most anticipated in 2013 and has dropped off significantly. At the time of this survey in 2013, MVP had just announced the Axiom brand (which is now its own option in this survey), and rumors of their distance drivers were on the horizon.

When we combine the Trilogy numbers for this year, we get a total of 26%, which is up quite a bit from last year’s 18%. Innova’s and the Trilogy’s increases came at the expense of MVP and Prodigy, who decreased 12% and 7% respectively. Discraft’s anticipated releases raised slightly, from 8% to 9%.

Most Innovative Brand

When it comes to innovation, the race is a little tighter among manufacturers. Innova is perceived to be the most innovative company, and garnered 27% of the votes, up from last year’s 17%. MVP was not far behind this year with 19% of respondents.  That is a decrease from 38% last year. Latitude 64 was next with 12%, followed by Dynamic Discs and Prodigy at 9% each. Vibram, the only company making discs out of a different material, carried 7% of the votes. Discraft sat at 5%. Comparing Trilogy brands to last year shows an increase from 11% to 21%, which puts them in second place.

While some brands have taken strides in innovation, we feel that a few have accomplishments worth emphasizing:

Trilogy Brands

In 2014, the efforts put in collectively by Trilogy brands have been amazing and they receive our vote as the most innovative. They have diversified their product lineup, popularized the Missilen, which has divots in the plastic for increased aerodynamic properties, and have launched a new blend of plastic which is durable, transparent, flexible, and grippy. But, outside of the product line itself, Dynamic Discs has raised the bar in marketing and creating a premium identity within the industry. Singling out Dynamic Discs within the Trilogy category, they have launched an app specifically for their home National Tour tournament, the Glass Blown Open (which is already sold out at 900 competitors), they have created beautiful short video teasers for new releases, and they sponsor weekly podcasts (which is not new this year). In the end, hats off to Dynamic Discs for their all around efforts to innovate, not just in plastic, but in overall growth for disc golf.

MVP

For how small and young MVP is, they garner many votes in this category. MVP has the best overmold in disc golf. Because it is so unique, it will always stand out as innovative, even if it was introduced long ago. That’s not to say MVP was not innovative in 2014. This year MVP introduced the only overmold discs to ever see the fairway, and they have expanded their product lineup to bring brilliant colors. It’s clear that with MVP their mantra is “If you are going to do something, do it well”. We sometimes consider MVP the “Apple” of disc golf.

Prodigy

In 2013, Prodigy faired well with the amount of new releases, unique plastic blends, and “easy release technology” (which we don’t hear about often anymore). In 2014, Prodigy introduced a new basket with inner horizontal chains which make a chain-out impossible when you hit the target zone. It will be interesting to see how this innovation affects the sport moving forward.

Innova

Innova does something new on an annual basis. In 2013 they began production of overmold discs. In 2014 they created GStar plastic and released it in several popular molds. GStar is a unique blend which is opaque, flexible, durable, grippy, and attractive.

Largest Impact on Disc Golf

The survey also sought to find out which company had the largest impact on disc golf in 2014. The top vote recipient was Innova, who edged out Prodigy, 26% to 22%. Dynamic Discs received 17% of the votes, Latitude 64 got 8%. Discraft and MVP rounded out the list of companies making the largest impact, with 6% and 5% respectively. Innova and Prodigy sponsor a majority of the most widely recognized and skilled disc golfers in the world. That exposure undoubtedly contributed to the high numbers for those manufacturers in this category.

In addition, Innova’s impact on disc golf for simply being in so many stores cannot be measured. How often are players introduced to disc golf while browsing for discs at Hastings? Even Innova may have a hard time calculating that number. Because of the availability of Innova product, more people become attached to disc golf.

Last year Prodigy was voted as the top company to impact disc golf with 40% of respondents. Innova was a distant second with 16%. MVP held a larger share than this year, sitting at 12%. Latitude 64 took fourth with 11%, compared with this year’s combined Trilogy result of 27%.

Best Reputation in Disc Golf

Which disc golf brand has the best reputation? In the most lopsided category, Innova crushed the competition with 58% of the votes. The next closest was Discraft at a distant 12%. Dynamic Discs had 8%, and Latitude 64 had 7%. MVP and Prodigy tied at 4%. That says a lot about Innova when people who throw other brands still respect them.

Last year Innova also led the category with 51% choosing them. Discraft took second last year with 16%. Latitude 64 and MVP rounded out the top four with 11% and 7%. The Trilogy result for this year is 16%, which is still significantly behind the leader, Innova.

Summary

Innova dominates the disc golf world, but certainly has a lot of competitors hungry for a bigger slice of that growing pie. What would it take to unseat the giant? Major breakthroughs are rare in disc golf. True, discs come along that certainly make waves, but what new development will occur that might allow one of the smaller manufacturers to become the new number one? Maybe a new plastic type? Or new material altogether?  It’s more likely that smaller brands will just need to expand their lines to offer a bigger variety of speed and flight characteristics. And, just keep getting their name out there. Sponsoring disc golfers, sponsoring major tournaments, and offering specialty tournaments might turn the tide for Innova’s competitors. Perhaps smaller companies might focus on introducing new players to the sport. That would grow the sport, the customer base, and possibly create lifelong, dedicated fans of their brand.

Thanks to all of you who took the time to share a little part of your disc golf world. The results will be posted in periodic blogs at InfiniteDiscs.com, each blog covering different aspects of the survey.  If you would like to be alerted to new posts, scroll down to join the Infinite Discs mailing list.

In coming articles we will explore more nuances of respondent’s choices for tops brands. We will examine who the typical disc golfers is, and how that affects which brands they prefer. We will also look at who is switching brands and which companies they are moving to and from.

State of Disc Golf 2015: Introduction

Overview

Between December 5th and December 15th, 2014, exactly 5,038 participants completed “The State of Disc Golf: 2015 Survey.” The survey can be summarized as an accurate representation of self-selecting disc golfers.

Accuracy

It is impossible to know how many disc golfers there are in the world right now. A larger survey of random Americans would be necessary to determine the approximate number.

If we assume that there are 1,000,000 disc golfers, this survey has, with 99% confidence, a margin of error of +/- 1.81%. We can also say with 95% confidence, that there is a margin of error of +/- 1.38%. These numbers were found using a simple calculator here.

Methodology

This survey was first published and announced on December 5th by Infinite Discs. It was then posted on Facebook and Twitter by Infinite Discs. After the initial announcement, it was picked up by others and posted and shared in many social outlets, such as Reddit. This survey was also published on the PDGA Facebook page and was e-mailed by the PDGA to those who are included in the PDGA mailing list.

This survey is not truly scientific, as participants were self-selecting. It was published that the survey was just over 10 minutes in length, and $1,305 in prize merchandise would be awarded to random participants.

One may argue that casual disc golfers are not enticed by the prizes, and would therefore not elect to participate in the survey. Therefore, those who participated in the survey may generally be more passionate about the sport. This survey is not a sample of the average American. It is instead a sample of the disc golfer who is involved in the sport to a degree that they would have heard about the survey through any of the means mentioned above.

Sponsors

These sponsors donated prior to the survey closing, but were not announced until after.

  • MVP – $180 in discs
  • Dynamic Discs – $355 in merchandise
  • Prodigy – $220 in discs
  • Aerobie – $150 in discs
  • Vibram – $100 in discs
  • Infinite Discs – $50 in gift cards
  • PDGA – $160 in memberships
  • Innova – $90 in discs

Avoiding Bias

We felt very strongly about avoiding bias in this survey. Through e-mail we discouraged all parties who may be interested in obtaining favorable results from advertising or promoting this survey. We informed manufacturers that if they did promote the survey, they may be accused of obtaining bias results. As far as we are aware, no manufacturer promoted this survey.

We also encouraged manufacturers to donate to this survey, to entice respondents to complete the survey. Manufacturers who donated are listed above. Each of these manufacturers and donors understood that they would be listed as a survey sponsor after the survey had closed.

Fans of certain brands, who are bias, shared this survey. Therefore, this survey includes results from bias individuals and groups. This is fine, as the State of Disc Golf finds the bias of fans equally important; we simply did not want fan bias to be unfairly and heavily weighted from promotion of the manufacturer which they admire.

Publication Schedule

We anticipate to have our series of articles published before the end of March, 2015.

Thank You!

The results of this survey are immensely beneficial to disc golf. A survey of this scale allows us, and you, to do more for disc golf. We encourage you to use the data you find in this survey to promote disc golf courses, and to persuade city officials how beneficial this sport can be in your area. We would love to hear about how you use the data.

Welcome Feedback

If you have any questions regarding the survey, please comment below. You may also e-mail support@infinitediscs.com with any feedback.

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