PGA Tour Caddies File Class-Action Suit Against PGA Tour
/Thanks to reader Mike Z. for Darren Heitner's story on Forbes.com detailing the lawsuit filed against the PGA Tour seeking "relief" from a U.S. District Court.
The prime issue: advertising on caddie bibs.
The crux of the complaint is that the PGA Tour has unlawfully forced professional golf caddies to wear bibs bearing the logos of the PGA Tour’s sponsors. The caddies claim that the value of the bibs is approximately $50 million annually. Caddies receive none of that revenue. Importantly, the plaintiffs state that they never consented to the PGA Tour’s commercial use of their likenesses and images.
That will be a key point as the PGA Tour legal department is typically quite thorough on these matters. Why the caddy oversight?
As a sidebar, the complaint also claims that the PGA Tour has treated caddies as “second-class participants of the game” of golf. It details an incident during The Barclays golf tournament in 2013 when a rain delay caused caddies and their families to seek shelter. However, caddies’ wives and children were not allowed into the shelter designated for caddies despite ample space remaining therein.
The plaintiffs’ lawyers have informed me that they are filing a separate motion seeking an injunction against the PGA Tour from retaliation against caddies. According to the lawyers, threats have been made and/or implied that caddies who push the issue will lose their credentials.
Over at CBSSports.com, Dennis Dodd notes the location of the filing is no coincidence
The suit was filed Tuesday in the same United States Northern District Court of California that was home to the O'Bannon class-action suit vs. the NCAA involving college athletes.
Luke Kerr-Dineen has filed the entire document at GolfDigest.com.
**Steve DiMeglio in USA Today on the suit.
Ty Votaw, the Tour's chief marketing officer, said that in with respect to litigation, the Tour won't comment at this time.
"We're very disappointed that we've reached this point," Kenny Harms said while sitting in an executive boardroom at the Hilton La Jolla Torrey Pines that overlooks the home of the Farmers Insurance Open that starts Thursday.
Speaking to Harms, Stephanie Wei reports the acrimony started in earnest a year ago at Torrey Pines.
Harms, who serves on the board of the APTC, said he and other board members met with the Tour a year ago during the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines, and when the bib was brought up, Tour representatives specifically said it was “off limits.” The following month at the Valspar Championship in Tampa, Harms met with Andy Pazder, the Executive Vice President and Chief of Operations for the Tour, who reiterated that revenue from the bib was not on the table.
“One of the big problems with them having a bib on every single caddie is that it restricts our advertising or revenue for actually getting our own sponsors,” said Harms in a phone interview. “No one is going to pay a caddie to wear a sponsor if the bib is going to be over the top of it. Second of all, that bib is ours. It’s on our body. There is no other group of people in the U.S. where you are creating revenue and not getting paid for it.”
