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Tiger Woods has signed the first endorser for his burgeoning apparel company Sun Day Red, and there are plans to soon build out a full roster of professional players like top golf brands Callaway, Nike, and Adidas, among others, have.
The chosen one is Karl Vilips, a 23-year-old Australian rookie who will make his PGA Tour debut this week at the Mexico Open. Vilips is a former No. 1-ranked amateur player, like Woods once was, but their biggest connection comes from Stanford, where both played their college golf.
Sun Day Red launched last May, and Woods has been the only pro golfer to wear the brand at the highest level of professional golf (although Vilips was spotted wearing a Sun Day Red polo back in October). Woods split from Nike at the end of 2023 following a 27-year relationship.
The Tiger Effect
Vilips, currently ranked No. 253 in the world, earned his PGA Tour card by finishing No. 19 last season on the second-tier Korn Ferry Tour, making $340,000 and winning one tournament in Utah in August. He was born in Indonesia but grew up in Perth and moved to the U.S. when he was 11.
“He was perfect for the first, and as we expand, we’ll look for people like him, who have great stories,” Scott Frost, Sun Day Red’s head of marketing, tells Front Office Sports.
With Woods, 49, limited in his playing capacity, Sun Day Red is looking for younger golfers to represent the brand on golf’s biggest stages. “Not to say we won’t ever have other big names in the brand,” Frost says, “But for now, we want to build it from the ground up.”
Sun Day Red doesn’t have a specific number of golfers it would like to sponsor, but the company has “fielded a lot of calls” from agents and players inquiring about working together, Frost says. Expect Woods and Co. to remain patient in choosing their next player. “We’re not really going out and seeking folks,” Frost says. “I think we’re lucky to be in a situation where we can kind of hand-pick.”
Seeing Red
Sun Day Red has already beat its first-year revenue goals, Frost says, despite almost exclusively being a direct-to-consumer business. There are plans to sell Sun Day Red in high-end retail locations starting this summer.
In Sun Day Red’s young life, the brand has already dealt with multiple trademark disputes around its Tiger-like logo, including from fellow sports apparel company Puma, as well as Tigeraire, a company that makes cooling products for athletes.
Woods still has the trademark rights to his “TW” logo that was made famous during his Nike days, although the launch of Sun Day Red has distanced the golfer from that branding.
