Hosel, a golf technology startup focused on the resale market for clubs and equipment, has raised £500,000 in a pre-seed round led by Ascension VC. The platform aggregates listings of pre-owned golf clubs, equipment and accessories from trusted sellers, allowing golfers to compare prices, buy with authenticity guarantees and trade in clubs through a single searchable marketplace.
The business is targeting a global second-hand golf equipment market valued at $3 billion. Demand for “nearly new” clubs is increasing as resale becomes a core part of retail, but the market remains dominated by non-specialist platforms such as eBay and characterised by issues around pricing, product quality and counterfeit goods. Hosel aims to modernise the resale market by improving pricing transparency, authentication, fulfilment and customer experience.
Launching in the United Kingdom, where there are estimated to be around 5 million golfers, Hosel plans to target the United States as its major future market, which has almost 30 million golfers. The investment will support development of the platform, with a further institutional round and US expansion planned later this year.
Hosel is led by co-founder and CEO Andrew McGinley and co-founder and CTO Charles Harley. McGinley previously founded, scaled and exited care marketplace Care Sourcer and later supported founders across the Scottish tech ecosystem as an Entrepreneur in Residence at CodeBase. Harley previously contributed to app development at Skyscanner and FanDuel before joining FanDuel after its acquisition, and later worked alongside McGinley at Care Sourcer.
Golf is an amazing game, but one of the greatest barriers is cost. Whether you’re building your first bag, upgrading your driver, or trading clubs you no longer use, everyone should be able to access the game at a fair price. Essentially, Hosel is about bringing trust and price transparency to golf resale, which is seriously lacking as things stand. Second-hand golf shouldn’t feel like the Wild West, and by aggregating trusted sellers Hosel is going to be much better for golfers and the overall long-term health of the game.
Hosel sits at the intersection of two powerful trends: the structural growth of golf participation and the mainstream shift towards recommerce. As avid golfers who experienced the status quo - fragmented sellers, price opacity and a poor customer experience - Andrew and Charles decided to build the infrastructure required to capitalise on this £2 billion plus market opportunity. We’re excited to back them early in what we believe is the Vinted for golf.
