Golf Question of the Week: Does Natalie Gulbis Need An Image Makeover?
http://www.worldgolf.com/cgi-bin/common_cgi/p.php?a=si&p=11549It’s either long overdue, or needlessly messing with a good thing.
A Richmond, Va. branding agency has been given the task of rebranding the LPGA tour’s biggest sex symbol, Natalie Gulbis. Our Golf Question of the Week to you, Beach Bloggers, is simple:
Does she need it?
Goodbye, pin-up pictures and hello, “game face.” That’s the essential marching order for Circle S Studios – and blasphemy to the eyes of the red-blooded male golfer who’s long preferred Gulbis’ provocative calendars above his desk to posters of, say, Tim “Lumpy” Herron.
"With the original stuff, she was in a beautiful bathing suit, tights and things and that certainly got the attention of a lot of people," said Circle S President and Managing Partner Susan Hogg to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. "But we're trying to scoot it more to who she is and where she wants to take [her career and name] … and being a role model, specifically to young girls and women in general. That's the brand we're trying to portray."
Seems Circle S is determined to do everything in its power to obliterate any remaining notion of Gulbis being the “Anna Kournikova of the LPGA Tour.” Of course, that thought should have disappeared earlier this year when Gulbis earned her first LPGA Tour victory at the Evian Masters in France – as plain a sign as any that, aside from her good looks, the 24-year-old Gulbis has a bright future that will go as far as her talent will take her.
Just don’t tell longtime LPGA Tour veteran Jan Stephenson that talent alone effectively sells women’s golf. Stephenson’s no stranger to provocative poses that have gotten her more public attention and notoriety than a career that has earned 16 LPGA event victories. Her mantra, as expressed in this now-infamous, recent Golf Magazine interview:
Sex sells.
“We have to promote sex appeal. It's a fact of life,” explained Stephenson, in reference to the LPGA’s marketing efforts. “The people who watch are predominantly male, and they won't keep watching if the girls aren't beautiful.”
Your turn to weigh in, Beach Bloggers. Do you think you’ll like the “new” Natalie Gulbis?
A makeover? NOW . . Let’s play golf . . . not calendars, skimpy outfits, etc. That’s available everywhere. Let’s see what she can do on the golf course, again. Jan Stephenson was a great LPGA golfer, and, at the time, THE "Looker" on tour. And at my age, she is still a "Looker".