By David Droschak
“North Carolina’s No. 1 Source for Golf News” is entering a new era.
Triad Golf Today, closing in on three decades of providing the state’s golf enthusiasts with provocative features on course design and equipment, travel trends, golf professional profiles, junior and college golf coverage, opinion columns and so much more will now be producing an online-only product.
Triad Golf Today had been in both print and online for 28 consecutive years prior to this year. It followed the lead of sister publication, Triangle Golf Today, which successfully headed solely into the digital market place in 2021 after being in print for 21 years.
“I never envisioned the growth and success we’ve had with our publications,” said longtime Triad Golf Today and Triangle Golf Today publisher Jay Allred. “It all began as a desire to have more local golf information readily available in our area. From Day One our emphasis has been on local golf news and getting it out to people — financial success was never a main goal. The biggest burden I have faced over the last few years wasn’t financial but the limitation on how much golf news we could get out to the community. At some point, you have to pivot and move in a new direction to ensure the future.”
“The COVID-19 pandemic produced a unique set of circumstances that forced most businesses to take a step back and analyze operations and costs, and we were no different,” added Triangle Golf Today and Triad Golf Today editor David Droschak. “It was clear to us that readership patterns changed over the last two years with golfers using more personal computers and cell phones to access their news rather than print products. So, it made perfect sense for Triad Golf Today and Triangle Golf Today to convert solely to a digital product.”
Readers will now be able to sign up online for enter-to-win golf contests, and receive email blasts, along with social media posts as editorial content and golf deals are posted on a regular basis.
“As we discard print and design deadlines, we’ll now be able to offer more flexible opportunities to our advertisers and more instantaneous golf cover to our loyal readers,” Droschak said. “After just one year of going exclusively online with Triangle Golf Today, we saw an 11 percent increase in online readership. We hope to keep increasing that trend in both products as golfers discover and get more comfortable with our new online-only option.”
Triad Golf Today and Triangle Golf Today are the longest running privately-owned golf publications in North Carolina history. Allred has been entrenched in the golf community outside of Winston-Salem for three decades as publisher of Triad Golf Today and Triangle Golf Today. In addition to those duties, Allred has won three state championships as head coach of the Reagan women’s golf team, and also works at The First Tee of Central Carolina.
Meanwhile, Droschak had a 20-year career with The Associated Press in Raleigh and was named 2003 NC Sportswriter of the Year before taking over as editor or Triangle Golf Today in 2005. He took over as editor of Triad Golf Today a few years later after the retirement of longtime editor Steve Williams.
“Our team is energized to head down this path of informing our readers with more content and faster delivery methods,” Allred said.
