Now There’s an Easy Way to Invest in Pro Golfers Before They Hit It Big
It’s hard to trace the emergence of personal financial backers in professional golf because they’ve been around for a long time. The cost of chasing a pro career is steep: Travel, hotels, equipment, caddies, food—the list goes on. To wholeheartedly pursue that dream, many players seek out cash to help them along the way.
Imagine: You’re an aspiring Tour pro, grinding at your home course. An eager member catches sight of your smooth move and strikes up a conversation. A few lunches later they offer to support your golf ambitions for a year. Or, better yet, they introduce you to a buddy who will make it three. You can finally quit the side-hustles that funded your golf and focus on the task at hand. Some players enter these types of agreements as budding professionals and find success. Others don’t have access or become overwhelmed by deals that are ambiguous, burdensome or a combination of both.
Enter Carry Golf. Founded in 2021 by Donnie Dotson—a former human intelligence agent turned Goldman Sachs manager—Carry allows fans to invest in an up-and-coming cohort of golfers. The company not only offers a potential return, but it also streamlines the fundraising process for players who have a real shot at successful careers.
“We are trying to provide a more credible, legitimate infrastructure for something that’s been going on forever,” Dotson says. “We want to be the fundraising facilitator on behalf of the players, so they can focus on their golf games, their practice, their tournaments and allow us to help take care of some of the contractual obligations and facilitate these different experiences.”
With as little as $250, participants can invest in Carry’s select group of 10 aspiring professional golfers locked in for 2023 and potentially make a return on their future success. Carry will provide those 10 golfers with $45,000 to $55,000 of funding for a year.
In return, those players will contribute 15% of their on-course earnings from golf tournaments with purses of at least $1.5 million. Purses of that size can be found on the PGA Tour, DP World Tour, LPGA Tour and sporadically on the Korn Ferry Tour and the Asian Tour. Although Carry cannot guarantee a return, at the end of each year the company will pay out annual “dividends” to fan investors.
Players who receive one season of financial support from the company will contribute 15% of their on-course earnings for four years. If a player receives two seasons of support, they will be required to contribute for seven years.
Here’s the list of 2023 Carry golfers:
Kristen Gillman, Epson Tour
Alana Uriell, Epson Tour
Brett White, Korn Ferry Tour
Chandler Blanchet, PGA Tour Latinoamerica
Graysen Huff, PGA Tour Latinoamerica
Hannah Gregg, Epson Tour
Quinn Riley, APGA
Kaitlin Milligan, Epson Tour
Tyler Collet, South Florida PGA Section
Sarah Rhee, Epson Tour
Gillman, a two-time U.S. women’s amateur champion, was taking substitute teaching jobs to fund her pro career before she joined Carry. Riley, who played college golf at Duke, recently played the PGA Tour’s Wells Fargo Championship on a sponsor’s invite, and Collet has twice qualified for the PGA Championship.
Carry’s new “one-click” investing infrastructure allows interested golf fans to invest in the careers of the above golfers in just a few minutes.
But the chance to turn a profit is just one of the many benefits that comes with Carry’s mission. Dotson designed the investment opportunity to expand far beyond such a possibility.
“I know there are people who are only interested if there is a greater guarantee of economic success, but, you know, the majority of people seem to be most interested in being along for the run,” Dotson says. “You are getting to be part of a very impressive group of athletes’ journeys as they advance from lower-level tours toward the PGA or LPGA tour. And depending on your contribution level, there’s a range of perks and experiences that come with it.”
Carry offers a slew of benefits to its “fan investors,” including inside access with the participating players. Investors are invited to develop relationships with the athletes, who will share observations from their weeks on tour and a behind-the-scenes look at the daily grind. High-level investors ($10,000 and above) will be invited to an end-of-season retreat at Streamsong Resort. All Carry members will have access to discount codes with partnering brands and opportunities to video chat with company ambassador and PGA Tour player Harry Higgs.
“What we really want to prove here is that there are a lot of fans out there who love the game, who want to be part of someone’s journey to the top and support them,” Dotson says. “You’ll get to know fellow golf obsessives at our events and you’ll get cool opportunities. And if the players go on to have success, you can have some skin in the game, too.”
Gregg, one of the 10 players for the 2023 investment period, used to utilize her large following on social media (133,000 on Instagram) to raise money for tournament entry fees. Last September she launched a GoFundMe page asking for contributions to fund her trip to Stage II of LPGA Qualifying School. After raising the funds, she secured Epson Tour status for the 2023 season via the tournament. Without the support, it would have been near impossible for her to even enter the qualifying series.
“It just left me kind of feeling indebted to people,” Gregg says of her own fundraising efforts. “One year I signed headshots and gave away gifts from my sponsors, but I wanted to do more. I could include them in my journey in some way so they could feel like they were part of the team. But it was just not possible when I first started. Because of that, Carry was very interesting to me, not only because of the platform, but also because it makes the players feel safe and secure.”
As a Carry signee, Gregg feels as though she can not only fully devote herself to her career, but she is also excited to help prove a larger point.
There’s a common saying in the golf community: “Good golf takes care of everything.” The line couldn’t be further from the truth, according to Gregg, and she believes Carry can help fans understand that reality.
“People think that if you play good enough golf, that success will just happen for you. That’s not the case in golf. Not only do you have to be good, you also have to have resources, the funding, the coaching. All of that costs so much, that even if you’re one of the best, you’re not guaranteed to make it,” Gregg says. “I would say that if people are worried about making a return on their investment—I don’t want to say that it’s a misrepresentation of the experience of Carry—but it’s not really the main goal. We want people to join and see our journeys. We’re in it for the next three to five years. It’s a slow burn, and you’re always hanging on, hoping that the opportunity comes so that you can take advantage of it.”