Three well-known executives of the golf business have teamed up to distribute a dollop of golf apparel brands around Europe. Called Premium Golf Brands (PGB), their Irish-based company has taken over rights in several European countries to brands such as Cutter & Buck and Fairway & Greene, and it is launching Calvin Klein Golf clothing under license across Europe.

PGB is a tie-up between Eurostyle, an existing Irish distribution company specializing in golf apparel, owned and managed by Alan Dwyer; Grahame Jenkins, managing director of Ashworth Europe until last summer; and Charlie Casson, men’s product manager at Ashworth until the end of last year. Jenkins is PGB’s chief executive, based in Belfast, while Casson is the sales manager, based in Manchester. Dwyer has become chairman of PGB, based in Cork, and he will take up an increasingly non-executive position, both at PGB and at Eurostyle, to focus on other business opportunities.

Eurostyle formerly held Europe-wide distribution rights for Cutter & Buck, but these were cut back to the UK, Ireland, Spain and Portugal as part of Cutter & Buck’s acquisition by New Wave of Sweden last year. The rights for these four countries have been transferred to PGB, while New Wave is studying different options for the rest of Europe.

On the other hand, PGB has inherited the right to distribute Green Lamb, the golf apparel brand owned by Eurostyle, throughout Europe. It also has the European rights for Pukka, a fast-growing American brand of golf headwear; Fairway & Greene, a high-end American brand of resort golf clothing; and Zero Restriction, a golf outerwear brand acquired last year by Summit Golf Brands, the U.S. company that already owned Fairway & Greene.

The contacts built up by Jenkins and Casson at Ashworth should be instrumental in building up a network of agents for all these brands and Calvin Klein Golf around Europe. Such a network has to be entirely constructed: even at the time when Eurostyle had European rights for Cutter & Buck, its sales for the brand outside the British Isles and Iberia were minimal. Through Jenkins and Casson, PGB is confident that it will have agents in place in France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and perhaps Sweden by this summer.

The Calvin Klein Golf range was introduced in the USA last year. It will be delivered to British and Irish stores over the next months. PGB was established at the beginning of 2008 in Cork, employing more than 50 people.