ClubstoHire.com landed a capital hat-trick when it opened in the Portuguese city of Lisbon on 1 April – the third capital city in which Paul McGinley’s golf club hire operation has launched a store.
The Lisbon launch takes the number of ClubstoHire outlets up to nine – following the recent announcement of an agent in the Isle of Man – and follows Edinburgh and Dublin as capital city destinations.
McGinley’s fellow ClubstoHire director, Tony Judge, said: “Lisbon airport serves around 13 million passengers per year and is the seventh-most-visited city in southern Europe, so it’s an ideal site at which to open our ninth outlet.
“It’s also the gateway to an outstanding golfing area, with 19 courses within a 45-minute drive from the airport, including Praia d’el Rey, Bom Sucesso, Oitavos Dunes and Penha Longa. So clearly a large number of golfers will be heading there.”
The decision to open further branches of ClubstoHire has been driven by outstanding results, with bookings for January 2012 up by 250 per cent on the same time last year.
Judge added: “We will continue to look for ideal venues to open stores as we realistically believe that we will double our turnover during 2012 and will save travelling golfers a staggering €1,000,000 on excess baggage charges during the calendar year.”
And golfers heading to the delightful and historic Isle of Man can now benefit from the service after it opened on the Crown Dependency.
Isle of Man Golf Tours, the island’s first dedicated tour operator, is acting as agent for ClubstoHire and will offer the same high-quality equipment and levels of service that have seen 25,000 customers use the service since it launched in Faro in July 2010.
There are nine golf courses on the Isle of Man including the renowned Castletown Links. The island is just 32 miles long and, at its widest point, 14 miles wide. It is equidistant from the mainland and Northern Ireland, and flights to the airport, near Castletown, come from the UK, Ireland, Switzerland, Italy, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Spain.
Isle of Man Golf Tours is an independent company owned by directors Ged Power and Martin Young, and the duo aim to ensure a golfing visit to the delightful island is enjoyable and stress-free.
Power said: “Golf is special here. We have a variety of stunning courses and they are all accessible and playable any day of the week – all year round. The courses are seldom full and we design itineraries that make you believe you have them to yourself – what we like to call ‘millionaire’s golf’.
“Increasing charges for airline carriage could easily prove prohibitive for travelling golfers but the service we can provide as an agent of ClubstoHire means a visit to the Isle of Man has never been so affordable or stress-free.”
Only recently, Ryanair increased its charges for golf bags to a minimum of £50 per flight, while, before the end of the last year, AirBerlin raised its golf bag carriage charge to €100 return. And, with the majority of European carriers now charging upwards of £60 return, hiring a set of high-end clubs from ClubstoHire makes enormous economic sense while also offering peace of mind.
A broad equipment range is offered from just €35 per week, with options available from TaylorMade (including the R11S driver and the new RocketBallz), Callaway, Wilson and MD Golf; all clubs are offered – left or right-handed, ladies and men’s – and hire is available from just one day to a full four weeks. For those wishing to travel extra-light, shoe hire is also available.
Bookings for Antalya, Alicante, Murcia, Dublin, Malaga, Edinburgh, the Isle of Man, Lisbon and Faro can be made online at www.clubstohire.com