MA-based MacNeill Engineering Worldwide, which supplies
athletic shoe companies with cleats and spikes, "has for the
first time ventured into the noisy and expensive world of
sports marketing and endorsement" to back its new soft golf
spike, according to Andi Esposito of the Worcester TELEGRAM
& GAZETTE. While MacNeill produces 80% of the steel golf
spikes sold worldwide, currently more than 2,000 U.S. golf
courses ban metal spikes. So MacNeill has developed Tred
Lites, a soft thermoplastic polyurethane cleat. MacNeill
President Harris MacNeill "expects the company's manufacture
of soft golf spikes to exceed" manufacture of metal spikes
by early '98. MacNeill has also hired Matzell, Richard &
Watts, Boston, to create a series of ads for golf trade
publications, which "play on" the company's experience and
its "exclusive relationship" with two dozen golf shoe
makers. The company has also, for the first time, endorsed
a pro golfer by signing the LPGA's Rhonda Reilly to a one-
year Tred-Lites deal (Worcester TELEGRAM & GAZETTE, 7/21).
