Introduction
The aim of this presentation is to analyse consumers’ buying behaviour regarding golf clubs by evaluating in greater depth their personality and its impact on their purchase decision. As marketing consultants, we conducted a research in the golf industry choosing six representative brands as following: Titleist, Callaway, TaylorMade, Nike, Adidas and Bridgestone. By evaluating these companies, we gained an insight into customers’ attitudes when a golf club is purchased being able to make recommendations for the selected brand in order to improve their marketing strategy.

Defining the concept
Gordon Allport - one of the most important figures in psychology and distinguished as the father of personality – defines personality as "a dynamic organisation, inside the person, of psychophysical systems that create the person's characteristic pattern of behaviour, thoughts and feelings.” (Louise Deacon, 2013, p75)
Personality and personality traits
The concept of personality trait is almost as old as the language we speak. It is rooted in Ancient Greek, when Aristotel emphasized vanity, humility or selfishness as temperaments which directly influence people moral or imoral behavior. Nowadays, two key assumptions regarding personality traits should be said:
1. Traits are stable over the time. Obviously, as human beings we might have different reactions in relation to the given circumstances, but it will always be a core of consistency in our beliefs, attitudes and actions.
2. It is normally belived traits directly affect people’ behavior (Matthews et al., 2009)
Analysing these two characteristics, it is clear why companies are mainly focused on their brand image and positioning implicitly the way they are perceived by the audience. By using various marketing tools (the multiple-trait approach – combinations of traits are examined and the total effect of the collection of traits is considered - tends to more efficient to predict individual behavior than other methods) organisations are able to target the consumers, to properly segment them concerning their personality and finally to predict their buying behavior.

Market Sector Evaluation
Golf has been dramatically developed around the world over the past twenty years. Research shows there are over 30,000 golf courses and more than 50 million golf players globally. Although at the moment the United States is the largest golf market in terms of supply and demand, the game originates from Europe and it still has a noticeable presence there. (Sartori & Oakley, 2011).
The golf industry is competitive throughout the world, thus the companies are encountering fierce competition which can affect their profits. In order to maintain their market share and revenues, they are investing into their brand image, a vital tool through which a company can communicate trust, value, innovativeness, motivation or lifestyle. Hence, a recent study conducted in 2007 confirms that golfers have a positive brand’s devotion showing strong brand preferences. They identify themselves with the product, namely the golf equipment which implicitly encourages a status symbol (Shun Chiu et al., 2011).
Thus, the top 3 golf brands occupy over 60% of global market share (Shun Chiu et al., 2011): Callaway, Taylor Made, Titleist have 25.2%, 19.2%, 18.9%, while the other 40% incorporates companies such as: Nike, Adidas, Bridgestone which they will be further evaluated in this assignment.

The six main brands in the golf industry 1. Titleist It is the number one brand in golf

Source: Titleist Report, 2012
Titleist is a high-end brand targeting consumers whose desire for good quality products exceeds the high price (Titleist Report, 2012). When a young consumer purchases their own set of clubs, they will not buy top of the line clubs right away. They will either borrow clubs from a peer or purchase a cost-effective brand. Thus, due to its products’ quality, Titleist is