For me, a final morphed thread word, brought to mind when I reflected on the original bit and Tom and Mark's comment:
What in Christ's name does Jack Nicklaus need with the horseshit puffery of brand, and venture? He is a paradigm of competitive sport, a decent and charitable man and already prevailed over a golf-based emeritus cottage industry...but wine, ice cream, shower sandals, and sunglasses? Why does he have to equate himself with Tommy Bahama too?
And what for? Would he be any less great, less feted, less rich or less charitable if this effort never existed? Would he have any more trouble getting a plane at private hangar, or any more able to take a multi-million dollar meeting, a $50,000 appearance, a big check to a hospital?
Doesn't he (and all of you perhaps agreeing) see this is as a diminishment of his substance...a diffusion that all makes him more disposable, like any other damn thing, rather than precious?
I comprehend the business marketing opinion that such venture(s) are a vital spirit which makes market economies run... forget the pie chart in this case... It makes Zeus into an undignified hawker of inventory with which he has only name association, which doesn't matter if it sells or not, like any another sandwich-board crier at the intersection.
When people of all stripes decry the loss of institution, I think they are well-served to look at the microclimates like this...Jack Nicklaus shower sandals indeed.
cheers vk