How a 5-Year-Old, Black-Owned Golf Brand Teamed Up With Nike

Five years ago, Eastside Golf started with just a logo: a sketch of one of its co-founders, former pro golfer Olajuwon Ajanaku, clad in a sweatshirt, gold chain, and blue jeans mid-swing. Now, the streetwear-infused golf apparel brand is sharing real estate with one of the most iconic corporate logos of all time: the swoosh. 

The New York City-based company has teamed up with Nike to debut its first pairs of performance sneakers for on and off the putting green. The product launch, which includes both a hybrid non-spiked golf shoe and a spiked one, is part of Eastside Golf’s “everyone’s game” collection, which aims to popularize the majority White sport among young people and diverse communities. In a design nod to that mission, the shoes have interchangeable swooshes in colorways for Historically Black Colleges and Universities, including Spelman College and Morehouse College, where Eastside Golf co-founders Olajuwon Ajanaku and Earl Cooper met on the school’s golf team. 

“We want people to see themselves in the game. We’re blazing a path that’s never been done before, and it’s not easy,” Cooper tells Inc. in an exclusive interview.” The co-founder started playing golf at age 6 and, at Morehouse, won a Division II national championship with Ajanaku in 2010. “I think that’s also why these brands have partnered with us — because we are so uniquely qualified for the moment.”

For Eastside Golf, that moment started back in the summer of 2020. Barely a year after the business launched, the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin prompted a nationwide outcry and protests for racial justice. Two months later, in August, a White police officer shot Jacob Blake, a Black man, outside his home in Kenosha, Wisconsin, leaving him partially paralyzed. In response, players from six NBA teams decided to boycott their playoff games on August 26, which set off a ripple effect across the entire professional sports world. The night of the boycott, 12-time NBA all-star Chris Paul, then the president of the NBA Players Association, was clad in head-to-toe Eastside Golf attire. 

“It just went absolutely viral,” recalls Cooper, who says the outfit was not a planned promotion. “He kind of broke us into the mainstream.”

Eastside Golf’s co-founders seized that spotlight and channeled it into a long-term vision. The brand took new customers — who discovered it through social media and celebrities Jayston Tatum, Shonda Rimes, and former president Barack Obama — and turned them into loyal fans, about 40 percent of whom make repeat purchases. The startup posted 600 percent year-over-year growth over the past two years, enough to catch the attention of investors. In January, the company raised a $3.4 million seed round led by EP Golf Ventures and that included Chris Paul and former MLB pitcher CC Sabathia.

With that dose of capital, the company has been able to hire industry veterans and sustain its rapid pace. Sales have already more than doubled since last year. About 80 percent of purchases are made direct-to-consumer, but the brand, which is already on the shelves of more than 80 sporting goods stores and golf club shops across the country and the U.K., is looking to up its wholesale presence with an expansion into Nordstrom and airports. Eastside Golf is also testing the waters for its own brick-and-mortar store with a Shopify pop-up event this month in the SoHo neighborhood of New York City. The company declined to provide specific revenue figures, but Cooper says it’s approaching eight figures for 2024. 

That trajectory is reflective of the co-founders’ ambition. As much as the two entrepreneurs value their corporate mission and philanthropic efforts, including giving more than $250,000 to the Morehouse golf program that brought them together, they make no qualms about it. This is not a feel-good nonprofit. This is a business addressing an underserved market. 

“We don’t want to be known as this small, Black, minority business. We want to be known as a household fashion brand,” says Cooper. “Competing at that next level is what we want to do.”

Eastside Golf has raised its profile in part by collaborating with larger corporations like Nike, Jordan Brands, and Mercedes-Benz. “You always need a champion,” says Cooper, who advises other early-stage entrepreneurs to take their time building these relationships. Start from a place of authenticity, and be selective. Then employ a long-term, comprehensive approach. “Once we partner with you, it’s like your family,” he says. 

For Nike, this is not a one-off product drop. The powerhouse athletic brand, along with Mercedes-Benz, is also helping Eastside Golf to show off its new shoes on the course by sponsoring its second annual invitational golf tournament later this month at the Jersey City, New Jersey-based Liberty National Club, which has hosted PGA and LPGA tour events. 

As impressive as their scorecard looks five years into the business, the co-founders — like any golfer — know how difficult each round can be. Holes in one are few and far between. “It’s a competitive landscape,” he says. “People can wear anything they want. To decide to put on something Eastside Golf …. man, it just means the world, and it never gets old.”

Corrections and amplifications: An earlier version of this story misstated the age of Eastside Golf. It is five years old.