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“The ceiling was so low, it was a bit of a bang-your-fist job and say, ‘Can I grab another coffee down here?'” Frankie said.<\/p>\n
The idea took shape in Melbourne around 2013 and 2014 when Frankie was working as a booking agent for Mushroom and sneaking out to hit balls at Albert Park during lunch breaks.<\/p>\n
“I think it was 20 bucks for a bucket of balls and a beer,” he said.<\/p>\n
He’d walk in wearing black jeans and a Guns N’ Roses shirt, surrounded by players in crisp polos and tucked-in chinos.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n “We’d walk in and feel totally out of place,” he said.<\/p>\n “But we’d still hit good balls and have fun, so I thought, why isn’t there golf gear for people like us? For the rest of us who just love the game.”<\/p>\n The first drop was 10 hats.<\/p>\n The couple moved home to Byron and started building the label, picking the brains of other successful local brands and firing up the brand’s Instagram account around 2016 and 2017.<\/p>\n “Honestly, we thought it’d just be our mates buying it,” Frankie said.<\/p>\n “But people overseas got it straight away. That blend of surf culture and golf really resonated.”<\/p>\n Within months, Birds of Condor was shipping to South Korea, Japan and the United States.<\/p>\n Frankie grew up surfing in Byron, competing and chasing waves three times a day.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Golf was what he and his mates did when the waves were flat.<\/p>\n As a kid, he and his mates jumped the Byron Bay Golf Club fences to fish balls out of the water, wetsuits still on, and came home with ear infections to prove it.<\/p>\n “Everything we do circles back to golf,” Frankie said.<\/p>\n “But it might start with a song, a surf vibe or something from pop culture. That mix is what makes it us.”<\/p>\n When Birds of Condor started out, golf fashion was stiff and predictable \u2013 all tucked-in polos and matching belts.<\/p>\n The culture hadn’t caught up with the idea that golf could be relaxed and expressive.<\/p>\n “We copped a few raised eyebrows and online digs early on,” Frankie said. “People didn’t quite get it at first.”<\/p>\n Before COVID, the family spent three straight years showing at the PGA Show in Orlando.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The first year, a couple in matching gear stopped at their booth, pointed and laughed.<\/p>\n “I remember thinking, wow, this could be a really tough trade show,” Frankie said.<\/p>\n By the end of the week, people were lining up.<\/p>\n “People were excited to see something new coming into golf,” he said.<\/p>\n The name and logo came after a long search.<\/p>\n A condor is a hole-in-one on a par five, also called a triple eagle, which is why the logo stacks three W-shaped eagles.<\/p>\n “We wanted something that didn’t hit you straight away,” Frankie said.<\/p>\n “Birds of Condor felt a bit mysterious, and it captured that feeling of magic on the course when everything stands still and you’re high-fiving your mates after rolling in a putt.”<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/static.timesnewsgroup.com.au\/prod\/uploads\/sites\/29\/2025\/10\/birds-of-condor-lawn_67633.jpg\")
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