Rally For The Cure(R) Partners With Golf Digest Planner to Help Promote Breast Cancer Awareness

FARMINGTON, Mich., Jan. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- The Rally for the Cure(R), in partnership with Susan G. Komen for the Cure, a golf-based initiative dedicated to helping eradicate breast cancer as a life-threatening disease and the J. Ryder Group, developer of the GolfDigestPlanner.com, the world's first comprehensive golf-planning web site, have signed an agreement to promote a tournament planner and sell branded merchandise to more than 3,300 Rally for the Cure(R) event organizers and participants.

Rally for the Cure(R) (http://www.rallyforthecure.com) event organizers and participants will be able to order branded merchandise at a new online store, http://www.rallyforthecure.com/pinkshop, operated by J. Ryder Group. The store features golf event related products with a pink theme. Each item can be branded with the Rally for the Cure(R) logo along with the event and sponsor names, in an effort to expand awareness for the initiative.

"This is a tremendous opportunity to help Rally for the Cure(R) achieve their goal of delivering the message of breast cancer awareness to women through golf," said James Ryder, president of the J. Ryder Group.

"Our event organizers and participants consistently ask us for branded merchandise to show their support of breast cancer awareness at Rally for the Cure(R) events," said Cate Campbell, operations manager of the Rally for the Cure(R). "We are impressed with the J. Ryder Group's capabilities and product selection. Their Golf Digest Planner is the perfect tool for event organizers as well, and they will help us introduce our program to thousands of new events."

The J. Ryder Group will also provide an option for golf event organizers using the Golf Digest Planner to incorporate a Rally for the Cure(R) event into their golf event.

In the Rally for the Cure(R) program, participants pay a $20 entry fee, automatically entering them in a closest-to-the-pin contest at the club's designated par-3 hole. Rally awards the winner of each closest-to-the-pin contest a significant golf prize. Most importantly, all participants receive detailed breast cancer awareness materials from Susan G. Komen for the Cure, as well as a pin -- designed exclusively for Rally for the Cure(R) -- featuring the symbolic pink ribbon wrapped around a golf club. All participants are entitled to a one-year subscription to a Conde Nast publication with their entry fee.

This summer, J. Ryder Group and Golf Digest introduced the first comprehensive golf tournament planning Web site to assist tournament organizers of the 1.2 million non-competitive golf events played in the United States each year.

The free Golf Digest Tournament Planner, found at http://www.golfdigestplanner.com, is anchored by a six-minute planning "Wizard" designed to assist in planning every aspect of any golf event -- including locating a tournament host course, accepting registration and payment, and picking hole-in-one and million-dollar-shot contests.

GolfDigestPlanner.com was created after exhaustive research into the tournament organization world. Ryder spent two years conducting focus groups with executive directors of non-profits, corporate planners, PGA of America members and association executives to help design the Wizard's areas of focus and capabilities. Essentially, this site is a free do-it-yourself version of hiring a collaboration of the world's most experienced tournament organizers. Events can take anywhere from 250-400 hours to plan. With this system, initial tournament setup can be done in minutes.

The Wizard, which takes approximately six minutes to complete, walks the user through the process, starting with event registration and host course information. The Wizard then provides a template for sponsorship packages and suggestions for sponsored contests and even the percentage of successful tournaments that use each type of contest. The same information is also provided for the "Set Up My Tournament Experience" section, which provides suggestions of whether to give player gifts, have a long-drive contest, mulligans, raffles and auctions, etc. The Golf Digest Tournament Planner then sets up a task list for tournament organizers to follow leading up to the tournament, even sending reminder e-mails as dictated by the organizer, so the organizer has online guidance every step of the way.

The system also has more than 20 standard e-mail marketing templates for soliciting sponsors and players, confirming registration and communicating with volunteers. These e-mail templates run on "auto pilot," gathering player information including foursome names, sponsor logos, auction items, providing thank you notes, etc. without the organizers' follow up.

The site also saves a planner's information from year to year, so in the event of an organizer turnover, as many events are put together by a different volunteer each year, the new organizer has a record of everything done the previous year, including player and sponsor information. The application can also "push" key information to the course professional so they can prepare for the event. This includes registration counts, pairing sheets and the event day agenda. Organizers also have a personal "logo vault" on the application to store their tournament logo and all their sponsor logos for sign, banners and promotional materials.

For more information or to explore the seemingly endless guidance GolfDigestPlanner.com can give any tournament organizer, log on to http://www.golfdigestplanner.com.

About the J. Ryder Group

The J. Ryder Group has been actively involved in the golf tournament business since 1998. The firm has managed or provided services to more than 10,000 golf tournaments and recently announced a golf tournament planner in partnership with Golf Digest (http://www.GolfDigestPlanner.com). The J. Ryder Group was the executive director for the Arnold Palmer Turning Point Invitational, which celebrated Arnold Palmer's 50th Anniversary of his U.S. Amateur Championship. The Arnold Palmer Turning Point Invitational raised $6.3 million. "This is the most incredible event I have ever been involved in more than 60 years of golf, and I have been involved in a lot of them over the years," Palmer said. The Ryder Group developed a highly desirable and first of its kind online hole-in-one prize package ordering and fulfillment system. The Ryder Group holds contractual relationships for the online hole-in-one prize package program with Ford, Chrysler, Lincoln, Jeep, Mercury, Dodge, Jaguar, Land Rover, Volvo and Mazda.

About Rally for the Cure(R)

Rally for the Cure(R), in partnership with Susan G. Komen for the Cure, is a grassroots golf program dedicated to spreading awareness in the fight to eradicate breast cancer as a life-threatening disease. Rally brings the breast cancer awareness message to women golfers, and its events provide the platform for special fundraising opportunities for Komen for the Cure. Participants pay a $20 entry fee, automatically entering them in a closest-to-the-pin contest at your club's designated par-3 hole. The $20 entry fee is for U.S. events only; the entry fee in Canada is $32 U.S. dollars. Rally will award the winner of each closest-to-the-pin contest a significant golf prize, such as a golf club or a gift certificate for a pair of golf shoes. Most importantly, all participants receive detailed breast cancer awareness materials from Komen for the Cure, as well as a pin -- designed exclusively for Rally for the Cure(R) -- featuring the symbolic pink ribbon wrapped around a golf club. All participants are entitled to a one-year subscription to a Conde Nast publication with their entry fee.

Each step of the Rally program enforces the awareness and early detection messages that save lives.