Ask a DTC-curious golfer which iron brand to try first and you'll get one of three answers: Takomo, Sub 70, or Haywood. All three sell direct, all three skip the pro-shop markup, and all three have built genuine followings without a single tour endorsement contract. Past that, they're making different bets on what actually gets a golfer to switch away from a big-box OEM set.
Takomo: the YouTube-native option
Takomo Golf is built in Finland and owned in part by Grant Horvat and the Bryan Brothers — two of the biggest names in golf YouTube. That's not a marketing partnership bolted on after the fact; it's baked into the ownership structure, which is a genuinely unusual model for a club brand. Their hollow-body forged irons start around $450 a set, positioning them as the mid-price option in this comparison. If you already watch golf YouTube, you've almost certainly seen these clubs in a review before you ever saw them in an ad.
Sub 70: the full-bag value play
Sub 70 takes a different approach — instead of one hero product, they cover the entire bag: irons, wedges, hybrids and woods, all at mid-tier pricing, backed by a 60-day trial period that removes most of the risk of buying equipment sight-unseen. Their best-known story is that John Daly plays their clubs without any sponsorship arrangement, which has done more for their credibility than any ad campaign could. Sub 70 isn't chasing YouTube culture the way Takomo is — the pitch here is simpler: tour-adjacent construction, full-range coverage, and a trial period long enough to actually find out if the clubs suit you.
Haywood: built for players who already know what they want
Haywood Golf sits at the more serious end of the three. These are irons built for feel and playability rather than forgiveness — the kind of clubs aimed at a player who already knows their strike is consistent enough not to need help. Haywood is also the most structurally prepared for cross-border sales of the three: a dedicated UK/EU storefront fulfilled out of Northern Ireland, rather than a single global-shipping cart. If Takomo is the YouTube pick and Sub 70 is the full-bag value pick, Haywood is the pick for a lower-handicap player who wants tour-blade feel without the tour-blade price tag.
“Takomo sells a following. Sub 70 sells a full bag and a trial period. Haywood sells feel, to a player who already knows what feel means.”
So which one?
There's no single right answer, because the three brands aren't really competing on the same axis. If you're the kind of golfer who already has three tabs of golf YouTube open, Takomo's positioning will feel familiar and the ownership story adds a layer of trust. If you want to replace your whole bag in one order and have two months to decide whether it was the right call, Sub 70's range and trial period make that the lower-risk move. And if you're a better player chasing a specific feel rather than a specific story, Haywood is built for exactly that conversation. All three are proof that the DTC club category has moved well past "cheaper knockoff" — it's now genuinely a question of fit, not just price.