I’ve been fortunate enough to visit Scott Readman Concepts on their home turf and this post will tell about my trip(s) to Scott Readman Concepts HQ.

I’ve also been trying to write this post for two years now, and getting it right has been impossible.  After my last trip, I’ve given up on trying to capture every interesting little detail and make it fit to the general golf audience.  So I decided to just talk about my most recent experience at Scott Readman Concepts HQ which was just as memorable as the rest.

Warning: this is a long read and is a recount of personal adventure.  I understand if you don’t want to stick it out (but I appreciate it if you end up doing so), but it felt like something worth capturing.  Most importantly, it may help to give a glimpse into real life for this crew, and not just the “golf business personas” that you’re familiar with.

Scott Readman Concepts HQ

The SRC shop is a straightforward three-room facility in a small business complex that is relatively unassuming.  If not for the small SRC sign next to the door, you wouldn’t think there are a few wizards cooking up a unique range of golf wares in this building.  When you enter their shop, you’re in a small hallway with the main office right in front of you, Scott’s hammering workshop to the left, and the embroidery and storage/showroom to the right.

Plastered all over the walls are mementos and artifacts capturing the weird journey and roots of this company.  Included are the flags of Chicago as well as a Chicago Cubs “W” flag.

My favorite part about Scott Readman Concepts HQ is all the random amazing stuff you stumble upon.  It’s like being a kid in a candy store.  Yeah, there’s a bunch of cool stuff right in your face, but the random boxes with older putter heads or “temporarily suspended” projects, in-flight projects, prototype headcovers, and other assorted gems.  It’s hard to not just sneak it all into your backpack and run!

Day 1

Now, technically Day 1 is really just half a day.  I arrived at the Bath Spa train station around mid day where I was greeted by Emma’s parents who would drive me over to the Scott Readman Concepts offices.  It was nice to catch up with them, since I haven’t seen them in over year, as we wound through the city of Bath and the beautiful countryside on our way to Bristol.  In true Bill Bush/SRC fashion, I walked right into the middle of last minute chaos so I setup in my usual corner spot of the embroidery room and did a little of my own work I needed to get done.

While Scott and Emma wrapped up what they had to get done, I wandered over to my accommodations next door.  Conveniently, there’s an old chapel just a few yards away from HQ that’s been converted into three separate living quarters.  This place is amazing, and it makes connecting with the SRC crew each day a breeze because it’s just a mediocre lob wedge away.  It’s also right on the way back to Emma’s house from Scott’s so we can share a cab.  Again, convenience.

This was my second time staying in this place and it felt good to make my return, even if I had to lug my heavy suitcase up two stories via a narrow spiral staircase.  The views are fantastic (see below) and it’s nice to stay in a place that feels like a home when you’re actually 4000 miles away from your real home.

I unpacked a little bit, did a little more work, and then wandered back over to SRC HQ to catch up with my friends.  We spent a little bit of time talking about my week abroad, looked at some new things in the shop (ball markers, putters, covers, new leathers, bags, memorabilia, etc), and stamped various forms of metal together (you’re welcome for that upside down M, Tommy).  My favorite part of course, was my annual Scott Readman Concepts equipment restock.  This was also when I was introduced to my project for the next day or so.  More on that later.

I also spent a lot of time looking at this tractor.  If you’re familiar with the children’s show “Tec the Tractor,” I found where Tec’s been living – in Scott’s workshop.

Next we formulated our plan for the night.  We decided to lay low, go to Scott’s house, order in some pizza and kebabs (which may have spilled everywhere), and have a few beers.  We had a stop to make first on the way home – the Oldland Village Club.

This was my first introduction to authentic Snooker.  I’d seen the game plenty of times before but I’ve never played on the actual massive table with the tiny cues and smaller balls, and I certainly had no idea what the rules were.  Let me tell you, I was terrible.  I chalk it up (hey, nice pun, Bill) to the giant table screwing my lines up.  Following not even a complete game of Snooker, we headed to Scott’s house where we met up with his wife, Ellen, ordered food, invented a functioning new version of Amazon’s Alexa, and called it a night.

Day 2

I used my first morning in Bristol to catch up on some much needed sleep, hopped out of bed, admired a typical English morning fog over the commons, and walked over to the shop at about 10am.  First order of business was to head to Emma’s house to catch up with her folks more.  It’s become tradition that our first stop is their house, I sit in this chair in the dining room, talk about whatever random topics, and pet the two cats (one of which looks alarmingly like my dog).

We left Emma’s house and wound our way through the countryside back to the office.  Frankly, this drive couldn’t be more stereotypical “English countryside.”  Huge rolling hills, winding roads with high walls, farmhouses, single-lanes, people riding horses instead of cars…

With the morning fog now burnt off, you have a clear view of Wales in the distance with a hot air balloon floating somewhere in between.  It’s a tough view to beat.

Once back at the shop, Scott and Emma worked on stamping a couple more ball markers for me to take home.  Meanwhile, I went over to the workbench and went to work on one of my new putters.  It’s not every day you get to be hands-on with your own new putter pretty much from the beginning.  Not only is that a cool experience, but it adds a lot to the sentimental value of getting to work side by side with your good friend to make this thing come to life.  In due time, this will be one a one-of-a-kind Scott Readman Concepts IKB2 putter.

I spent most of that day rounding off edges, sanding out milling lines, and trying my best not to screw up this irreplaceable putter.  This was pretty much an all-day affair, but as Scott made clear, this putter is meant to be finished by hand over the course of a year.  (Obviously I will do it much faster out of sheer excitement and winter boredom.)  So I did everything I needed to do using his tools, the rest could wait for home.  It was time to head out for our evening plans.  The plan was to have a big dinner at Scott’s house, but we had some time to kill before we were supposed to be back.  Our time-killing stop was at a “new” craft brewery that popped up called Bath Ales.  We had a nice pour on their balcony talking about god knows what and then made our way to Scott’s house.  The picture below couldn’t more perfectly mine and Scott’s mutual disposition.

At Scott’s house, it was great catching up with the various members of the Readman and Co. families.  Being I was in England, we very obviously had a traditional Mexican meal as one would expect.  True to form, Ellen Readman and the various guests did not disappoint with the food.  Hats off, I didn’t expect Mexican to be done so well in England!  Everyone was excellent company, the conversations were spirited, and the international relationships were strengthened more than ever.

I also wanted to bring a little American culture to this group.  What says ‘Murica better than a game of catch in the back yard?  I brought Scott a couple of baseball gloves and a real-deal MLB baseball.  Hopefully Scott gets it down by my next visit so the quality of our “catch” improves.

I ended up getting back to my apartment at about 1:00 AM and got about three hours of sleep.  I had limited time with these characters so I made it count!  After about three hours of sleep, I was off to Bristol airport and on my way back home to Chicago.  Another great visit in the books.

Final Thoughts

I’m not a spiritual person per se, but I do believe the universe twists and pushes things for some unknown weird reason that can’t be easily explained.  As such, there are certain people that the universe pushes you toward and everything just clicks.  My encounter and ongoing relationship with Scott Readman Concepts is a perfect example of this and I’m grateful for all the weird twists of fate that made it happen.  Not only are the people of SRC (as well as their families) great friends like family now, but they are great at what they do and we’re lucky to have their steadfast support at DRH.

Bonus Material

When I first started talking to Scott about four years ago after blindly contacting him regarding my old website, we quickly figured out we had some interesting connections.  For instance, the Bush family is traced back to literally Scott’s backyard (I have very close ancestors buried at the church connected to Scott’s daughter’s school down the street from their house) and my family owned a pub at the turn of the twentieth century that Scott and Co semi-regularly frequent (see photo above).  Scott’s shop is located in “Trubody’s Yard” and one of the Trubody’s married into my family in the area sometime in the mid 1800s.  So weird, Universe.

Not far away is another church where a bunch of the ole Bush family is buried.  You’d think we’d play golf on my visits, but instead we prefer doing weird things like digging around graveyards to find my old family members.  Perfectly normal.  The church above is located in a place called Bitton and it’s where Emma appropriately earned the nickname “Grave Digger.”

A few visits ago I started working on my first custom SRC putter with Scott – admittedly, at a very limited level.  Over two visits that were six months apart, that putter would become my trusty SWC that has served me well ever since.  It was a great experience seeing the blank head sitting in a vise, and two years later, it looks totally different and feels like an old friend.  I’m grateful for Scott letting me have this experience.

If you would have told me four years ago that I’d someday being grilling chicken and ribs in Scott Readman’s back “garden” all the way in Bristol, UK, I wouldn’t have believed you.  Yeah, I’m sure there are plenty that have shared plenty of cool golf experiences with Scott and team, but alas, here we were grillin’, listening to country music, and throwing the pigskin around the yard.  It’s the special experiences like these that make us do what we do at DRH.  All the cool golf stuff is just secondary.