LPGA MEDIA CONFERENCE

June 16, 2005

Carolyn Vesper-Bivens

Ty Votaw

COMMISSIONER VOTAW: Thank you, Laura, very much. It is with mixed feelings that I begin and commence this, perhaps one of my last teleconferences as Commissioner, as I have had a wonderful 14-year plus period of time with the organization. It's an organization that is in my blood and is one that I feel an enormous affinity for and loyalty to and dedication to, and with this announcement today we are formally beginning the process of transitioning to new leadership. And I can tell you on behalf of the board of directors and as well as the search committee, that which concluded their work last night in naming Carolyn as the seventh commissioner, that we are very excited about this transition and very much looking forward to seeing the next leader of the organization put her stamp on the LPGA. And with that, I'd like to turn it over to Carolyn, Carolyn Vesper Bivens and introduce her as someone who will become the seventh commissioner of f our organization when she assumes the role next month and welcome her on behalf of the membership of the LPGA, Tour membership, as well as the LPGA T&C membership. Carolyn, welcome.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: Thanks, thanks Ty. I'm going to thank you all to give me a little bit of time to kind of get my feet on the ground. What I can say now is that I am extremely excited and pleased to be joining the LPGA and to be joining it right now. The platform that's been built, the momentum that's been built in this sport, looking at the seasoned players who are on the Tour, the young ones who are fairly new to the tour, and then looking out to those who are on the pipeline, this is a sport that has an awful lot of momentum. And I just could not be more pleased to come into a brand that's this strong and has this promising of a future as the LPGA, and I look very forward to working with them.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: Thank you very much. I look forward to meeting you. Actually, a recruiting firm, Heidrick & Struggles, that worked with the LPGA on this is the one who actually called me. And I was in a tangential world in media planning and buying, and so that was the first contact. And it only took one meeting before I was very seriously bitten by the bug, and knew that this was something that I was extremely interested in.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: Okay. Well, let me take the experience piece of it first. Actually looking back at this point already in the rearview mirror, I feel like my previously 25 years experience have prepared me for this job, and it comes at just the right time in my career, and as I said, at a very exciting time in the LPGA he is Torrey. The fact that I work with and have worked with all media types, all media forms, with the networks, with publishers across a variety of platforms, I think will benefit me. Of course, what I have to get up to speed on are the kind of things that Ty grew up in this business, and in his 14 years, he's gotten institutional knowledge and he understands the nuances of this. And hopefully he's promised that he's not only a phone call away, and we're going to do a slow, very methodical transition so that we don't lose anything. In terms of, you know, what do I plan to do, at this very moment with what I see what's happened over the course of this past few years, and certainly this last few weeks, what I hope to do is simply build on the momentum that this organization has from a marketing standpoint. This is not an organization that needs to be fixed. This is not a turnaround. This is an organization that's on the move, that is contemporizing itself; it's hot, has a wide variety of personalities who not only are great golfers, but are pretty interesting people, as well.

COMMISSIONER VOTAW: No, I think from the outset everybody associated with the search, everybody was clear they were looking for the best possible candidate. I think the media played up whether we should or shouldn't focus on a woman more than what was any part of any deliberation. It was really the part of finding the right person for the job is how I know the committee worked. I was not on the search committee. I was certainly available for help, and I was happy to be able to assist in advising them if as and when some questions arose. But I can tell you from interacting with the committee in that way, that from the outset, they were looking for best person for the job. As to the number of applicants, I would say that it was in the hundreds, and it ran the gamut of some interesting people who raised their hands, as well some of the most qualified people in the area of sports entertainment, marketing and business. And out of that process, I think I can speak for the search committee, even though I wasn't a member of the search, but I can certainly speak for the board of which I am a member, that based on report of the search committee, after that process completed itself, there was no more qualified person than the person that was selected, and that's Carolyn. And everybody associated with that process is very excited about not only her emergence, but her acceptance of the job.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: I guess, and you are at a bit of a disadvantage, I don't know if you've seen my biography, but, no, I don't seen consider myself a media person. My background really is business, sales, advertising, operations. But I would say I'm a business person much more so than a media person. And I think that as this organization is evaluating itself, they are finding out that much of what was announced over the course of the last couple of weeks that this organization just isn't in the business of golf. They are in the business of sports and entertainment. And so I think my business background lends itself to that.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: The biggest challenge that I see is taking advantage and leveraging the momentum that this organization already has; making sure that we adequately promote the seasoned talent that's on the Tour, the young people coming into the Tour and knows that are in the pipeline, and make sure that people understand these women aren't just great golfers. As I said, they are really interesting people. This is an exciting, very contemporary thing to watch if you're a man or a woman, and certainly a sport somebody should consider. But if you don't play golf, it's still not a bad way to spend your time and participate with and watch the LPGA group.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: You know, I really don't right now. As I said, unlike Ty, I don't come from the world of golf, and what I intend to do over the course of the next few months is learn and listen from a lot of different people before I form any opinions on that. So I apologize to you, but I just don't have a position on that right now.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: As I said to George, what I plan on doing over the course of the next few months is listening a lot more than talking. So I have met a few of the players. There were players that were represented on the search committee, and certainly I have reached out and talked with a few others. Ty and I are going to be spending the next few days together, the next few weeks and I'm going to be taking his counsel, and we're going to overlap over the course of the next few months.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: First of all, I don't plan on going to the Open. I actually have another life that I have to transition, and I only left my New York group yesterday morning, and I didn't get to make phone calls to my L.A. people and my New York people until late last night and early this morning. So I still have some transitioning to do of that part of my life. And the second part of your question was?

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: You know what, what I would say about that, there is no association, there's no organization where that kind of thing is 100%. Whether you work with a studio and you make a movie and you need the starts to go out with promote it; some of them will, some of them won't. What I hope I have learned from watching Ty and some of the former commissioners, I'll make sure that everybody understands the direction and where we're headed. But in terms of getting 100% participation, I would never expect that, but I would expect that everybody will know where we're going.

CAROLYN VESPER BIVENS: I don't play as much as I'd like to, and maybe as much as I'm about to. My home course for 22 years was Congressional. In terms of favorite courses, I've got a number around the world. I have to say Pebble Beach ranks right up there. International sure isn't bad for the LPGA's backyard, and I love some of the Greenbrier courses. But on the other hand, is there really a bad course?