Did Costco pull Callaway golf products due to ad backlash?

On Aug. 21, 2026, Good Good Golf, a golfing YouTube channel that runs a golf apparel store of the same name, shared a new advertisement for a driver produced by the golf manufacturing giant Callaway.

The advertisement shows a woman — former NCAA golfer and Good Good partner Alexis Mietkowski — reaching for a golf club before a man — Good Good co-founder Garrett Clark — runs over and pushes her to the ground. “Do not touch my new driver,” he says in a menacing voice while standing over her. 

The advertisement sparked immediate backlash online and was quickly deleted. Good Good Golf and Callaway both issued apologies in the following days.

Claims quickly appeared online that the warehouse chain Costco had pulled all Callaway products from its stores and website in response to the advertisement. Some versions of the claim also suggested that Costco refused to stock meat U.S. President Donald Trump imported from Argentina. Snopes readers searched the site looking for more information about the claim.

We contacted Costco, Callaway and Good Good Golf as part of researching this story, but had not heard back from any of them.

We rate the claim a mixture of true and unproven information. 

Searching Google for Callaway products available at Costco returned dozens of results that all led to pages that said “product not found” on the retailer’s website, suggesting that Costco had recently unlisted the products. Meanwhile, a similar search directly on Costco’s website showed several golf products, but none from Callaway. Therefore, we concluded that Costco had unlisted Callaway products. 

A Google search for Callaway products listed on Costco’s website returned dozens of results, all of which led to pages saying “product not found.”

However, Costco did not release any information explaining why Callaway products had been removed from its website, and whether the change was permanent. 

Similarly, we weren’t able to confirm that Callaway products had been removed from shelves in Costco stores across the country (for instance, one post on the r/golf subreddit claimed Callaway clubs weren’t on shelves in Cincinnati, Ohio, while commenters said in replies that Callaway clubs were still available at their local stores).

ESPN reported on Aug. 26 that Dick’s Sporting Goods and its subsidiary Golf Galaxy would pull Good Good Golf products — not Callaway products — from its stores. According to The Athletic, the brand also reportedly lost a reality TV show on the Golf Channel. 

Meanwhile, Callaway announced on Aug. 27 that it had officially severed ties with Good Good Golf because of the advertisement, and the PGA said it would remove Good Good’s name from an upcoming event in Austin, Texas, where it was set to be the title sponsor. 

Sources