Special Edition | December 30, 2024
I began 2024 wondering if Normal Sport would survive the year.
It had become very extra. Something about which my wife (fairly) said on a semi-regular basis: “Wait so explain to me again why you’re taking time away from our family to write more ridiculous golf things that nobody is actually requiring you to write?”
In my head, the extremely justified answer was always, “Well I need to diversify my career so that I have something to fall back on at some point!”
The truth of it, though, was probably not as noble.
The truth of it was probably a bit more selfish and went something like this.
I absolutely love doing it. It is tremendous fun for me. Sometimes … more fun than reading another Elephant and Piggy book or playing another round of Cars Trouble.
I enjoy having a side hustle at all times. I realized recently that I have more or less had a side hustle for the last 20 years.
For whatever reason — as is most often the case, it was probably several reasons — I didn’t pack it in and just kept on writing. I’m now extremely grateful for this because, as you all know, at the end of September Normal Sport became a full time job.
Given all that transpired in 2024, I thought it would be fun to take a quick end-of-year look back on some of the Normal Sport numbies from 2024 with a few of my thoughts going into 2025.
Newsletters written: ~95 — This one is a little wonky because we wrote some one-offs and some announcements, but we started the year with issue No. 45, and we ended it with No. 139.
Emails delivered: 1.1 million — [proudly looks at parents] I write emails for a living now.
Words: Our email software (Beehiiv) tells me I wrote … 255,000 words … about golf … this year … most of which was my side job.
Illustrations: ~275 — This is a preposterous number. Jason is the 🐐.
Subscribers: 14,900
Growth: 130% year over year
Paid members: ~346 — Just before Christmas, we did a 40% discount for the first 100 people who signed up. We still have 14 spots available if you want to jump in! You can sign up here and use the code NS40 at checkout.
Average open rate: 69.3 percent — I’m really, really proud of this number given that the industry average for opens is closer to 40 percent, give or take.
Average click through rate: 8.1 percent (industry average: 4-5%).
Our five most opened newsletters (percentage-wise) looked like this.
1. 15 final Masters thoughts (April 17)
2. Scottie is the second best player in the world (April 3)
3. A missed opportunity by the Fireballs (April 11)
4. How Augusta National is like a Pixar movie (April 10)
5. Why I’m glad for LIV (Feb. 13)
Unsurprisingly, people were interested in golf in April.
Here are our three most clicked-on newsletters.
1. The difficulty of concurrent dreams
2. The $4.5 million youth soccer chair
3. Gray area
Here are a few lessons we learned in 2024.
• We are still experimenting and exploring. Should we publish on Tue/Thu/Fri? What about Mon/Thu/Sat? Should we launch a pod? Should we try to crush on LinkedIn (probably not)? Should we ________________. This is part of the fun of having a business, and I suspect this will always be part of the fabric of our business.
• Two things that I was meh on that I’m really glad we did: Reader survey (so much good feedback) and “tell us your story” page for new subscribers (so many great stories that we have been able to share with others).
• We will double down on content in the six big weeks (majors, Players and Ryder Cup). Maybe triple down. The degree to which golf matters during those six week compared to how much it matters in, like, November and December is staggering (see most opened newsletters above).
• Advertisements can actually be additive to the content and not a detraction, but it takes a lot of time and a lot of effort to make this work.
• I don’t care as much about having a 100,000-reader newsletter as I thought I did. I care about having the right 10,000 readers and even more than that, I care about the whole thing remaining sustainable.
• Launching and iterating is far more important than perfection.
• A good logo is not the most important thing, but it does make everything feel just a little bit better.
• I don’t have to say everything in every newsletter. Editing down to the best 55 percent or 65 percent is important, and it’s one thing I probably struggle with the most. I had been feeling something in this direction, and I got some great feedback recently from a friend who is also in the indie golf space that encouraged me even more.
So expect newsletters to be shorter, tighter and (hopefully) better in 2025. And if they’re not, please respond and yell at me that your time is more valuable than another video of a rules official running through the woods at a random golf tournament.
by: Jason Page
When I see 272 illustrations I think … how did I get here? What I know now is that you illustrate a year’s worth of newsletters the same way you eat an elephant. One piece at a time. And that’s not counting the many artworks that didn’t make the cut. The half finished Bern Hard poster (Bernhard Langer + Die Hard) will stay for my eyes only.
One of the unintended joys of averaging 5.5 illustrations per week is constantly being surprised by what images bubble up. The surprises start on Sunday/Monday when, while doing dishes, sitting on the toilet, or riding a bike, I unload ideas onto my Normal Sport Idea Dump iPhone note. It’s filled with pure gold like:
Rain Main Bryson (Zach Galifinakis math) or Masters pine needle counter.
Amen Corner, Masters x Dewalt speed square putter alignment.
Kevin Na green / white shirt (Chotchkie’s from Office Space) with flair button “We’re not on the PGA Tour anymore!”
Johnson Wagner-Seve fruit bar reenactment.
Sandwich in parking lot with flag toothpick “Short game help? Call Joe Mayo.”
And less gold ideas that I jotted down that barely make sense out of context:
Range meditations
Kuchar mowers
Bernhard Langer colon trophy
Karma Police Xander #2 Well Fargo
Jim Nantz toilet
The fun and challenge as an illustrator is seeing how those fantasies turn into images. I can’t just say, “Hey reader, imagine a Bernhard Langer colon trophy”, as much as I might like to sometimes. The world needs to see it (I think). But how do these disconnected tidbits from the week come together in one visual patchwork and how do I make it snappy?
Snappy is subjective, but if we’re laughing at the image (or idea of the image) as it’s being made it usually has the energy we’re looking for. Not all 272 images have that energy, but it’s something I’m stoked to keep shooting for in 2025. I talked about this creative process, my ding dong approach, loving a tight deadline, etc. with Kevin Moore for his New Club pod episode “The Absurdity of Golf Through Art”.
Here are five of my favorite 2024 illustrations with that certain je ne sais quoi.
If we were handing out Normie Awards, Johnson Wagner would be first on the list.
Sergio’s Fireballs GC branded eclipse glasses in the Masters Champion Locker Room (what a sentence). I like this one because we can’t say for certain that this wasn’t reality.
Bryson might be the Normal Sport MVP of content providers. We’d like to say TYFYS fueling what we do online.
Of all the TIO illustrations this year (there were many) this one from the Italian Open is my fav.
Oftentimes, the last illustration made 30 minutes before the deadline has the most energy. Case in point is this Peter Finch, KVV and Geno Bonnalie fever dream courtesy of reader submitted stories. Visualizing those stories was a huge highlight of my Normal Sport year!
OK, me (Kyle) again. It feels like I have been on a sprint for the last three months since I launched Normal Sport full time. Something like this.
This has been a thrill because it has resulted in short term sustainability but also exhausting because sprinting at that speed (well maybe not that speed ⬆️ , but a speed a bit faster than Jhonny Vegas) is exhausting.
So we have been resting for the last few weeks. The rest is important for us personally (and also a privilege) but also paramount for us to operate at a high level going into 2025.
During Christmas break, I asked my kids what they want to know about adult world. My 8-year-old paused for a bit before asking whether all adult jobs are difficult and boring.
A very 8-year-old question.
I thought about his question before explaining that I genuinely do not feel like I have a job. That it rarely feels like work. If Yasir randomly bequeathed me $20 million tomorrow, this is still what I would want to do. And I think (hope?) this general disposition is part of what makes the Normal Sport newsletter enjoyable.
I read this post recently about how to build a great newsletter, and this part really resonated.
Basically, and I recognize how lame this sounds, I think people respond enthusiasm and joy. Readers want to learn stuff, and to be made to laugh, and to have their weird feelings articulated for them artfully … especially when we’re talking about a publication that arrives in their email inboxes, they want to read something that sounds like it was written by and for living human beings.
Read Max
That’s not the whole thing right there, but it’s a lot of it. Maybe most of it.
Thank you for continuing to support Normal Sport by reading and receiving what we’ve been building. And if you, like Xander in 2024, want to progress to the next level, by all means we would love to have you as a paid member of our strange little world.
Happy 2025.
KP (and JP)