Originally published at: https://discgolf.ultiworld.com/2020/11/24/glass-blown-open-renamed-to-dynamic-discs-open/
The world’s largest disc golf tournament is changing its name.
The Glass Blown Open is getting renamed the Dynamic Discs Open starting in 2021, following years of consideration.
“Every since I got here in 2016, it’s been an agenda item: do we finally change the name of the event?” said Dynamic Discs event manager Doug Bjerkaas, who cited long-standing confusion about the name. “This year, there was enough momentum behind the reasons to do it that we said, ‘Yep, OK, let’s do it.'”
Those reasons? An opportunity to more clearly brand the event as a disc golf tournament and more prominently feature Dynamic Discs, the tournament organizer and de facto sponsor. But it is also about better marketing to a widening audience.
“For so long, we focused on disc golf insiders, PDGA members who know who Paul McBeth is,” said Bjerkaas. “That was our strategy for a long, long time. The biggest reason for finally changing the name this year was the explosion of brand new disc golfers out there playing disc golf.”
The Dynamic Discs Open has long been the name of a smaller B-tier event run by the brand, but it was used this year for the name of the Disc Golf Pro Tour event that restarted the season after the COVID-19 hiatus in the spring and early summer that forced the cancellation of the 2020 Glass Blown Open. That B-tier will get a new name that is still in discussion. One thing is certain: “it will not be the Glass Blown Open.”
GBO — as it was commonly called — has grown into a 3,000 person event that brings together the top level professionals and an enormous group of amateurs, all in the small town of Emporia. The tournament originally got its name from Emporia’s famed glass blowing community and the hand-crafted glass trophies presented to the winners of the tournament. Those trophies will still be a part of the event, which will continue in its current form, but the name will be retired.
The branding opportunity was too great to pass up. “We wanted to make sure our name was front and center for the biggest disc golf tournament in the world,” said Bjerkaas.