Staff WriterWhen Dove Men+Care turned up on the first tee of the Sunshine Tour, it wasn’t just another logo slapped on a cap. It was a bubble bath crashing the boys’ club – a grooming brand marching onto the fairways with golf bags, bar soap and a mission to convince professional men that looking after their heads and hearts matters just as much as flushing a 5-iron.
In a new partnership announced this week, Dove Men+Care has teamed up with the Sunshine Tour and South African professionals Haydn Porteous and Heinrich Bruiners to bang the drum for resilience, respect and inclusivity on and off the golf course.
“Sport has the power to inspire, unite, and build communities”
If you’re going to gatecrash golf’s locker room and start talking about feelings, it helps to have someone who knows what they’re doing. That’s where Dove’s social playbook comes in.
“Sport has the power to inspire, unite, and build communities,” says Trevor Ngwenya, Dove Social Media and Community Lead. “We’re committed to championing care through sport and partnering with the Sunshine Tour is a natural next step.”
In other words, this isn’t a hit-and-run sponsorship. It’s Dove Men+Care betting that golfers – and the fans who follow the Sunshine Tour every week – are ready to ditch the old “man up and grind” approach in favour of something a bit more human, and a lot more honest.
Porteous and Bruiners: Birdies, bogeys and better self-care
Haydn Porteous has held a trophy with both hands and stared down the cameras on a Sunday. Now he’s lending those same hands to a brand that wants men to look after themselves before they fall apart.
Porteous is genuinely delighted to be inside the Dove Men+Care tent rather than just wandering past it on the range.
“It feels amazing to be part of a household brand like Dove Men+Care.”
Alongside him is Heinrich Bruiners, a player who knows all about the strain and solitude that can lurk behind a scorecard. For him, this partnership isn’t just another logo on a shirt – it’s a nudge he plans to take personally.
Bruiners added, “This collaboration will serve as a gentle reminder for me to prioritise personal wellbeing”.
On a tour where players chase status, points and paydays, the idea that two pros are publicly tying themselves to a message of vulnerability and wellness is quietly radical. Out here, you’re more likely to hear about a new driver than a new sleep routine.
Why the Sunshine Tour is the perfect fit
The Sunshine Tour has been building its brand around a simple but powerful idea: “Greatness Begins Here”. For young pros grinding away on sun-baked fairways from Johannesburg to George, this is where dreams either take off or stay stubbornly on the runway.
This new tie-up with Dove Men+Care plugs straight into that identity.
This partnership aligns perfectly with the Sunshine Tour’s message that “Greatness Begins Here” for their professionals. Thomas Abt, Sunshine Tour Commissioner, says, “Correctly caring for themselves is the start of their journey to greatness”.
It’s a neat bit of symmetry: the tour offers the competitive proving ground, and Dove Men+Care brings the reminder that greatness doesn’t just come from the gym, the range, or another mind-numbing putting drill. It also comes from sleep, diet, mental health and the basic act of not treating your body like a hire car.
A grooming brand that wants more than shower shelf space
As a leading manufacturer of men’s grooming products, Dove Men+Care has spent years trying to help men look and feel their best from the neck up. Now, with this Sunshine Tour partnership, it’s leaning hard into the idea that what happens in the mirror should match what happens between the ears.
On paper, it’s classic sports marketing: big brand, big tour, two recognisable players, plenty of logo placement. In practice, it’s a bit sneakier – using golf’s weekly drama to normalise the idea that self-care is part of being competitive, not a sign that you’re going soft.
The partnership will promote self-care and wellness, inspiring a new generation of golfers and fans to prioritise their wellbeing. With pros like Porteous and Bruiners effectively saying, “Yes, we moisturise and no, we’re not apologising for it,” the hope is that junior golfers and weekend hackers might follow suit.
“Together, we’ll celebrate resilience, respect and inclusivity”
If you’ve ever seen a player trudging down the 18th after a round that looked like a crime scene, you’ll know golf is a ruthless examiner of the human condition. It tests patience, pride and sanity on a loop. Which makes it a surprisingly good classroom for the values Dove Men+Care wants to shout about.
As Ngwenya puts it, “Together, we’ll celebrate the values of resilience, respect, and inclusivity both on and off the course.”
Resilience? That’s making triple bogey on the first and still signing your card.
Respect? That’s calling a penalty on yourself when nobody’s watching.
Inclusivity? That’s a tour opening its arms to more faces, more stories, and more ways to be a “real man” than the old, stiff-upper-lip stereotype.
With this partnership, Dove Men+Care doesn’t just cement its status as a leader in men’s grooming; it plants a flag on the fairways as a brand willing to take on the culture of sport itself.
And if that means a few more players start thinking about personal wellbeing before they think about their next swing change, the Sunshine Tour might just become the place where greatness – and better self-care – truly begins.
