Are you checking email right now to get away from family on this fine Thanksgiving? Shame on you…
In case you can’t pony up the cash for the new Lexus with giant Red Bow for that special someone this Christmas consider a shiny new Spikeball set. It gets much better mileage and after a few games you’ll start to notice that “Holiday 15″ start to melt away.
One quick note, I got a note from a guy at St Martin University in the Pacific Northwest a few days ago. In telling me about this plans to try to get Spikeball into their intramural sports program he described the nature of Spikeball in an absolutely perfect way…
“I hadn’t seen Spikeball before and I feel like a kid who heard an underground band before everyone else, right before they made it to the radio.”
Consider Spikeball kind of like Spinal Tap, before Smell the Glove’s major release.
…and for that, he is getting a free set. It will be on your doorstep in a few days Matt. Enjoy.
That’s it, now go back to your family.
-Chris
PS: Spikeball is shooting a promo video in Malibu a week from Saturday. If you live around there shoot me a note and I’ll gladly dominate you on the beach…Spikeball style.
FREE SHIPPING!!! (priority shipping in the US is free, express will still cost a small fortune)
Hey Folks,
Sunburn starting to fade a bit? Sick of “back to school” commercials? Labor Day getting too close? It’s not over the but the signs of the end of Summer are here. No need to fear weather wise, my gut is telling me we’ve got another month or two of good Spikeballin’ outdoors here in Chicago. Don’t question my gut- it’s corn fed, has plenty of room to graze, is antibiotic free and knows what its talkin’ ’bout.
Speaking of back to school I’ve been getting a lot of notes from college students telling me how much they’re playing on campus. Some Finance majors have told me they are rebalancing their Fall investment portfolios. What was 100% book money is now 49% book money, 51% Spikeball money. Yes, a bit controversial but it’s certain to give an amazing rate of return given these rough economic waters. Again, don’t question me, I took Econ 101.
Wake Forest, Ohio State, Marquette, Auburn, Cornell, Springfield College, etc they’re all getting games going. If you know of any students that would like to get a game going shoot me a note and I’ll see if we can hook ‘em up.
I just returned from about 2 weeks of Spikeballin’ in Michigan. Good stuff- we played in a small area called Epworth Heights and got to play with folks from Oregon, Virginia, Arkansas, Colorado, Arizona, New York, and yes, even Michigan.
(L to R) Springfield College grads Marc, Tricia, Emma, John, Tim, Analia,
Brady
Speaking of Springfield College (Massachussetts) take a look at this
photo from a recent reunion. Springfield is hard core. They don't
need boring speeches from 115 year old professors and campus tours
showing off the new library...give 'em a few Spikeball sets and they're
good.
Finally, we’ve got a small crew of people heading to Miami the weekend of Sept 13-14th to play. If you’re in the area or know of anyone that may want to play shoot me a note and we’ll get together.
Anyone been to the “Lech Summer Active” in Poland? It just became a lot cooler event. You guessed it- they now have Spikeball. Here are a few pix of them playing on the grass.
Spikeball as a wedding or birthday gift?
I have been getting some notes that people are getting Spikeball sets as wedding gifts. Think about it, does your friend REALLY want a shiny new toaster? Who cares if it’s not on the registry- do it- he’ll thank you for it. “Brilliant!”
And some random shots from playing last weekend…
Those of you in Cape Hatteras, Virginia Beach, Louisiana, and Florida– thanks for the notes and keep ‘em coming.
First thing– apologies to ALL of you. I can’t believe how fast time goes. It’s been way too long since you’ve received an official Spikeball update. You must be soooo dehydrated, filthy, starving, and smelly. Don’t worry- I’m here to intensify those symptoms.
Lots going on in the world of Spikeball. Before we get started though we need to ‘pour some out’ for our friend Provo. While playing the greatest beach game in the history of mankind he separated his shoulder. Now this is no ordinary shoulder. This shoulder powers one of the best bands out there— Alaska Thunder F&*!. Word is it’s the 3rd time he’s separated it so it looks like the attorneys can’t place full blame on whoever these guys are that run Spikeball Inc.
OK, dry your tears, back to business. We’ve generated some nice press in the past few weeks.
FitSugar.com (ladies, this is the sister site to HUGE site popsugar.com) did a nice article on us touting the nice workout that comes along with beach domination. Take a look at it here. After we sold a set to a guy in Athens, Greece I asked him how he heard of Spikeball. Here’s his reply: “found out about it on fitsugar.com - I have 4 kids and there are lots and lots of beaches in Greece, so this one must be a winner :)” Time for a gyro.
We also got a nice write up in the Kipp Report. Here it is. Never heard of it? Me neither. They are an English language news site in Dubai. Yup, Dubai as in United Arab Emirates. Word around town is they have billions of gallons of sand…perfect for the greatest game of all time. They are like the Saudi Arabia of sand…and they have an indoor Alpine skiing hill.
And finally, being the cool-kid-trendsetters that we are, we got a write up on TrendCentral. Spikeball is officially a, “New Sport to Know”. Read more here. And you said we wouldn’t grow up to be anything.
Volleyball Champ wins Spikeball set
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I got to spend my 4th of July in a part of Ludington, MI called Epworth. There’s a volleyball tournament every year and the winners get a nice ribbon. Playing next to these guys all day we figured we’d man up and offer a far superior sport as their reward for winning. Mark Saksa was on that winning team and has promised to spread the Spikeball love in his town of Kansas City. Don’t go hunting for beaches in Kansas, Spikeball works just as well in the lawn.
The best part of the day was when after the Spikeball sets were given to the winners someone yelled out, “Had I known I’d get a free Spikeball set I would have tried harder!”
It’s spreading…
More Spikeball Sales in the Bathroom at a Bar
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Remember in my last note when I mentioned the Spikeball business cards in the urinal? That was in Chicago. Here’s a story from Florida…
As the orders for sets come in I like to reply to ask the customer how they heard about us. We got an order in Florida where our Spikeball Inc member Biggggy lives. Here is the reply from the customer…classic:
“…I actually was in the men’s room at a bar called Yardhouse, and I saw a card sitting next to the sink. I think the phrase “Fill the cooler” at the top of the card is what caught my attention (I am a big fan of drinking and playing competitive games…I grabbed the card, checked out the website, watched the videos, and bought the thing…Anyhow, great luck with your new product here, I think it will go over great; everyone I have linked to your website seems to think it’s a cool idea!”
It’s spreading…
Ummmm…how do I assemble it?
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Some of our “challenged” customers (I love you all, I swear!) have had some issues with assembly (I’m talkin’ to you Wellner!). Given that I think these folks may also have trouble with the written word I put together a video showing how to properly assemble your Spikeball set. I was really going for the low budget look here and I think I nailed it. I didn’t have any Spikeball Supermodels hanging around at the time to shoot this. Don’t get me wrong, I usually have TONS of Spikeball Supermodels hanging out, but the timing didn’t work out for the video. Anyway, enough words- check out the video below or on YouTube here. I also put some other videos up: Spikeball Rules Video (not the greatest quality), 3 Games Going at once, and Double Bouncer…don’t do it.. Forgive the low budget nature of these. It is due, oddly enough, to our low budget.
Finally, some of you Facebookers read this but I wanted to share it with everyone. About 7 weeks ago, before our official launch, we were on the JV team. Spikeball was only in 2 cities- Chicago and Stuart, FL. How things have changed. We now have people playing all over Southern California, Florida, Rhode Island, Ohio, Montauk, Nantucket, Hamptons, Wisconsin (Milly-Wah-Kay “home of the good land”), Tennessee, Connecticut, Texas, Georgia, Greece, Italy, Poland (yes, Poland), and plenty of other places. This isn’t quite Varsity squad but we’re getting there.
It’s spreading. Can you help? Send this blog link to your crew and check out our group on Facebook. If nothing else, it will give them something to check out on this fine Friday afternoon.
I’ve been getting a lot of letters from Spikeballers all over the world- it’s been pretty amazing to see how fast word is traveling. Here’s a nice one I got from a guy named Tim….
“…I have played spikeball and I love it. I took it with me on a vacation to Mexico and it
was a hit all over the beach. I had three or four different strangers that I met on
the beach tell me that they were buying a set when they got home. I met you guys on
the beach in Chicago and you seem like great guys, and I wish you the best. i will
continue to spread the word about how much I love spikeball. Good luck and thanks
for a great product and good service. Take care.
Tim R”
Hey Ballers,
We made ESPN radio last week! Local TV Sportscaster Mark Giangreco saw us playing on the beach and thanks to some prodding from Beast he mentioned it on his radio show. When asked what Spikeball was like he said, “It’s like a violent version of volleyball.” I love it. All along we thought we were tougher than volleyball players but to hear a man who’s entire life has been sports say it, well, I just get a little choked up.
What else is going on? For the female Spikeball fan, be sure to take a look at the article on fitsugar.com today. It looks like they saw one of you playing on the beach in California and wrote a nice article on it.
The Chicago Trolley rolled up to Beast’s house on Friday night and was covered in Spikeball banners within minutes. We handed out stickers, business cards, and T Shirts to about 30 Spikeballers including Creepy Spikeball Santa (see pix on Facebook) and all jumped on. We hit about 5 bars that night handing out cards and inviting folks to come down to the beach on Saturday. Some loved us, others hated us. The haters got stickers on their backs. The final stop was Cortland’s Garage in Bucktown. Biggggy and I went searching for a late night burrito. Bigggggy, being of not so abled mind and body, ordered the “Tongue Taco”. Seriously, a taco with tongue meat. Strike 1 Biggggy.
Saturday was perfect. 80 degrees, sun, light breeze, 5 Spikeball sets in constant use, it couldn’t get better. There must have been 5 billion people at the beach. Enough red necks and “You know where the weight room is?” pickup lines to stretch all the way to Havasu. Pat got there early to protect our space against the volleyball players and Speedo-clad leathery old men who wanted “their spot”. Beast was supposed to show up at 9am as well but I think one too many Zima the night before nixed that. 10am- really Beast?
By about 11am we started hearing the beautiful, never-ending refrain of, “What is Spikeball? How do you play? Where can I get my own set?” We had tons of people playing, eating (Tim brought sliced celery, seriously), hanging, and just enjoying the day. It was great to see that a lot of people would wander over, pick up a ball and start playing. The age range on the sand was 2 years old to about 50. The first-timers started a little timid but after about 4 minutes of play they were talking serious trash.
We played with some Irishmen who walked up with their hurling equipment (look it up, I had to). We had to explain there was no wooden stick in Spikeball unless someone needs to be taught a lesson. We had a father and son come and play for about an hour. What better pre-Father’s Day present could you ask for? They got their own set and made plans to play the next day with 10 friends that were coming to town. The love is spreading. Saturday night we basked in the glory with a band called Alaska Thunder F*%^. They were incredible. If I wore a bra, I would have thrown it on stage. These guys rocked. We covered the bar in www.doihavespikeball.com posters and got our groove on. Some got too much of a groove on and left early, thankfully. Trying to spread the word a bit more, I left a stack of Spikeball business cards near the sink in the bathroom. About two minutes later someone asked me why there were 20 Spikeball cards in the urinal. Brilliant! Spikeball urinal cakes in the future?
