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)
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”
The day you’ve been anxiously awaiting has finally arrived……
Spikeball officially takes the beach!
Considering that you’ve received this invitation, you have some sort of connection (that you may or may not want to admit) to one of the greatest games ever conceived. This is now the opportunity of a lifetime to find out exactly what we have been talking about for the last six months.
Please join us as we mark this historic day with the Spikeball Launch Party.
Here are the details for this all day event:
From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., we will be playing Spikeball at North Avenue Beach, in front of Castaways. Whether you are a newbie or an experienced baller, come out and join us for some Spikeball fun in the sun. Just want to watch? That’s fine, leave the self tanning lotion at home and get the real thing.
21 or over? From 8 p.m. to midnight, the party will take place at Fizz Bar & Grill. For $30, you have the pleasure of taking part in a four hour open bar, along with featured live music from A.T.F. We’ll tell you what A.T.F. stands for the night of the party.
Be the cool kid on your block that is the first to spread word about this major red carpet /sand event. Send it on to your crew.
Wanna learn more about Spikeball? Shoot me a note or take a look at the sweetest web site since Mulletsgalore, www.spikeball.com.
Fellow Ballers and future Ballers,
Summer begins today. That’s right, you heard me. June 21st doesn’t matter anymore. Our good friend Spikeball.com has just changed things. Celebrating the official birth of ummm…itsel, Spikeball.com has decided to move up one of the most anticipated days of the year. Mark your calendar, Summer begins today, June 4rd . (this is not a Nicole “Summer” Eggert Baywatch reference)
Let’s talk about Spikeball.com a bit more, shall we? It’s live, kicking, strutting, delivering death stares and ready to mop you up. Before you rush out to go see the best “all ages” site out there, let me explain a bit about what you’ll find.
Don’t know the rules of the game? Get schooled here…
http://www.spikeball.com/thegame.php
And to those of you that still don’t know who I am or what we’re about- take a look at the “Who We Are” page.
http://www.spikeball.com/whoweare.php
How techno-geeked-out-slick is Spikeball.com? We are soooooo slick we even have our own blog. Yea, take that, Volleyball! Spikeblog? Spikeblogball? I don’t have a clever name for it yet but you can keep up with the latest Spikeball scandals/exploits here…
http://community.spikeball.com/
And most importantly, this is the most powerful button online today (bookmark this one). It’s the one that officially brings you into the coolest club since those kids with jean jackets and cigarettes in 8th grade started theirs. Click on the button below, grab your wallet (sense the super subtle sales effort?), and enter a whole new world.
http://www.spikeball.com/theequipment.php
As always, tell your Mama, tell your Daddy, tell everyone that you rule because you’ve been to Spikeball.com.
Summer is here,
Chris
PS: Launch party in Chicago on June 14th at North Ave Beach. Go.
Hey Everyone,
You better be feeling good. Why? You are one of the privileged recipients of the first Spikeball Newsletter. Print it, frame it, smoke it - we don ’t care- just make sure you give it a good read and help spread the love by sending it on to friends.
I didn’t want to send this out until we were closer to the launch but the stack of “When can I get my own set?” emails is getting a bit deep. This is music to my ears. Spikeballers’ demands can’t be ignored.
June 1st…or right around there is the answer. That’s when 5 years worth of “We really should launch Spikeball as a business” discussions on the beach will finally materialize. 5 years? Our bad for allowing you to sit so bored on the beach this whole time. No worries- we’ll make it up to you. Once you play, you’ll instantly forgive us and fall in love with the hottest thing to hit the beach since Hasselhoff.
So what are we doing right now? Why wait until June 1st’ish to launch? Other than sitting on a runway (2+ hours!) while writing this, we are refining the web site (it WILL win awards), tweaking the final net design, and lining up the details for the launch party in Chicago on June 14th. You’re on the list- don’t worry. Our non-Chicago friends need not worry; we’ll add events closer to you and your beach as we move along through this soon-to-be-epic-summer. We are getting requests from folks in places like Italy, Florida, Maryland, California, and even Poland…anyone know of a good beach in Poland?
I keep referring to “We.” Who are we? There are 8 of us launching Spikeball. We are from Kankakee and Scotland aka KankaScot- equally tropical places. As we get further down the road we’ll share more about us, how we got here, and our innate ability to absolutely dominate on the beach. The “About Us” section on the site that launches June 1st will be the finest About Us section you’ve ever read.
“Turn off all electronic devices and fold up the tray” is on so I’ve got to run. I’m not going to ask yet, but be prepared for the next newsletter where I ask all of you to invite your Facebook friends to join the group. In the meantime send this literary masterpiece to your friends and enemies. Do it and feel the Spikeball karma creep into your life…it can’t be denied.
Enjoy,
Chris
Let me know what you’re thinking chris@spikeball.com
