Avalanche in the early Millennium days.
site owner in Canada, but he really made his name when he hit the US scene back in the 90s.
He announced his entrance to the US industry scene with a company called Diablo. Diablo primarily sold paint, but later expanded its product portfolio to include markers, loader, and etcetera. The remarkable thing about those times was just how quickly Richmond and his Diablo paint had managed to grab such a significant market share in what felt like an unnaturally short period of time. One minute he’ s in the Canadian backwaters selling paint, next minute he’ s all over the place!
WHAT LURKS BENEATH
Richmond’ s business approach is unusual in the sense of just how he goes about the selling / promoting of his company’ s products. He’ s not like you’ d expect an owner of a multi-million dollar company would be. He comes across as extremely personable and genuine with absolutely no pretentions other than being one of the guys. He was obviously astute when it came to financial matters, but that will only get you so far I’ m afraid. For one reason or another, after a few years, Richmond eventually sold his concerns for a disgusting amount of dosh and went off to enjoy a well-earned sabbatical from our sport / industry. Or so we thought! However, Richmond couldn’ t keep his butt out of paintball and he returned a few years back and now owns the GI stable of companies along with the NXL and a few other concerns besides. Talk about jumping in at the deep end! But maybe that’ s what he thinks works best and I’ m not going to argue.
However, Richmond had a more serious quest in mind on his return to paintball, and nobody, and I mean NOBODY could have guessed what he was about to do this time around. Not much surprises me after being in this sport / industry for coming up 30 years now, but after what happened last year and this, my head nearly fell off when I realized what was going on.
The first inkling came a couple of years back when rumours were beginning to circulate in our industry that Tippmann was up for sale, more precisely, it was being lined up for a buy-out. For those of you who don’ t know, Tippmann has been one of our industry’ s longest serving and largest of companies in the US. I think it was
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