PLAYER PROFILE
Their introduction to pickleball didn’ t come until sometime after, when Jodi’ s parents moved to The Villages in Florida and had taken up the sport. They introduced Robert and Jodi to pickleball and they fell in love again. In a decision that was partly about being closer to family, partly about living in a better climate, partly about retiring early, and partly about their growing love of the game, the Elliotts moved to Florida as well, and fate started guiding their paths once again.
“ We had no idea that Robert would design a pickleball paddle,” said Jodi.“ We were down here for about two and a half years before it happened. I was dinking with Robert, and with his engineering background, he started designing a paddle for me that was better than anything I had been using.” Robert soon found himself in the position that every innovator has been in when they create something unique and useful: confronted with demand from everyone for his product.
“ I was only going to make a paddle for Jodi, but people tried it and they liked it. Soon after, I made myself a paddle that suited my playing style and other people wanted that one,” Robert said.“ All of a sudden, we have these orders and the craziness that comes with that. As we went along, two orders became three. Five months into the business, we had a single order for 500 paddles. From there we continued to grow quickly.”
Joshua, who earned himself gold medals at Nationals for Junior Men’ s Doubles, Mixed Doubles and Singles in 2014, 2015 and 2016, began researching the paddle resale market in earnest. He realized that instead of the resale market he dreamed of, he would be focusing his time on sales and distribution of new paddles his dad was crafting, which was a better dream.
Rachel, who was also a Junior Champion at Nationals and managed a silver medal in the Women’ s 19 + at the age of 14, became an instant product tester and sounding board for ideas. Once again the family came together— this time to come up with paddle names.“ As a family, we sat around the table and talked about names for paddles; it was totally all done as a family unit,” Rachel said.
The name for the company itself came to Joshua long before the first paddle was ever even thought of being designed, and the family loved it: Engage.
While demand continued to rise, supply barely kept up until Robert reached the point where he finally left his job to focus 100 % on Engage. A short time into the business he invested in CNC machines— automated, computerdriven production units that helped him keep up with the orders coming in. As the company grew, the family continued to hire employees and now have two
Rachel Elliott wins the Girls National Championships as her father, Rob Elliott, looks on. locations in Florida where they do it all … no outsourcing— a completely different world than what Robert was doing in the beginning, in his garage with hand tools and spare time almost two years ago.
Today, Robert spends a lot of time working on Engage’ s product lines, tweaking skins and cores and bringing those new prototypes on the court to test with his favorite test team, the family, which is the best reward the Elliotts could ask for.
“ The company and pickleball in general have kept us together as a unit,” Jodi said.“ We bought an RV and we teach clinics together. It’ s kept us so tight. Every night is family night. I love it, and I feel lucky that Joshua and Rachel want to be a part of it.” It is no wonder why they have been nicknamed“ The First Family of Pickleball.” •
JANUARY / FEBRUARY 2017 | MAGAZINE 47