BIZZ BUZZ
Having a
Ball!
FRANKLIN SPORTS IS
A LEADER IN HIGH-
QUALITY PICKLEBALL
GEAR—AND WORKING
TO PUT PICKLEBALL
INTO AS MANY STORES
AS POSSIBLE.
Franklin Sports may be a name
you associate with baseball, but the
company has been serving up pickleball
gear for players since 2015, and has no
intention of slowing down.
The third-generation, family-owned
business has been around since 1946
and remains a major player in the
world of sporting goods.
Vice President Adam Franklin says
the company’s entry into pickleball
started with industry research but
has since become a passion. “In 2015,
pickleball was brought to our attention
and identified as a growing sport yet
one we didn’t participate in,” he says.
“We decided to get involved in a big
way, developed products and worked
with a retailer to put together a
program.”
That retailer was Walmart, and
Franklin Sports pickleball products—
mostly entry-level paddles and balls—
were introduced to more than 500
stores throughout the country.
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“As we learned more about the
sport, we worked to develop the X-40,
our flagship ball in the space,” says
Franklin. “We also met more players
and became partners and sponsors of
the USAPA and the US Open. That’s
when we started looking into higher-
end paddles. Given our manufacturing
expertise, we went to many
tournaments, identified opportunities
where we could make a difference and
put a 15-page catalog of equipment
out there.”
At its headquarters, Franklin Sports
set up a temporary indoor pickleball
court for employees and plan to break
ground on a permanent outdoor court
in the spring. At the annual sales
meeting at Fenway Park, the company
hosted a tournament inside the
stadium concourse for the sales reps,
unifying the new direction in pickleball
with its baseball heritage. Franklin
Sports was the presenting sponsor for
the Mid Atlantic Regional Tournament
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last year, and will provide the official
ball of the tournament this year with
the X-40. It has also set a goal for the
ball to be the exclusive ball of 100
national tournaments by the end of
2018.
“For us, the ball was the most
important piece of the puzzle,”
Franklin says. “We spent two years
developing the X-40, taking all positive
and negative comments from players,
and creating a happy medium between
the two. We partnered with Academy
Sports to launch the ball at retail.”
Franklin admits people ask him
about the development time of the
X-40. The truth is, the technology
behind making the pickleball is
deceiving. “They’re machine drilled.
There’s proprietary technology
involved, polymer combinations and a
whole host of variables that have gone
into testing, testing and retesting to
make sure we got it right,” he says.