May - June 1998
Vol. 9, No. 3

CHANGING TIMES
by Luke St. Onge

I’ve been in the sport since the early 1970s and each year I continue to find reason to get on this particular soapbox. I think we can agree that the sport has come together over the past five years with the IRT/WIRT, USRA, manufacturers, and club owners all working together to promote racquetball. We are on television, we have a major court club initiative in place, and our numbers are up. So what never ceases to frustrate me, month after month and year after year?

It’s the lack of product loyalty by players who neglect to support the very manufacturers and industry sponsors who work so hard to promote and develop our sport. The next time you play at your club, look at the equipment in use by the players around you. Are they playing with a racquet that advertises, sponsors, or promotes the sport? Or with an off brand frame purchased from the trunk of a car? What shoes are they wearing – Ektelon, Prince, Wilson, Head? Or Nike, Adidas, and Reebok – companies which don’t even bother to design shoes for racquetball – and instead take your profits and funnel them into rival sports? What strings do you demand to be put into your racquet? What glove do you wear? There are well over 20 eyewear manufacturers, but only three actively promote the sport. What do you wear and what do your friends wear?

We are all in business of one type or another. Given a choice, do you support your own business or do you buy a competitor’s product? Do you support your alma mater, or a rival institution? Get the drift? Many of today’s racquetball manufacturers — which also manage to promote the sport you love — offer product second to none. Every time anyone in the racquetball community buys a piece of equipment produced by a manufacturer that does not support our sport, we are all being hurt.

If we, as racquetball players, don’t make a point to direct our consumer dollars appropriately, we have no one to blame but ourselves the next time one of our courts becomes the next “Adidas” box soccer room or the next “Nike” climbing wall. Take a moment to look in your gym bag. Who gets to push their next gimmick with your dollars? Who do you support? Does it matter? Is loyalty still alive?

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