sportstyle

50 • September 2021 sportstyle • sportstylemag.com inventory will catch up with demand, but it's hard to predict when." For example, no youth leather footballs will be available until January. Coming out of the pandemic, Garretson had thought that schools wouldn't buy as much, but in reality it's been business as usual. "We don't anticipate a slowdown. We had to reorder baseballs four or five times this year and we will sell as many or more footballs as in 2019," he says, adding that the uniform business remains steady. He also reports that 99 percent of his cus- tomers can now be visited in-person with no restrictions. As a result, the business has been aggressively moving forward. "We've grown and hired three more people — two roadpeople and a support person," says Garretson. "Customer service is key and I'm optimistic that we'll see our sales grow in the next year." Winning in Kentucky Team sports in the Bluegrass State are quickly gaining momentum thanks to a full reopening. "Over the past month [June] business really picked up," reports Aaron Hutchinson, a sales- man at Campbellsville, KY-based H+W Duke's Sporting Goods, which also has one location each in Bowling Green and Elizabethtown, KY. "We're already receiving orders for custom uniforms for fall into winter and leading into Spring 2022. This should be the biggest year ever for the company." [Editor's note: H+W Sports and Duke's Sporting Goods merged in early June, bringing together more than a century of experience in the sporting goods industry. The combined entity is now one of the top 15 Adidas team dealers in the nation; Duke's was already the second-biggest school jacket seller in the country.] Although COVID disrupted the usual selling cycle, business is now getting back on track for the combined entity. "Baseball and softball teams had new uni- forms so they didn't need anything, but now they've played a season and are amped up and ready to go," Hutchinson says. "Some schools skipped a year or held back, but they're now back on-cycle and are getting uniforms and a lot of schools and administrators are back to a regular rotation." Since state mask mandates were lifted in the spring, reps are able to visit with coaches; however, a lot of customers and coaches turned to online ordering during the pandemic, so the challenge now is to rebuild those personal, one-on-one relationships. According to Hutchinson, the goal is to sell one or two seasons ahead and the dealer has already started selling custom uniforms for Spring 2022. "People are on top of ordering earlier now and everybody is really excited about getting back to playing," he says. The main concern now is the supply chain. "We've seen a lot of delays from quite a few vendors, depending on where in the world the products are made. But a lot of our vendors are doing a fantastic job — smaller brands such as A4 and SanMar are reacting quickly." He adds that rising shipping costs are also a big factor affecting the price of goods. During the pandemic lull, the company focused on its corporate business, which includes supply- ing custom items to distilleries, car dealerships and even Amazon. "The corporate business really sustained us over the past year and we've even been able to plug in a lot of team brands such as Adidas and Under Armour," says Hutchinson. But now, the strategy is to go full throttle in the team market. "We want to push the gas and be out in front of things and be ahead of the curve. We're excited for the rest of the year.," he says. "Usually, June and early July is a slow time but we're crazy busy now, which is good." Momentum in Minnesota While the team business suffered here during the pandemic, All Seasons Sports in Delano, MN, had an ace up its sleeve. "We were fortunate. We got through the pandemic because we also handle hunting and outdoor, which continued to boom in popularity," says owner Shawn Lynch. "Some people enjoyed having more unscheduled family time and might be reticent to get back to team sports full bore, but overall our outlook is strong for the second half of 2021." On the product side, the situation is still a bit tricky. "A lot of organizations had product from the year before and also schools had budget constraints," says Lynch, who is trying to stay ahead of the game but is having a challenge by a lack of fill-in product availability. "We're figuring out what to order — all in all, it's a small wrinkle for us." Although in-person meetings with coaches and athletic directors have resumed, most of the dealer's business is done remotely via email, phone and text. Lynch believes that supply chain issues are likely to continue for the foreseeable future. "Inventory will be tight — you don't catch up overnight," he says. "Freight costs are also a factor and will add extra costs to each item." The key, he says, is to stay positive: "Control what we can, put the work in and the problem will take care of itself." California Dreaming The Golden State endured some of the most Draconian pandemic restrictions in the coun- try and is just now starting to emerge from the nightmare. (Washington state suffered a similar fate and one dealer there, who asked to remain anonymous, remains so infuriated by the situation that he declined to comment for this article, fearing that he'd be tempted to launch into an unprintable diatribe.) At any rate, team sports are at long last being played, although the progress is gradual. "We're getting there, but we're not up to full strength yet. Leagues are starting to play again and club sports are getting back to normal," says Aaron Karsh, director of operations at California Pro Sports in Harbor City, CA. "Our outlook is good and we're hoping that every- thing will get back on track. In California, the calendar moved up a bit so things are more of a challenge this year." Karsh notes that orders are up because school teams didn't play a lot last year. "Programs that had money bought uniforms, but didn't use them and others didn't buy uni- forms but now need them," he explains, adding that there is still uncertainty with fundraising. Supply chain issues are still causing head- aches and there are numerous ripple effects. Karsh explains that during the pandemic, many overseas manufacturers changed their tooling to suit changing market demands, while others had trouble obtaining parts such as thread and zippers, all of which impacted product produc- tion and availability. On the bright side, "This presented a good opportunity for us to get rid of back stock from two to three years back and allowed us to move through some of the older stock that we have," he says. Overall, Karsh is looking forward to attending more in-person events. California Pro Sports has a retail trailer that it takes to tournaments and it also wants to be more proactive in retail. Echoing the sentiments of other dealers across America, Karsh declares," I'm excited about being back in a normal cycle and hope it stays that way." l "Inventory is the number one thing because factories are waiting for containers to get unloaded and turned around and prices will go up on everything. Eventually, inventory will catch up with demand, but it's hard to predict when." Todd Garretson, Garretson's Sports Center Although COVID disrupted the usual selling cycle, business is getting back on track for dealers and vendors. • TEAM: BACK TO BUSINESS 2.0

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