Playing at work paying dividends for Classic Sport

BROOMFIELD — At Classic Sport Companies playing street hockey or foosball at work is not discouraged. In fact, it’s considered product testing.

For the 50 employees of Broomfield-based Classic Sport, work is synonymous with play, and it’s this enthusiasm for games that has helped catapult the company from being a garage operation to a nearly $25 million a year business in 10 years.

Classic Sport manufactures a variety of sporting goods products, including balls for team sports, lawn games, such as croquet and badminton sets, and indoor games, such as foosball and air hockey tables.

The company, formerly known as R.A.M. Sports, was started with credit card financing by two principals, Randy Jones and Mike Oister, in their Loveland garages. When they began, their business mission was simple: Make better balls.

In the early 1990s, basketballs, for example, were made out of leather, explained Classic Sport Chief Executive Caryn Ellison. Jones and Oister found that by using a composite of polyurethane, however, they could create a better ball in terms of durability and performance.

“(Classic Sport) was the first to introduce a nonleather basketball, which is now a standard in the industry,” Ellison said. Additionally, the company engineered new balls for other sports, including football, volleyball and soccer.

“We’re focused on innovation and lack of hype. We stand behind our products and believe our products stand on their own. We don’t pay for endorsements,´ said Ellison, about how Classic Sport balls differ from big market players such as Spalding and Wilson.

In September 1994, the duo moved operations to a 350-square-foot space in a Denver incubator and began that year with sales of $424. By the end of the year, sales exceeded $200,000. Within five years, the company had a growth rate of 2,192 percent, earning it a spot as the 86th fastest-growing privately owned company in the United States on the 1999 Inc. 500 list.

While the company appeared to already be on a hot streak, it was a three-pack of miniature balls invented by Classic Sport and introduced to the market in 1999 that Ellison said truly put the company on the map. As a result of booming sales, Classic Sport tripled its revenue from $4.6 million in 1998 to $12.6 million one year later.

To fund further expansion, Classic Sport used an undisclosed sum of private venture backing in 2000 and obtained another smaller round in 2001. Ellison joined the company three years ago and became chief executive officer in 2003. Both Jones and Oister have since left the company to pursue other endeavors.

After a series of moves since 1994 to increasingly larger spaces, Classic Sport settled into its current 43,000-square-foot office and warehouse facility in Broomfield in August 2003. Here, the company designs and sells its merchandise. All Classic Sport products are manufactured overseas.

From the company’s original core products of inflatable team sports balls, Classic Sport expanded its product line to include lawn games such as croquet, bocce, as well as badminton and volleyball sets, and indoor games such as table hockey and table soccer. Classic Sport also has added portable basketball systems, ranging in cost from $200 to $600, and soccer and hockey goals to its offerings.

Additionally, Classic Sport is the parent company of Old School Sports, which manufactures nostalgia-based games, like Sandlot Baseball, beach and water sports balls under a Surf & Turf name, and inventive products such as Soccer Golf.

“We never enter a category unless we are able to offer something new and innovative,´ said Ellison about the company’s direction.

Given the mature market for performance sports balls, Ellison said sales within this category have remained relatively flat. “Because sales are flat, it makes innovation with our products critically important,” she added.

Of the company’s other product offerings, Ellison sees indoor games as a key area with growth potential and forecasts a 10 percent annual increase of sales in tables for the next several years. As an industry, sporting goods manufacturers sold $300,000 in game tables last year, she said. Classic Sport indoor games such as air-hockey tables run $499 to $799.

Classic Sport sells its products through a variety of sporting goods retailers, such as Garts, Galyans and The Sports Authority, and through mass retailers such as Target, Sam’s Club and Costco. During the past 18 months, the company has been expanding its distribution channels to include more alternative venues such as Kohl’s, Cracker Barrel and billiards stores.

Ellison expects Classic Sport to reach $25 million in revenue in 2004.

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