wintry mix
Newbie
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- Dec 8, 2020
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DD needed a good HR person to advise them against a poor choice for their HR position.
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The Inevitable 2022 Pros Switching Sponsors Thread
- Thread starter dehaas
- Start date
DD needed a good HR person to advise them against a poor choice for their HR position.
takman
Eagle Member
- Joined
- May 22, 2009
- Messages
- 603
I understand Trilogy being DD, Lat 64 and Westside. But what does that mean for the separate Team members? Any limitations on what they can throw/market between the 3 brands?
Flick Maniac
* Ace Member *
Contract specific I would assume.
My understanding is you can bag discs from any of the 3 but typically your signature disc(s) will be with your primary sponsor.
- Joined
- Jul 29, 2009
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- 15,800
The Lat 64/DD partnership is different; in the case of say DGA, their players can bag Discraft discs but DGA doesn't really gain anything from that. DD is the U.S. Lat 64 distributor, so they DO financially gain from a U.S. run on Lat 64 Daggers. Westside is a sub-brand they both own half of now, so DD has even more to gain from a U.S. run on Westside Harps. The whole operation is more entwined than Innova molding Millennium discs or Discraft molding DGA discs.
In the MVP/Axiom/Streamline example, isn't that straight-up branding as the same people own all three? The MVP owners didn't have any more to gain from "The Shot" having been made with an MVP branded disc or the Axiom disc; it's really all the same thing. At least that's my understanding. I could be wrong.
At any rate, the Lat 64/DD operations are entwined enough that it makes no sense to create a new putter for Ricky Wysocki given that he's already associated with a Lat 64 putter. Plug in and play.
I guess the danger there is what does it do to sales of DD's flagship putter (Judge) when their top player isn't using it, but I'm assuming the Judge has enough of a following at this point that it won't hurt it too much. It just isn't going to go "BOOM" like it would if Wysocki was using it, and that's harder to measure.
TheOtherBill
* Ace Member *
- Joined
- Jul 26, 2010
- Messages
- 2,741
Her move to announce is getting more interesting to me, which might be her plan. She hasn't been the 'make a big splash' player in the past but maybe she's recognizing the need to put herself out there more. Waiting until after all the other 1st and 2nd tier pro's to announce sure moves the spotlight to her too.
Or maybe she doesn't have a deal she's happy with yet?
seedlings
* Ace Member *
What Catrina would be happy with has probably changed a dozen times over the last 2 months. She's waiting till the last minute to bake the cake.
Arisugawa
Par Member
This has been answered in the past, but yes, MVP-sponsored players are typically free to bag discs from all three MVP brands: MVP, Axiom, Streamline. Which is why you'll have an Elaine King Photon, a Sarah Hokom Trace, a James Conrad Envy, etc.
@CD-
Eagle Member
- Joined
- Dec 12, 2020
- Messages
- 829
I'd bet the sponsoring brand is waiting to announce until
- they have all the products stamped/available to post on their site. Maybe they have to wait for a new run of discs/shipment
- videos being produced for announcement/ITB or lining up a interview spot on different podcasts the day(s) following any announcement
- legal reasons (maybe separating from long term sponsor is challenging)
I'd also wager that she has picked out some discs for her bag and is practicing already in preparation for the season.
That's not really what I was unclear on.
In the other cases, the companies are different. Latitude 64 and Dynamic Discs are horribly intertwined in a complicated business partnership, but at the end of the day Latitude 64 is a company run by David Berglund and Dynamic Discs is a company owned by Jeremy Rusco. They are different companies.
MVP, Axiom and Streamline to my knowledge are all owned by the same people. It's more like brands of one company than different companies. I'm not 100% sure of that so that's what I can't state for fact; that's the part I'm unclear on.
Player is sponsored by X brand who also molds Y brand so player can throw Y brand discs is a pretty long-standing standard practice in disc golf.
dehaas
* Ace Member *
What's crazy 3P is that on Johnny Discgolf's YouTube channel a couple nights ago he interviewed Rusco. He was asking questions primarily about the Ricky and Kona signings, and while they were talking about the signing bonus I think Johnny kinda assumed some of that cash was intended to get him off the hook with Innova. Rusco mentioned that Ricky and a lawyer were working that out with Innova but their new deal definitely had verbiage included to cover breaches of contract. He talked about Paige wanting to break her contract to go to DC and said it wasn't worth trying to fight it.
All that you'd expect…but what blew my mind was when he said that everything between them and Latitude was a handshake deal. I know dg has a strong grass roots founding, probably with a bit of anti corporate "The Man" counterculture mixed in but that absolutely floored me. DD has heavily invested in new facilities, which to me is absolute insanity given absolutely zero legal recourse. Yes, the relationship is mutually beneficial since they're Latitude's US distributor…but still…that's a massive limb to go out on.
Moral of the story…the last 2 years…McBeth specifically opened a massive Pandora's Box. DG prior was all word of mouth stuff because that was the culture and vibe. Things are gonna get wild…and there will definitely be some out there who get burned bad. Everybody working in the dg industry up until very recently was doing it as a labor of love. Perfect storm occurs and money starts rolling…now you're talking labor of love type people having to actually run things like a business.
People have talked about a Covid bubble bust…I don't think it will come from new players losing interest and quit playing. If anything it will be from mismanagement of some of the companies involved…we've said for a while that money inside the sport just changes hands…somebody will screw that up and it'll generate a chain reaction. Eventually high dollar pro contracts will result in negligible sales results…not because fewer people are playing, but because everything is saturated.
There was some grumbling in the STL area of DDO severely cutting the pool sizes for women and age protected divisions. I've never traveled to play it, but it sounded like the tiered registration basically filled those fields immediately. Communications were sent asking if the field sizes would be increased based on demand and that's when things got a bit wild. Advanced Womens only had a field of 8 allowed…after years of having a couple dozen in the field.
The response…not enough resources in Emporia so the priority was being placed on spectators. There was some response that they were working on trying to expand fields, but basically the general vibe is the courses outside Emporia are too far to drive and Jones is a hot mess, so we're wanting to accommodate to the paying spectators and not deal with the hassle of working out the logistics of a larger tournament field. Keep in mind…this is the same town hosting 2022 Worlds.
Stuff like that is what's going to upset people and make them want to "keep dg weird" instead of "growing the sport". And the idea has already been floated of local tournament(s) aimed directly at the divisions being snubbed.
All that you'd expect…but what blew my mind was when he said that everything between them and Latitude was a handshake deal. I know dg has a strong grass roots founding, probably with a bit of anti corporate "The Man" counterculture mixed in but that absolutely floored me. DD has heavily invested in new facilities, which to me is absolute insanity given absolutely zero legal recourse. Yes, the relationship is mutually beneficial since they're Latitude's US distributor…but still…that's a massive limb to go out on.
Moral of the story…the last 2 years…McBeth specifically opened a massive Pandora's Box. DG prior was all word of mouth stuff because that was the culture and vibe. Things are gonna get wild…and there will definitely be some out there who get burned bad. Everybody working in the dg industry up until very recently was doing it as a labor of love. Perfect storm occurs and money starts rolling…now you're talking labor of love type people having to actually run things like a business.
People have talked about a Covid bubble bust…I don't think it will come from new players losing interest and quit playing. If anything it will be from mismanagement of some of the companies involved…we've said for a while that money inside the sport just changes hands…somebody will screw that up and it'll generate a chain reaction. Eventually high dollar pro contracts will result in negligible sales results…not because fewer people are playing, but because everything is saturated.
There was some grumbling in the STL area of DDO severely cutting the pool sizes for women and age protected divisions. I've never traveled to play it, but it sounded like the tiered registration basically filled those fields immediately. Communications were sent asking if the field sizes would be increased based on demand and that's when things got a bit wild. Advanced Womens only had a field of 8 allowed…after years of having a couple dozen in the field.
The response…not enough resources in Emporia so the priority was being placed on spectators. There was some response that they were working on trying to expand fields, but basically the general vibe is the courses outside Emporia are too far to drive and Jones is a hot mess, so we're wanting to accommodate to the paying spectators and not deal with the hassle of working out the logistics of a larger tournament field. Keep in mind…this is the same town hosting 2022 Worlds.
Stuff like that is what's going to upset people and make them want to "keep dg weird" instead of "growing the sport". And the idea has already been floated of local tournament(s) aimed directly at the divisions being snubbed.
Orioles_Lefty
Eagle Member
- Joined
- Mar 22, 2017
- Messages
- 597
I listened to the Ultiworld interview with Rusco today. I thought they asked good questions but I wish they had asked about the manufacturing agreement with L64. DD is the biggest disc brand not making their own discs, right?
I'm probably overthinking things, but I wonder if DD saw Ricky's previous sponsorship with L64 to be advantageous to their current business relationship with L64. Having your top sponsored pro putting a disc made by your disc manufacturer and likely throwing other discs made by them would be a different thing than a Discmania player throwing all Discmania back when Innova was manufacturing for DM.
The Ricky sponsorship is like a DD branding sponsorship but one that will ripple across the three brands. That's how it was, in a way, back when he was with L64, except it seems like DD was doing a lot of social media work for a business partner.
I'm probably overthinking things, but I wonder if DD saw Ricky's previous sponsorship with L64 to be advantageous to their current business relationship with L64. Having your top sponsored pro putting a disc made by your disc manufacturer and likely throwing other discs made by them would be a different thing than a Discmania player throwing all Discmania back when Innova was manufacturing for DM.
The Ricky sponsorship is like a DD branding sponsorship but one that will ripple across the three brands. That's how it was, in a way, back when he was with L64, except it seems like DD was doing a lot of social media work for a business partner.
dehaas
* Ace Member *
If Ricky was on Latitude's payroll and not Dynamic's that's pretty much best case scenario for them. Don't have to pay him but he's moving product you're the distributor for.
Rough guesstimate Innova either doubled or tripled what he was getting from Latitude so he bailed. Insert Covid boom dg rich money and DD having a turd winning presence and they're ready to spend some cash now.
Rough guesstimate Innova either doubled or tripled what he was getting from Latitude so he bailed. Insert Covid boom dg rich money and DD having a turd winning presence and they're ready to spend some cash now.
dehaas
* Ace Member *
Took longer to post the link than it probably would take others to google it themselves?
Regardless, point is…until just very very very recently handshake deals is how the entire sport operated. Things are a changing…
For better or worse nobody knows.
dehaas
* Ace Member *
To provide some back story for the newer faces:
Bowling Green Ams was THE amateur tournament of the year for the longest time. Bowling Green was the am equivalent to USDGC if you were trying to get sponsorship eyes on you, and for everybody else it was a giant party.
Glass Blown Open started to be held the same weekend, Trilogy is born, and Emporia becomes the dg Holy Grail for ams. Smallest field in the last 3 years was just under 1100 players, largest just under 1400. Field is being cut in half for what originated as a big amateur tournament and became a big pro event everybody complains about because of the golf course and 30mph winds.
Maybe it's a bigger deal where I'm at because we're smack in the middle of BG and Emporia, both just a couple hours away. People would take a week off work and make it a big dg vacation.
In order to meet the DGPT guidelines changes had to be made, effectively cutting out the people who built your event from the ground up. Those are the things that will stick out with people and make them never want to come back.
All I'm saying is growing pains are coming.
Bowling Green Ams was THE amateur tournament of the year for the longest time. Bowling Green was the am equivalent to USDGC if you were trying to get sponsorship eyes on you, and for everybody else it was a giant party.
Glass Blown Open started to be held the same weekend, Trilogy is born, and Emporia becomes the dg Holy Grail for ams. Smallest field in the last 3 years was just under 1100 players, largest just under 1400. Field is being cut in half for what originated as a big amateur tournament and became a big pro event everybody complains about because of the golf course and 30mph winds.
Maybe it's a bigger deal where I'm at because we're smack in the middle of BG and Emporia, both just a couple hours away. People would take a week off work and make it a big dg vacation.
In order to meet the DGPT guidelines changes had to be made, effectively cutting out the people who built your event from the ground up. Those are the things that will stick out with people and make them never want to come back.
All I'm saying is growing pains are coming.
