Now that the 2024/25 lacrosse season has finally come to a close here in the UK it gives us a chance to reflect on the fact that our new look store in Hyde is a little over a year old. Back in 2010 when Northern Soul was formed, I could never have imagined that we'd end up in a store that looks anything like it does now.
Every retailer across Europe will claim to be number 1, Europe's biggest, have the widest selection of lacrosse equipment. Well, there's only one Spartacus and if you've every seen the movie Highlander you'll know "In the end, there can be only one"
We've had visitors from across the globe drop by the store this past year including a few American families, 2 of these visitors actually worked at Lacrosse Unlimited in the US and could not believe their eyes when they walked in the building, one of which said "there's no store like this in America"
Last July we had the entire Nederlands women's box lacrosse team visit on a Saturday evening while in the UK for the Tasko Cup. Aussies, Kiwi's, Germans, Swiss and even a family over from Hong Kong. A young Dutch guy was in Manchester with his girlfriend for a long weekend, they'd flown in with carry on luggage but flew home with a couple of very full equipment bags overflowing with lacrosse sticks and every piece of lacrosse gear you could imagine.
Make no mistake, the store does no always look as tidy as in that video. Vending at events can be challenging, the packing and prep, the travelling, set up, crap weather, getting to an event to find out a bunch of teams has dropped out or worse still that a section of an event has been cancelled. You get back to the store after an event, unload the vans, put back in stock and do it all again the next weekend! We love doing events but they can be much harder work than you'd ever think. Sometimes you'll hear someone say "Look, there's a pop up lacrosse shop", if only it popped up!
As in previous years, I'm sure this Summer will see a good number of visitors from various American touring teams drop by the store with their UK host families. I'm sure the kids will end up staying longer now we have a goal in the store to snipe a few corners. Even when we were based at Woodend Mill, players from visiting tour teams used to say how much better our store was compared to their local lacrosse stores back home.
It's not been easy getting to this point. The margins are tight when you import 95% of the products you sell from the US, the tariff issue is yet to hit us and there is much confusion among all the major lacrosse brands. By this point in the year brands have normally sent booking information for the upcoming year and we'd have placed our orders for a years worth of products. We can only assume that equipment will become for expensive and that all the brands will want to hold less stock in their warehouses going forward, there is much uncertainty and it is slightly reminiscent of the Covid years. With little to no lacrosse for nearly 2 years during the pandemic it was a difficult period for many businesses, I felt like we were selling sun beds during a 2 year heat wave. It was a tough time for us financially and mentally. Take a look at the video on YouTube.
We hustled hard during the pandemic, selling mystery boxes, training aids for players to practice on their own, we used the time to produce content to keep people interested in lacrosse at a time we were unable to play. The move to the new store seems to have made those tough years like a lifetime ago.
When I think how far we've come as a business it makes me immensely proud of what my father and I have achieved. Thanks to all the staff members, family, teammates and friends that have assisted along the way, it's been a tough journey at times but enjoyable at the same time. Although we have recovered pretty well from the pandemic, our sport is still hurting in terms of the number of players and teams. As a company that lives and breathes the sport, we are committed to helping rebuild the game in whatever way we can.
Stepping down from playing lacrosse and coaching the seniors at my home club Wilmslow has given the club a little more direction. It's actually been one of the post Covid success stories, we faced folding just before and after the pandemic and yet this year started a B team, fielded regular junior teams for the first time in 7 years and have seen a solid number of women join our ladies team too. Lacrosse in the Midlands has also been one of the growing areas of the game, well done to those who are working so hard to push the sport in those areas.
There's a few tournaments across the country that we might have attended in past years that we didn't vend at our the past years due to coaching commitments, some events being cancelled due to rain or lack of interest. Never before has a Referees Trophy not taken place. Unfortunately, the costs involved in attending some events as a vendor are just too high to justify being there, we do enjoy vending at events and will continue to support them where and when possible but at the end of the day we must run as a proffet making business.
This year I took on a leading role in organizing the Nick Kehoe International, an event that had previously run under a few different names over 27 years. My Father Clive has run the tournament during that time but he'd made it clear that 2024 was his last as he has had to commit more time to care for my wheelchair bound mother, who has too given 35 years to this sport, my parents have been been nothing more than devoted servants to the game of lacrosse. As a family we are 140 years in and counting.
I'd run camps, touring teams, coached multiple national squads but the NKI was the first time taking on a tournament. Building a team of like minded and committed people was the key to success, many of those people went above and beyond in terms of the time they gave up to help. There's defiantly some improvements we can make to the tournament and we are looking closely at the feedback from teams as to how we can make both men's and women's sides of the event run smoother, provide more playing time and hopefully raise the overall standard of the lacrosse we see played over the two days.
Strangely I've some mutterings about why the Nick Kehoe Tournament is run commercially. This year even more so. Firstly, all events could and should be run in a more professional manor. Being an amateur sport is not a reason to run things in an amateur fashion. Secondly, what's the incentive for a club to host an event a big event if they can't make money from it? That money ALL goes back into the host club and helps them develop and improve coaching, recruitment, facilities and so much more but in short it goes back into the game. Thirdly, every sport is trying to engage with sponsors so why on earth would lacrosse be any different? Thanks to some of the money raised in advance we were able to secure funds to stream the event with the assistance of Lacrosse Live UK and this years event had greater coverage than ever before. You'll have noticed that a number of sponsors had logo placed during the game and adverts during quarter and half time, it's not rocket science and maybe others should take note as many teams and family members were very disappointed by the lack of online coverage from North Flags Finals this year.
The Fly starts this weekend so get ready to be spammed on all social media. Some people might be buzzing for it but not I. This will be year 5 of the event and frankly it is hemorrhaging money, there's certainly some people making money from Sixes lacrosse with camps popping up left right and center but the costs involved in running The Fly far outweighs the money it brings in. More lacrosse is great but at what cost?
The financial climate can make forecasting and planning difficult but having control of your budget and having the ability raise funds prior to spending the cash is important to make any project profitable. It's all to easy to spend money.
We have a couple of ambitious projects we are working on that we hope will help grow our sport from the bottom upwards. Its fantastic that so many people are introduced to lacrosse at University but the those who pick up a stick at an early age, are coached and nurtured by experienced coaches and given regular competition have proven to be players that excel. If you've been involved in youth lacrosse in the UK you'll know first hand how few teams there are now and for that a decade on from the loss of the LDO program we disastrous effect it has had on club lacrosse and how fragile the club game has become.
It would be great to have an everlasting pot of gold that we could throw at the sport but no such pot exists. Our efforts need to be well targeted geographically, budgeted accordingly and executed well. Credit where credit is due, there are people working hard right now to provide more lacrosse to players and that's awesome but we need to increase that player pool massively.