I have a thought about what JoeSchmoe said is his post. He stated that smaller companies put more quality into their work and therefore charge more for their stuff. If memory serves me correctly, only Lane 1 seems to jack up their price as a marketing ploy in an attempt to convince the general public that their stuff is better. He included Visionary in there and I am trying to remember when they had higher priced equipment compared to the "big" companies. If anyone has ever tried out the Gargoyle line, you can see ALOT of performance and they RETAIL for $140-150. Their Executioners retailed for $190 and there was enough there to retail those at $220. As far as people using the same equipment, a couple reasons why this happens. First, if you know a friend or someone with high regard in your city that is on staff with a particular company, that automatically gets bowlers close to him interested in that company. Example: Dannial Cohen here in Atlanta is on staff with Track. He had been on staff with Storm for about 5 years. Everyone that knows him found it shocking that he switched because he was extremely loyal to Storm. So, he holds a couple Track Clinics here and invites all he knows to this event. Since then, most of those people who once bought Storm has since bought Track stuff because not only of Dannial's decision to switch (Dannial is not the type of person just to switch on a whim), but those people have personally seen the exceptional performance coming from Track balls. PLUS....having the opportunity to spend time with Chuck Gardner from Track doesn't hurt anything. Another reason why people use the same equipment is that they are already tuned into one company and they are very hesitant to try out another. Most proshops only carry balls from 2 or 3 companies. Dannial does very well at his shop and he carries primarily Track and Storm with a ball or two from Ebonite and MoRich. Outside the Power Groove, he has virtually no Brunswick, no Hammer, no Columbia, no AMF. When this happens, you may only have 4 or 5 high end balls to choose from, 5 or 6 mid performance balls, and only 2 or 3 low end, entry level balls. So everyone using the same stuff is actually pretty easy to have happen.
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Steven Vance
Atlanta (Buford), GA
Pro Shop Operator
Advanced Bowling Solutions
If anyone out there is worried about the scores being too high, try duckpin!!
