Wondering what to wear to play pickleball? Founders Stephen Soller and Jewlz Fahn of the super stylish brand “Rally Club” join us and share why pickleball apparel needed an upgrade. They discuss which products are hot sellers, what to expect in their new lines, and where to pick up some awesome merch!
For 15% off, use SIMPLY15 at www.rallyclub.net
Rally Club Simply Pickleball Transcript
Introduction with founders Stephen Soller and Jewlz Fahn
tennis and pickle ball are very similar to skiers and the snowboarders skiers
hate the snowboarders tennis players don’t love the pickle ball players we
are the snowboarders we’re the cool kids I’m Crystal Brown your host are you wondering what you should be wearing on
the courts to play pickle ball well Founders Steven Soler and Jules Fawn of the super stylish brand rally Club have
some ideas they join us and share why they felt that pickle ball apparel needed an upgrade what products are
super hot sellers what to expect with their new lines and of course where you can pick up some of this awesome merch
all right now to the show Welcome to Simply pickle ball the podcast where we discuss all things pickle ball the
fastest growing sport in America and around the world we are interviewing the founders industry leaders athletes
lovers of the sport that are driving the spectacular growth if you love pickle ball as much as we do listen
in all right well Jules and Steven thank you so much for joining today we’re super excited to hear about your brand
rally club and how it got started and everything about it and of course we’re going to talk about pickle ball um so
maybe we can start there with um Jules maybe you can tell us what brought you to pickle ball and and and how Stephen
knew you even liked pickle ball I um actually got into pickle ball a little
over a year ago close girlfriend of mine asked me if I wanted to take a clinic and I was like I had no idea what it
even was everybody was talking about it pickle ball I’m like is it with a bat
and a ball like I had no idea that there was a paddle and a net I had no idea so
we went to a local Country Club and took some clinics and I was hooked so much
fun loved the social aspect about it and how it’s a little similar to tennis but
I think the thing that’s so different is the social aspect yeah tennis it’s Uber
competitive and you really don’t interact with your opponent where I feel
with pickle ball you can laugh and talk and Heckle and
compliment all in the same game yes and I became hooked so quickly that’s
amazing and Stephen ironically we knew through a mute his partner my partner
now we have sons that are the same age that played basketball together many
years ago and now we’re at College together and even in fraternity W and so
I’ll let Stephen business end started but we all kind
of comingled so Crystal it’s kind of it’s like one of these things in life
Creation of Rally Club brand
right so Johnny’s a really good friend of mine we grew up in a similar Town um
he’s uh a couple of grades below me um and we have also common friends and
stuff and we live very close to each other and we often hike hot dogs we have retrievers and we take them up in the in
the canyons and we go hiking you know so I called Johnny up it was just like a simple conversation and I said Johnny
let’s go hike the dogs you know so Johnny goes oh you know I wish I could but my back’s really hurting me and I
think I need to walk flat I don’t know if I should go hiking and maybe I to take it easy so conversation continues
and I said to Johnny oh my God you know we’re getting so old you know we can’t go hiking and you know everybody else
I’m calling is playing pickle ball so what is this pickle ball you know at
this rate our dogs aren’t going to get hiked and what is this pickle ball it’s just like that’s all I’m hearing when I
call my friends they’re going I can’t I have pickle ball so let me so just to be
clear when you say Johnny this this is John and Sav your the other partner yeah my partner so so so so you know we we
would just like you know talk and you know we we friendly and we’ve both been in the apparel business for many many
years um we’ve had a lot of success in lots of different areas right so as a joke I say to Johnny you know maybe we
should come up with like a pickle ball line not even like really thinking just like talking you know yeah so Johnny
goes yeah you know maybe there’s something there you know and I said to him but we need a name that we can rally
around that’s simple right so Johnny Goes rally I think that’s it so W’s
talking to me I take my iPhone and I type out rally and I go ra and I leave a
big gap and then I do two L’s and I leave a big gap and I put the Y because I love the play of Stripes you know if
you look at our logo when in sports where or if you think of Adidas or anybody there’s got to be something that
you know people notice of your brand so you can kind of try build a brand right so he looks at that and he goes wow you
know so then the conversation goes okay maybe we should kind of pursue this so
we Johnny swa’s an incredible graphic artist and we um we start looking at you
know some other graphic people that we know in the industry and we come up with
the brand as you see it right um I have a cap I can show you um no so so so
essentially I love it yeah so essentially what we did is this is kind of how it came up we did lots of
different variations in lots of different colors but the Double L was something we wanted to stand out we
wanted the stripe the r looks like a batter a ball and the a is almost the paddle right so when we started showing
the logo around people went oh my God that is excellent and it took color it
took color so great you could you know every time we changed the color of it it
just looked like amazing you know yeah yeah so then we thought you know maybe we have something you know it’s but it’s
just a logo you know I mean there’s such a long way to having a brand from a logo you know so we thought okay you know
let’s go make a bunch of stuff we’ll do like a tiny little bit of production and
you know we made like I don’t know like maybe 1,200 pieces across a whole bunch of different ideas that we had and at
that time time we made a conscious decision not to go after traditional tennis wear or active wear you have Alo
you have Lulu you have so many companies doing it and they’re so excellent at it you have Wilson doing tennis you have
feler so we thought if we going into court stuff right away right you know what are we G what are we doing you know
it’s just Uber competitive and you know how do you scale that so you know we started like thinking it through and we
thought you know let’s relook at this whole thing and let’s make it fun let’s
give it color let’s do you know the lifestyle around Country Club let’s use
pickle ball as a way to kind of embellish on that concept because we feel you know after Co country clubs
became important again for people and you know people came back and started playing golf and it was a way to
socialize again you know people have been isolate isolated and to jules’s point and what I’ve seen because I’m not
as an Aid pickle Bower as Jules but I’ve gone to so many events and the social
aspect is part of this whole thing where people go and they meet and you know as
you said tennis is Uber competitive tennis is a very hard game to play very well pick Ball’s got a dead ball you
know it’s a whle ball so anyone that comes on a court immediately can get a rally going you know no matter what age
no matter what you can’t go on a tennis court and go serve overhand and you know the ball’s like all over the show with
the record yeah barriers to entry are amazing for people to feel good about
their activity right away just getting back to to the brand so that’s so that’s essentially kind of how the name came
about yeah and yeah and then you know we made the stuff and we
did like a a trunk show at a store and we sold like about 90 pieces in a couple
hours and you what what kind of store was this was this um it was just a regular mom and pop retail store it
wasn’t a sporting good store it was a fashion store and we thought wow you know maybe these are just because you
know people like the colors or we we couldn’t kind of figure out what people really liked at that point okay yeah but
fast forward to jewels so then um Johnny’s wife says oh you know I have a
really good friend her name is jwes she’s completely crazy about pickle ball playing pickle ball all the time she’s
exactly our customer you know and you know she’s lives in the palace and knows
a lot of people that are into pickle ball so we thought okay you know do we really have something was it the retail
store what was it right organized as an event at a we I call them bake sales it
was like a sale at Johnny’s house it was 11:00 till 2 o’clock on a Thursday
during the week so immediately I’m thinking oh there’s no ways this is going to be anything you know we’re
wasting our time it’s it’s kind of long story short Jules shows up it’s a Thursday Jules how many pieces did we
Introduction to the market
sell I think like 70 at least it was crazy and what was the Jules what was the mood
like what were were people like oh my god I’ve been waiting for this brand or it’s funny because I feel like if you
personally were to get on the computer and you were to Google pickle ball clothes pickle ball entire pickle wear
it’s dorky I mean I don’t think that you can find many things that you personally
would be like wow I want to wear that yeah and I play with a lot of people and I I know a lot of people who like the
sport so when I saw the line I was like oh my God this is super cute you know
it’s kind of where if you were to put take pickle ball and they were to marry
this like cool cozy comfy Country Club and this was the baby that was birth so
all of these friends of mine that came in this short time frame they just ate it all up they loved the
colors they loved the style and it’s just something different than they had
really ever seen before well that’s so that’s a good question Stephen I mean you know you have a background in
apparel um and so and and big businesses and so does Jonathan you know some big
well-known Brands um you know this could have just been a trunk show Mom and Pop
sell some things you’ve picked you know the Right audience but I imagine you weren’t wouldn’t be spending your time
building a brand if you thought it was just going to be kind of a small subset right you must be able to see that it
could be something much bigger I imagine yeah you know the the reaction to the collection was very
positive so we were very encouraged that we were on a track you know because we always concerned you know what are
people going to wear on the court what are people going to wear around the country club you know we made these amazing button- down shirts that you can
wear like as a cover up over I call them your lululemons or over your your way
you know because sometimes you in if in Miami or in La you don’t want to go put on you know a knit or a hoodie it’s nice
to have like a crisp cotton garment we added our you know our branding to it
and you know we we didn’t want to just become a t-shirt line we didn’t didn’t want to just become we didn’t want to
get labeled right away in what we could do you know yeah so we thought to keep
it super elevated so in terms of our product and the quality that we sell
um our knit portion is as good as it gets um you couldn’t make better
t-shirts anywhere in the world and what we’re making it’s Suba cotton it’s you
know um really really incredible Yarns that we using and the women that are
purchasing the stuff or trying it on are seeing that right away they kind of relate to some other brands that they
have been buying that are you know high-end in high-end retailers and everything right so we made a conscious
effort to do that because we didn’t want to go to jules’s point and do stuff
that’s inexpensive and got silly logos and you know we wanted to to be comprehensive we wanted it to be thought
out so we worked of a color palette that we thought was relevant to what we were doing and we stuck to that H we create
“I Can’t I Have Pickleball” becomes best seller
created the Whole Net nitline we created a bunch of different graphics and uh I
can’t to have pickle ball kind of was one of our original conversations so we thought
okay let’s put that on a T-shirt and let’s put that on a h cap and this cap
is our best seller I was just gonna ask you what some of your best sellers were yeah um I know I because I looked at
your site and immediately I wanted to get one of those yeah so this cap and
then this um this is one of the crews that that that we do H broke this is one
of the crews that we that we sell and this is like such a beautiful fabric and it also has you know but it’s the color
as well the textile the the fabric is just so amazing you
know perect so so then we kind of you know we had to
like make certain decisions in terms of graphic and and and how we go forward and and what we do but can you tell me
Stephen your maybe to go back a little bit into your back ground because if
someone was just getting into the apparel industry they may not know the difference between a sepa cotton or the
exact how to put the logo on so it’s not going to peel off so yeah you must have
something you must have a few years of experience understanding Brands okay interestingly enough okay so I’ve had a
bunch of of of brands in the past and my first company was was a company that
made dresses and we sold nean Marcus Bloomingdale’s B we sold every highend we had like 2 boutiques and every
department store and I bought all my Fabric in Europe in Italy and Switzerland all over bought the Fabrics
into the states made everything here and what I really did the success of that company was fabric all over the world
had a certain Essence and Italians did it a certain way and people people in in
France did it a certain way and what I did was I played into everyone’s strengths and I created this incredible
um clothing collection and it was really like an eye to detail and really working with people where they could be the best
you know fabric was almost like baking a cake back then that’s you know narge change with technology and digital
printing and all that so it’s kind of even the playing field and a lot of these companies that have been 100 been
around for 100 years are struggling against technology you know but so when it came to the pickle ball line I took
the same approach I thought okay you know I’m not really um from the nut
background from the T-shirt background you know that’s more casual I’ve been more from like a woven background where
I’m buying silk fabrics and and that kind of stuff and and Manufacturing everything Johnny funny enough
comes um more from the knit background all his businesses that he’s been involved in um in the past or or a lot
of them were premium um knit and t-shirt companies you know very successful so
when we started talking about it you know I took on the challenge to kind of obviously I I know about fashion and I
know about fabric so there was just like you know working with good people again that we felt would get us where we
wanted to go and Johnny had some really really excellent Connections in the business in this uh uh particular um uh
kind of of of of fashion and you know we went into it and we gave it our sense of
color and our sense of what we um thought would be kind of new and we we
we wanted it to be kind of like exciting we wanted it to have like appe peel like like if you send selling something
digitally you know it needs to have great colors and some when somebody walks into a store even when I was
selling my dresses and my other thing the first thing you’re going to see is color and fabric yeah you know if it’s something you like a color or a fabric
then you’re going to go grab it and then you’ll put it on and if it fits and Etc then and I and I really think so Jules
you must know some of the audience and you know because by the way not everyone plays pickleball at a country club but
it does have that feel of you know a racket sport feel right but so what were
Rally Club takes off
you hearing right away from people that were playing you know where you play or outside of where you play they’re loving
it because really there even without throughout like all of the
fashion there are not many pickle ball apparels out there yeah so you’ve got
tennis or you’ve got your athletic wear like your Lulu lemons people were really
loving it and it’s funny the especially the I can’t I have pickle ball and the bright colors are they just make it poot
well that’s that’s a good question right so tennis has been tennis brands have been around and and luxury brands on the
tennis court have been around but again for you guys to create a new brand and think that there’s a market there and
not and not have it just be a little hobby um you must have thought that there’s a reason that there needs to be
a new brand or there there there’s a reason that that something fresh would would resonate well and I’m curious like
what what you saw out there that you know did you see anything like what you’re build what you guys are building
from a brand perspective or any other apparel like it yeah you know um I I
mean what we live in California so you have a lot of different California lifestyle Brands you have a brand
Aviator Nation that’s pretty well known I was gonna ask you about them so so so
we all grew up with Aviator because our kids wear it you know it started with a little store in Abott Kenny and I mean
they’ve done a phenomenal job of capturing California lifestyle and it’s not a surf brand it’s really a
California brand you know and uh the owner’s done such an amazing job of
staying true to her brand and and what she’s done you know so funnily enough when we did a we did an event at the
Hill Crest Country Club on Thursday night and the pro that’s uh working on
the whole pickle ball um their pickle ball yeah whatever
they’re doing he he came over and he’s been there for 14 years and he came over to the collection I think he was an art
student at school you know and he came up to me and he’s been around tenis wear and traditional stuff and country club
wear you know the polo you know the traditional stuff and he looks at him and he said you know I know my customers
these women they play with me you know and yeah you guys nailed
it what do you mean we nailed it he said you know if I was doing it I would do it
exactly like you so I said tell me like I was so interested you know yeah yeah you guys look like The Aviator nation of
country clubs yeah I was thinking The Aviator nation of pickleball because I mean could you imagine you know Aviator
Nation didn’t just sell to Malibu right like it’s cross the country it’s it’s
gone you know and and just like pickle ball is not just in California at
country clubs right it’s it’s literally being played everywhere around America and and even even globally so you have
this huge Market um but Aviator Nation did some interesting things like they
have a spinning class in one of their stores I mean could you imagine combining pickle ball courts with your
line someday okay so so so so exactly so so so so we in this right now and the
questions you’re asking and what you’re saying are exactly all this right so now we we we we doing this Jules has taken
me on a lot of Adventures from different country clubs um we’ve done different popups or all over right and the one
thing that I’m seeing that’s keeping us really motivated to keep this thing going and to put in you know a big
effort is the emotion around the product and a brand is an emotion and Aviator is
A brand is an emotion
it’s an emotion you know people want to be part of that and so what I noticed with the pickle ball um participation is
people would show up and whatever game they would
at most of the events and the pickle ball would start and all of a sudden these adults became kids again and I was
like watching them and I was so fascinated at the emotional um response to this game they
were fist pumping high-fiving um hugging each other
shouting at each other you know it was like suddenly this like this this this
thing that was going on and was like tangible and I’m thinking oh my God you
know this it’s very different I you didn’t mention people breaking their paddles or throwing them down on the
court which also happens in addition to the high fiving but but I think I think you’re
absolutely oh okay um I you know you’re
you’re also seeing a lot of uh paddles being broken and thrown down on the courts so there’s a little bit of both
but I’m teasing but I think I think you’re right that element of turning kid-like and this element of play I
actually interviewed a documentary filmmaker who’s making a film called the game Cher all about pickle ball and what
like what is it that people are completely infatuated with and I think it does bring out that element of play
which is actually kind of a youth serum if you want to call it since there are people that play into their 90s and also
are playing um now in Youth so I mean so you guys have this basically an
exploding Market you have an opportunity but you’ve kind of picked a place to start that maybe feels like something
you know like Luxury Line right like there’s and and and that must be very
purposeful I’m curious you know how you see that brand so so so going back into
like kind of how we figured it we figured you know we need to use some of the cache of what we learned about the
clothing business in the past right so when we um were successful in our other
brands it was very tied to the retailers that you supplied so if people saw you
in Fred seagull and Ron Herman and in bares then they associate that brand oh my god look where these guys look at the
stores they in right this guy these guys look legit the stuff’s amazing and it’s
it’s it’s based on the store you know today things have have changed a lot because the retail environment’s changed
a lot and a lot of retail successful retail is about a shopping experience
not just about buying something because that you can do online you know right look at these these these these amazing
stores that have such a great experience when you walk in whether there’s food and coffee or drinks or how they’ve
curated it with art and you know different events and different people speaking that’s what people want to do
Rally Club partners with Fred Segal in Malibu
right now so jeweles myself and Johnny um put on an event with Fred seagull in
Malibu and uh at was it started off from a very humble conversation and we had
some very ambitious plans to have this whole pickle ball tournament and it was pickle ball in Malibu with Fred seagulls
and we were all so excited and Fred seagulls saw the product and they went oh my God this stuff is amazing go for
it right and we were going wow this is such a great start you know a lot of Our
Brands started in the Fred seagulls like humbly and then people saw it you know right next thing Jules gets involved
with um you know the whole project and we have little different dates going on
and then you know there’s different properties and different land owners in terms of how Malibu works and there’s
permits that are needed and all these different things are going on but at the end of the day we put on such a
successful event um we put I think there was about 300 units that went into the store that day the the displays were
amazing um there’s some of it on our Instagram you could see all the mannequins we gave all the all the staff
different caps we had a a pro there dressed up in US stuff we had a bunch of pickle ball going on and the whole
Community the amazing thing and I mean J’s can talk a little bit about it but she she went everywhere and I mean tell
them about the community and how they resp I’m curious Jules how you know to pull off a successful event like that a
you need to know how to do that so there must you must have some experience with that but also you must you have to think about all the details like how do I make
this really successful there are well you know aside from our clothes being
the main focus we had to think what is something that we can do that is going to stand out so it’s not
just oh Fred seagull’s selling rally Club come to our event because nobody
nobody knows yet what that is right exactly so we came up with the idea to
put pickle ball in the parking lot and we brought in a pro and we taped up we
had the you know the court and we had the net and we had the pro doing drills
we I went went around to the entire Community letting them know that we
wanted this to be a community event you know of course we’re putting a main focus on rally club and Fred seagull
sure but it’s also Malibu Centric we want everybody to feel involved and
that’s really a big part of rally Club is that everyone is invited everyone is
included we are an allinclusive Club be a part of our club
welcome to our club so we I went around we got different stores
donated uh different items from their stores to be raffled off they gave us things to put in our gift bags we gave
out 200 gift bags that had uh Sephora
inside we had um you know Barefoot dreams gor raffled off something we had
big names that were really getting excited about being involed involved with us we had restaurants we had
alcohol Watertown whiskey J Chine Sky duster beer and you know we we like to
have fun we are not a stuffy boring company you take a look at our product and we’re going to represent yeah so so
let’s talk about that for a second um you showed me some of your products you have a a fellow um the
guy wonder I was wondering when you were gonna talk about him because that was kind of also like a a kind of of fny
thing here’s our guy right our yes so so tell me you know again you’re the main
designer right Stephen and and you’re you’re sitting around and how do you come up with this pickle dollar guy you
know well well listen it’s a collaboration because we have a lot of different people involved um I’m just
one of them and um you know it involves graphic arts it involves styling you
know we have a good stable of of people in our our Corner between Johnny Johnny’s wife and my wife’s also was a
very very successful designer in her day and she designed really ready high in clothing for many years and so we have a
lot of talent around us which ising yeah it’s been very helpful because you know to be competitive today and to really
really look at things you know you have to have such an open mind yeah and so what I’m I’m pretty much the brand
police like if you go off brand then I’m going to come down on you that’s really
important because you know people go oh let’s do carpet income and let’s do all these different things and let you know
but I I wanted to really be brand ready all the time so I feel like a lot of my
energies is being the brand police and then but I also have to come up with Solutions and make sure that it does
look brand right anyway I can’t just be saying that but anyway how the guy came up um in the 80s there was a famous post
of be Bor and he has a headband on it was a famous post and it was at the
Roland Garis Stadium it was the French Open and the back of him with his blonde hair and the and the um sweatband band
you know so we we we we were toying around with like different ideas and we were working with a graphic artist and
you know we we kind of like flipped him around or he appeared like flipped around with the headband on and oh my
God like what is this guy you know and then as we looked at it you know we
thought H you know me and Johnny have been doing this for so long you know can’t we just be behind the scenes and
can’t the guy be like everything can’t he be like the pro can’t he be the
designer can he be the spokesperson so like when we started we put on an event you know we made the guy the guy was
like our he was like our spokesperson come join us so then you know we we kind of developed him we gave him a name his
name is Harry club and Harry what is his name Harry Club Harry Club it’s just
like it’s an internal name you know you look at like if you look at this and
there’s one of the pink hats that we embroidered it on and it says rally Club you know rally Club great so anyway when
when we put it on and and my kid started looking at and my son grabbed the one crew and he goes Dad this is so street I
said what you Street he saids look at the dude he’s like street I’ll wear that
you know and then we thought oh that’s like so cool you know right if your kid thinks it’s cool then you know it’s like yeah
that’s like so street that look at the guy you know so then anyway so he’s kind of we’re developing him you know he’s
um part of our graphics and he is part of our our he is a
spokesperson um you know we have to see where where we go with him well I think it’s you know it kind of ties back into
pickle ball really is a sport that can be for anyone I mean you again as a
brand you pick a focus you can pick a a potential customer um so maybe that’s a
country club but but the truth is it’s being played everywhere you know at every playground at any Corner any in
any place people can draw lines but I think to me the Harry Harry Club really
kind of um symbolizes that he’s not stuffy even you know he’s he’s really
approachable and he’s kind of the everyday dude and and there’s a little bit of Harry in everyone yeah because
like when you go to these places and you see the pro there he could be a Harry yes he knows all the women he knows
everything about pickle ball he knows he knows everything about fashion yes you know and he’s so excited being involved
and seeing people that aren’t normally active suddenly being active and the pro
is the center of the attention again like when we brought our Pro or a pro that Jules met that works in Beverly
Hills to the Malibu um event and he was still personable and he’s been dealing
with this demographic and loving his new found um activity he he he was just so
great naturally you know it wasn’t like oh my God just put your personality on and just be so great it just happened
you know and he could have been a Harry he didn’t have a beard did he Jules a
mustache so Jules I mean that’s again like for you you you’re dedicating your
time youve you’ve committed to this right and which takes away from playing pickle ball and Stephen you you’re sort
Is Rally Club the next Aviator Nation?
of putting your your your quote unquote ass on the line I don’t know if I can say that um your butt on the line here
like with your brand because it’s you have a reputation in the industry so does anyone you’re bringing in right um
so you guys have to believe that maybe you could be the next Aviator Nation or even something bigger than Aviator
nation that that because your line is it could be exposed to people again all
over the country and right now it’s going global there’s Collegiates pickle
ball there’s minor league there’s Major League I mean it’s on TV now you have sort of this opportunity to crack open
and I’m curious if that’s where you see it going or do you feel like well we would we just want to kind of go towards
maybe the Malibu crowd or the LA crowd like you know how do you because you could go either way again we’re going
big or going home but you know it’s kind of when you go to
these events and you see the people and exactly what you’re saying I mean I mean I’m originally from South Africa which is a I’m from Cape Town which is a
little Beach town right small little community and you know you come I came to the states in 88 and you come into a
country like this and I mean California you look at all the different states and everything I mean it’s just the
population is so incredible you know yeah and things like work yeah like like for
example we’re sitting on a podcast right now talking about rally Club pickle ball where else in the world would that
happen nowhere right it’s going to be lots of places it’s just you heard it here first yeah I’m just saying you know
we we have a podcast and I’m going what you have a podcast what why like you
know but but to your point right um so what we did we we always inserch a proof
of concept I’m going to every event because I really need to be around the customer when they look at the goods I’m
trying to get as much information as I can you know and I mean it’s a lot of work being present at all these things
but it’s like so so important um and so
so as part of the stages we decided okay let’s get a New York showroom you know a traditional clothing show so we went
into New York tell me before is that common at this stage for Brands I I’ve never been in the apparal industry you
know it’s in in the past showrooms were the way to distribute your product it was pretty much the only way traditionally I mean years ago there
were like 2,000 vibrant boutiques in America you know in the 80s and the ’90s and you know there’s been so many
Paradigm shifts in clothing and in apparel and how things are distributed and how retailers survived with
department stores and house apartment stores you know are trying to survive today with online and direct a consumer
and all their challenges you know so this clothing business has been in a
paradigm shift you know since the 80s and it’s forever changing and you know you see Brands come and go and you see
you know rags to riches and and there’s so many different things going on you know right so what we thought is we
Bloomingdales picks Rally Club for pickleball line
can’t just be traditional and just think one way um otherwise you know we could
get stuck and you know we need to explore every opportunity so we thought let’s put it in a traditional showroom
and we put it in a in a in a in a in a fantastic showroom in New York and we didn’t really know what to expect and we
put it through like a market week so that’s when people make appointments they come to the showroom we knew we
were expensive so we weren’t like um you know we were we had to be in excellent
stores that carry really good brands right and so after the first Market we got some really really good orders and
we were pretty fascinated wow you know this is not a sporting goods store this is not a pro shop at a country club this
is a fashion store and these are really good fashion stores you know are you talking about like the Fred seagull of
the world Bloom andales came in and they gave us an order if you go into Bloom’s
website they have something called Carousel now where they have all their active Weare Brands and they have
something that’s pretty pickle Centric right now with some bats and stuff and they chose us to represent so they
bought you have the pleated skirt the pink ple skirt there they bought that uh
they bought I can’t have pickle in a longsleeve t-shirt they bought this player hat so cute aren’t they so cute
and then they bought they bought our pink sweats you know so all of a sudden
we you know we we in Bloomingdales and they’re doing very well with the product um you know
we love it so those these are some of your bestsellers yeah they they they you know
and you know what’s so interesting honestly like bestsellers yes it depends how people see it you know and it
depends how people buy it like at Hill Crest on Thursday we sold a little bit
of everything it was so crazy you know we sold like every part of our collection was B that’s I mean that’s
amazing right like that’s the goal so I mean and are you guys is your goal to uh
be e-commerce direct to Consumer and and if so are you you know that’s a that’s a
big challenge right you have to distribute you have to ship you have returns like is that what you’re handling Jews all of the Johnny is
handling that okay Johnny is handling like most of the operational side of it
um he’s got a uh yeah he’s got a a very good um handle on you know e-commerce
and uh on on the website and he’s been involved in that over the last few years so his expertise there has been
completely valuable to us so that’s kind of where the lanes are like Jules Jules is is is is like promoting us and
selling for us and out there with the public and wearing the stuff around the community and really building a community she’s done such a great job of
that you know I’m dealing with like all the fashion and the samples and the showrooms and getting the stuff made and
you know getting it on time and Johnny’s dealing with the logistics and the online portion you know if you look at
our website it didn’t just happen you know it required some stuff you know but direct to Consumer is a very very
important part of our business and um because we have as you said then you have reach everywhere do you and and did
you guys raise money to uh start this brand has this been self-funded are you guys sort of bootstrapping wow do you
think that you could you imagine that you will take in investors from outside you know I think what I think what we
Dallas goes nuts over Rally Club
really really need I don’t think it’s about the money right now it’s more about the knowhow like like for us like
money okay it all obviously helps you know but what do you do with it you know for me it’s noan and and like what I
understand and what I’ve seen you know and at this stage of our life you know we’re dealing with with with with people
that really know what they doing in our little um our little group that we’ve created you know so I think like if we
have weaknesses you know you know maybe maybe that’s kind of you know maybe an
influencer or maybe somebody that can really help us build certain areas that we need you know those are viable things
that we would look for you know but in terms of of of just like taking money you know I don’t know what it would
change for us right now because you know we we’re doing what we can you know based on the success of the new York sh
we sent the line to one of my Dallas reps that I’ve worked with in the past and it was a conversation it was
actually kind of a silly conversation it’s funny how these things work I love I love part of this part so we were thinking of of getting a van for jewels
and putting rally on it and putting the man on it and parking it outside ear one
in the Palisades now are you open to that Jules Jules was
loving it we’re turning Jules into a Harry we’re getting to drive her around okay
this is all the joking that we this is how we we’ve been talking you know so we thought oh yeah let’s get jewels a van
and and you know go on on that whole you know Adventure so I’m on Instagram and
I’m my Dallas showroom they have a beautiful Mercedes van and during they do their Market week and then in Dallas
traditionally she would do a road trip where she’d put all the samples in the road on in the van and go on the road
and visit the retailers because they have these these relationships which are so fantastic that’s like old school you
know right and I love that and I’m trying to send that to js on Instagram
and as you can see my technology trying to get on so I sent it back to Allison
by mistake instead of forwarding it to J me haha Stephen how you doing what’s
going on I said to her oh my God I’m so happy you actually restart you know we
started this pickle line we put it in New York and I think your show would be perfect for it right so she goes oh my
God let me see it I go I send her onto the website she goes I want it I want it now I prepare a box of samples I send it
to her the next day because Dallas Market week started that day next God I
mean it was like so ridiculous like and then the Box goes over she opens the Box she puts it in the showroom and people
go crazy I was just going to say if I could imagine like the the second most
perfect place right you guys are in LA and you know you know the LA scene but
you go to Dallas and pickle ball is huge there I mean Mark cubin bought a team
right and he’s the billionaire in Dallas owns the Dallas Mavericks but he also owns one of the major league pickle ball
it’s just huge there um and I can and you could just imagine your line pretty
much all over the place there Dall loves color you see yeah so you know the pinks
and all the colors are just so fantastic so that was kind of like okay and then
then then I mean this is kind of how it’s how it’s been going you know and then uh we we say to Jules you know we
you know we need to Target all the country clubs we we always like coming with ideas to improve our distri distribution and Jules gets hold of a
Jules tell them about your Hawaii experience so Jules goes to
Kona well it our the line is it’s it’s very Al like because it is Country Club
it’s also Resort yeah where so while I was on the
big island of Hawaii I thought I’m just going to bring my sample line um I play
Pickleball out there I love it and I know that it’s big there as well so I
met with the monani AL bege who loved it and H life for Seasons loved it and
they’re like we need this festive festive is like their big big holiday
season oh so it it is we’re kind of I think what’s interesting you’re you know
the that Dallas loves color yes but if you think about when people turn to play
and they’re on the court it kind of gives them permission to go outside of their their comfort zone so maybe they
would wear a pink skirt on the on the pickle ball court but they wouldn’t necessarily wear it to work or you know
they it’s it allows people people to sort of bring out that kid-like or they’d wear a funny hat um you know I
can’t I play pickle or with the dude on it Harry um but they wouldn’t necessarily do that outside of the
pickle ball cord so I do think you guys are really tapping into what the essence of pickle ball is which is it’s it’s
people it’s it’s I mean so much more fun than stuffy tennis or I have to I have
so so if you look at our little hang tag I don’t know if you’ve ever seen this okay no I haven’t show me can you put it by the camera I’m going to read it to we
need to send you send you some stuff so you can actually really see it so our hang tag says rally Club on it it’s just
a regular hang tag yeah but on the on the back we write a note to our customer
and it says Dear player we believe that pickles are yummy and that pickle ball will rule the world that wle balls have
feeling too and that not all paddles are created equal we also believe that Sports should be fun and laughter is a
must and that um we should all stay out of the kitchen think you feel the same way as
we do amazing yeah that was just like kind of like what we felt when we first started
it you know yeah and now I mean and the thing is Jules you must have been part
of writing that because it’s so you know you someone who really plays I think
it’s important that you guys have both traveled around a little bit because it to to see that it’s not just again it’s
not just side LA or Palisades um it’s but but it’s kind of important that the
brand comes from there it’s sort of like why certain industries get are well do
well right like I live in San Francisco a lot of Technology comes out of here it’s no surprise when a new brand comes
up and you’re like a lot of the same people have put their mind and energy into a new brand in La I feel like again
being influenced by some of the brands that have come out of LA or in New York where you went where you can really you
know what will resonate with people and it’s not just again there’s a lot of people
putting together pickle ball clothes but nothing feels like rally it feels very
um it just feels thoughtful it feels approachable it feels luxury it feels
like you could be again you know the next big huge Aviator Nation type brand
I hope you guys are ready you know I have to say I I have
this analogy where I say that tennis and
pickle ball are very similar to skiers and the snowboarders right skiers hate
the snowboarders tennis players don’t love the pickle ball players right we are the snowboarders we’re the cool kids
and we are coming out and are here with
this really cool fun brand about fun and
I feel like it spews fun I totally agree and I I think the even the deeper level
is you know what sport can you play you know a seven-year-old a 14-year-old with
a 75y old male female it does not matter you’re either you either can keep up on
the court or you can’t but it’s it’s so playful and you hear people squealing
which again goes back to you know when you think about putting I could never imagine building an apparel brand I’ve
built technology but I can imagine that as you start to think of those words that goes into every piece of clothing
that you guys are putting together um so tell me what’s next you know what I you know again like I hope people will
subscribe to this podcast so they hear your journey because I’m sure we’ll be in touch again but what what what’s
what’s in the short term for you guys and then long term okay so so I mean I’ll just talk from from from where we
are with design and and what we wanted to do so going into it in the beginning we were very conscious of not doing
athletic we right um but now that we’re selling country clubs and now that we
Everything is made in the US
getting more traction we expanding the collection and um we’ve been very we we
we we’ve really wanted to support local manufacturing um
so yeah so all that stuff’s made in the US everything’s coming out of factories
in Downtown LA um which is a really uh it feels good to be um supporting local
business and it’s exciting to see them be excited about what we doing because
you know you go there and you say oh we have this brand it’s rally you know will you support us oh no no we’re so busy we
have so much going on or you know how many pieces are you going to buy or like why should we make all these screens for
you you know are you going to give us orders you know and then suddenly they see these like all these products coming
out and then some of them follow us on Instagram and they go oh my God you know look what’s going on so that’s been
pretty rewarding in terms of our supply you know so um then also being at
these events we see people wearing our stuff you know the sepa cotton teas and everybody looks great in it but every
now and then you see a guy you know in one of our shirts and he’s sweating up a storm right you know because he’s he’s
he’s competitive and he’s on for 3 hours and he’s in one of our beautiful cotton tees that doesn’t Wick away the sweat
you know it’s not that kind of garment and you know we feel you know we have an opportunity to also now that we’re doing
all this other stuff to bring some of that onto the court as well because as
you know Pickle’s gone competitive as well you got John macroe so we want to support everything about it we don’t
want to just be the the the AE pickle or the country club where we also want to be on the court so we’ve developed some
amazing amazing court stuff which is actually currently in the New York showroom Jules is put it on before we
sent it out and it was like we we we bought the best athletic fabric that you
can get we bought it in the US um it is so amazing so soft it’s got such a great
character and you know at first we didn’t know if it would take some of our treatments and everything and it’s taken
every one of our treatments amazingly right I cannot wait to see
cute yeah so it’s got the rally DNA and it doesn’t just look like you know your
regular tennis stuff we thought about it really carefully you know with our little bits of graphics and our little
twist and turn and our little bits of tape and everything we’ve done so that is going to come out next in terms of
our product um that will most probably be available to Consumers you know by December January because we do small
batch you know we don’t have to manfacture huge amount yeah we want to be we want to be close to the consumer
and get their feedback and be able to you know learn from everything we do you know so we’re not doing like massive
production offshore and you know dealing with all that stuff so we’re allowed to put in creativity we’re allowed to make
a few mistakes we’re allowed to improve on what we’ve got so the line’s getting really developed we have you know a nit
section which people are loving we have new graphics coming out new colors we have a couple of new Styles you know we
we moving into different weights of fabric because you know why you may not want our hoodie you know our hoodie is
amazing it’s like it’s one of the best hoodies if if you know hoodies like my kids that don’t play pickle ball if they
put them on they go oh my god dad this is so soft this is so great what they say this is Street this
is fire yeah fire so we’re looking into like
different Fabrications you know to stay with that obviously on brand and our cotton um portion is r really looking
amazing we use striped Fabrics from Japan and from Italy and we manufacture
the shirts and we use all this trim that kind of keeps it sportsy sport looking and keeps it rally yeah and then we have
the active stuff you know and um I think that’s where we are and then I think
just working on more and more events with jewels and you know more Country Club um Country Club approach but can
you imagine I mean you know you could all of a sudden have a complete
explosion which I would not be surprised uh if that happens um because pickle
ball I I’m glad it’s kind of separating this is a pickle ball Line This is not a tennis Line This is a pickle ball line
yeah pickle ball is exploding and it is crossing every demographic and you know no matter what
socioeconomic background you’re in you tend to want a pair of Air Jordans you know everybody wanted their pair of
imagine if you know people start wanting your stuff are you guys ready and prepared are you you know is
that are you excited for that kind of explosion because again that’s what’s happening with the sport so why wouldn’t
that happen with your brand I mean that would be amazing we listen we hope we hope but
but honestly in terms of our resources and in terms of people that are supplying us you know we’ve been in this
business for for many many years and we’ve done business with you know everyone from Target to Walmart to
whatever you know so we could scale as we need um I think the thing that we
really trying to do right now is we really think about that customer all the time what makes them special what makes
them go to the pickle ball court and stand out it’s okay to sell out of stuff and not to do it again because we have a
lot of creativity and we’ll come up with another one you know yeah you know that shirt that you got that Italian fabric I
can’t get anymore you know enjoy it there’s only 50 of them you know yeah and so that’s okay you know but um I
think I think we we learning a lot from doing the events seeing what the customers are buying and um you know
we’re encouraged by by the emotion you know that’s yeah like it’s like like
like first it was just a name and then it became like a logo and then it became
like a patch came like you know so so so when we when we like with rally there’s so
many uses of the word rally yeah you can rally politically you can rally to go to
work you can rally in a car you can rally in a ball game I mean there’s
there’s there’s so many well actually when I I play a lot of fickle ball like Jules and often a compliment is Great
Rally it doesn’t even matter who won the point it’s like that was a great rally instead of like oh good shot you did it
you did well it’s like hey that was a great rally so it’s very relevant right so so when I was driving around one day
downtown and I thought I was losing my mind what am I doing with this pickle ball like why like like am I am I
actually crazy so I I’m like driving in my car and I got you know we’re busy working on the website so I think what
was the ultimate rally so go if you go into our website the first part of our website is remember the first digital
game where it was like pong where it was like two paddles and a ball and the ball never went out oh yeah if you go on
rally club.net you’ll see that’s how it starts so you have two peddles the ball
goes across a rally happens for a couple C of times and then rally Club the word
forms and then the side you know so that’s kind of how the side started so I was just thinking you know like what’s
the ultimate rally you know and then we came up with that and it’s all these like little ideas that kind of you know
Stephen that’s so unique you know not everyone’s brain thinks the way it is
you know not not everyone thinks the way you do sorry go ahead no I’m just saying and as you said rally is your ultimate
goal in pickle ball because the longer the rally the more fun everybody’s having the
better the experience the ball’s dead so the rallies do go longer it’s s like tennis where somebody comes and smashes
it yeah but people have to be good enough to keep rally I know but but JS it’s like the
like when all these things that we watch the rallies go on and the people get
more excited yes and the experience is just all about that you know especially if you watch any major league pickle
ball right now with these amazing players which is now it’s on like ESPN and Amazon Prime and um the long rallies
are when everyone you’re right it kind of you build and get excited so I think you hit the name I think you guys have
hit the colors I think I think your branding is amazing I’m I’m not sure you’re I I really I’m I’m just I can’t
wait to get more pieces myself um and I appreciate you guys like sharing your story of what’s next and I’ll put in all
the show notes I’ll put links and discount codes and everything for people that are listening um but you know if
there’s any you know as you guys keep going please get back in touch uh and let me know and um and again like I
think I think Stephen I think you guys have come up with something quite unique um I I’ve been around startups for a
long time and also tend to have my ear to the ground on on ideas and I feel
like that’s why I keep challenging you like are you ready because I’m not sure you know like again if you’re like every
once in a while like what am I doing but I think I think pickle ball is having moment and one of the questions I’ve
been asking is is it just a moment and it’s pretty much you know across the
board everyone’s like no this is I don’t think just a moment there’s too much there’s too much
um there’s too much Community you know it’s it’s not like singles it’s like always doubles you know I mean you can
play singles but you know mostly it’s doubles yeah you know people have I won’t play I’m saying I don’t know it’s
it’s that’s when it’s like four people on a little Court you know you know staying out of the kitchen and and and
and like the terminology like like Dink and you know um and and just just
everything about it is so endearing in so many ways and everybody smiles yeah
it’s the best part of it um you know where people are on the court and you
know it’s like kids on a playground yes having a blast having a blast and like I said I really appreciate the you guys
are focused on community when you think about your brand um but you know it’s a serious business apparel is a serious
business you got to know your stuff and so hearing that your team is staffed with people who this is not your first
rodeo you guys have been around the block and you know how to get a brandade
and that’s also something that people can kind of invest in right knowing that you guys are going to be around because
it’s not easy yeah and I’m sure your kids will be playing even if they don’t think it’s cool right now no they play
my son I mean they at college right now but there’s no barriers to entry and that’s a big deal when it comes to an
activity and you know there’s been so much Wellness around you know with all the yoga yoga wear and wellness that’s
been such a big trend for so long and it’s brought people into activities through fashion through events and the
Whole Yoga Wellness thing has been going one but it’s kind of left out a lot of the people that are playing pickle ball
because if you look at our demographic you know someone at certain age groups is not going to go start yoga you know
but they already belong to a country club and they’ve been sitting around in the cafeteria or whatever and now all of
a sudden maybe watching their grandkids play or their husband play golf and all of a sudden the pro comes up and says
come look at this bat you know and the next minute you have a pickle ball player and she’s loving life you know
well and I think I think even you know i’ I just interviewed someone from pickle ball Kingdom which is a an indoor
20 Court pickle ball location and they’re doing a reality show called
pickle ball paddle battle and right that’s that’s so la but he’s
actually from Arizona but but the point is that I think country clubs are one place but there’s such a like a fever to
play that locations are being built all over popup if you have to you know these
warehouses that are sitting that are waiting development two years down the line and people put some lions in and
they created a little Community you know there’s stuff going on but exactly the the the thing um the entertainment part
um is is definitely a big part of sport I mean if you look at golf even you know you have that golf company that you go
and you eat and you drink and then you it’s like a driver is it called Top Golf top yeah yeah and I mean that’s like
people that don’t play golf go and they participate in it because it’s such a great social event and they can have fun
there’s a another interview I did I’m not just trying to promote all my other episodes although I hope everybody watches them um is is chicken and pickle
where they you know they’ve got pickle ball courts and a restaurant and a bar
and I asked him who comes and he said everyone from people after work people who are serious players people who are
wearing you know their suits and they just want to play so I think you guys again I think there’s no shortage and um
Conclusion
I’m just again very appreciative of your time I know you guys are both busy um running around with your Vans know just
kidding hopefully soon we’ll see the van drive by um and we wish you all the luck
and please keep us posted as as you um grow your brand and and hopefully you guys will be on soon and you’ll be like
guess what we just opened our 20th store and car us well Crystal thank you so much for
inviting us I mean we really appreciate it and uh very thankful that you are you know yeah I’m a huge fan so you’re
asking great questions thank you so much thank you guys thanks Jules thanks Stephen hey guys thanks for listening to
Simply pickle ball we will be back very soon with great interviews discussions and more all about pick don’t forget to
subscribe to our channels on YouTube Twitter Instagram or any of your favorite podcasting Outlet until next
time happy dinking
