Prediction Open · timeframe Jun 2043
Chris Ruder Predicts Roundnet Will Eventually Become an Olympic Sport
“Yeah, I absolutely think we will be recognized by the Olympics. I think there will be professional round net players, and we will be considered a legitimate sport.”
Insight
Ruder: Early International Expansion Requires Existing Organic Demand
“The time where it makes the most sense to really consider it is if you have that existing demand. If you don't, then, man, it feels like a really heavy lift”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Chris Ruder Earned Spikeball Equity From Partners via Sales Targets
“So I came up with, I think it was like a three-year plan where if I hit certain sales numbers, I would earn stock from them. If I didn't hit the number, then I don't get anything, and some of the guys were cool with that. Some were not, but, you know, I spoke …”
Insight
A Free Product That Cannot Market Itself Is Not Great
“You need to give away a ton of your product for free. And if the product can't really travel on its own, it can't market itself, then you might not have that great of a product.”
Disclosure
Spikeball's Shark Tank Deal With Daymond John Collapsed Over Licensing
“And when we talked about sort of what direction it would be or what do we want to do, his main interest lied in licensing. So I think he said something along the lines of, you know, Chris, I've got friends at Marvel Comics. Let's maybe explore like a Spider-Ma…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Chris Ruder: Volleyball players hated Spikeball when it first launched
“And I also thought that, you know, when I launched, I was like, yeah, volleyball players are gonna love this game, and that was just what I thought. They wound up hating it but it was these groups that I never would have thought of in a million years that love…”
Disclosure
Spikeball operated entirely direct-to-consumer for its first five years
“We weren't in any stores for our first five years. 100% spikeball.com.”
Insight
Chris Ruder: Vacation Requests Should Default to Yes for Strong Performers
“If you're doing your job well, and everything, and you know, you're gonna make sure things are covered while you're out, You know, the default answer should be yes.”
Assertion Supported
Chris Ruder Says Monster Faced SEC Trouble and Toxic Culture
“But the last couple years, culture went kind of toxic. Company got in some trouble with the SEC I think maybe an exec or two went to jail and it became a pretty toxic environment”
Assertion Supported
The Original Spikeball Had No Patent and an Expired Trademark
“There never was a patent on the product, so the design itself is kind of open, and the trademark, which protects the name Spikeball, has been expired, like, 10 years or something like that, so.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Ruder: Spikeball purchased its domain name for $100
“So we got spikeball.com for a hundred dollars.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Ruder: Spikeball raised a little over $100,000 in initial capital
“So we wound up raising, I think, a little over a 100,000 dollars. So it was roughly 10, 15,000 dollars a head.”
Disclosure
Ruder: Spikeball does not have a formal business plan
“To this day, you know, we don't have a formal business plan”
Assertion Supported
Spikeball Earned a Front-Page Wall Street Journal Story on Amish Players
“We wound up getting a front page story on the Wall Street Journal on that topic.”
Assertion Supported
Spikeball Reached $1 Million in Revenue Without Any Full-Time Employees
“So we had a million dollars
with zero full-time employees in 2013, and that's when my wife and I agreed it was safe to quit the day job.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Ruder: Dick's Sporting Goods reached out unprompted to carry Spikeball in 2014
“And, yeah, it was about a year later that when Dick's Boarding Goods actually reached out to us and said, hey, we'd love to carry your product.”
Assertion Not publicly verifiable
Ruder: Spikeball faces over 40 competitor brands in roundnet
“We kept growing, and then another one showed up, and then another one, and I think there's, like, over 40 now, or something like that.”
Assertion Supported
Ruder: Spikeball was originally launched in 1989
“I believe Spikeball was launched in 1989, so I was 14 at the time.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Spikeball paid $40k to $50k for its first 1,000 manufacturing run
“And if I remember right, I think it was about 40,000, maybe 50,000 dollars for those first thousand sets.”
Insight
Chris Ruder Says Five Minutes of Play Guarantees Spikeball Retention
“As long as they're willing to play for five to 10 minutes, they'll get it. But if they give up before then, our chances of keeping them are pretty low.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Ruder: Spikeball generated $10,882 in revenue in its launch year
“We finished that year at, I believe, 10,882 dollars.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Ruder: Early Spikeball Customers Received Non-Automated Personal Emails From the Founder
“So nearly every customer that bought at spikeball.com would get a personal email from me. It was not automated.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Ruder: Shark Tank finale appearance drove immediate direct sales and retail inbounds
“It was the final segment of the season finale. So yeah, we had a massive party at our office, huge sales on spikeball.com that weekend and in the weeks to follow. But the real lift was we started getting tons of inbound requests from retailers, primarily like …”
