At Zappia Athletic Products in Vestal, NY, part of the Greater Binghamton area, baseball and softball still deliver its biggest spring numbers, although lacrosse continues to gain traction and girls’ flag football is impacting softball participation, according to owner Dan Cordi.

“We continue to lose ground with hardgoods to the internet and large box store retailers,” he says. “Baseballs, softballs and catcher’s equipment were a significant portion of our sales in past spring seasons but are becoming an irrelevant factor to our store. However, our custom apparel and uniform sales and online apparel store numbers continue to grow. Our quality, creativity and service can separate ourselves from competition in these areas as opposed to a race to the lowest price possible on a batting helmet or baseball bat.”

Youth recreational sports continue to drive its spring sales, while its school and travel ball businesses have been “more up and down.”

Among challenges, Cordi notes that printing and embroidery supplies have pushed through significant price increases, as have many of apparel vendors. In what he believes reflects staffing shortages, he’s also seen a spike in orders being packaged incorrectly as well as lost or damaged packages that also impact profitability.

On the plus side, Cordi’s says interest in diamond sports from youth to varsity level has not wavered in his markets and he expects they’ll remain robust.

“Interest in youth baseball and softball has not wavered in our area,” he says. “Families attending games throughout the spring and summer is interwoven in the fabric of our culture. Whether they are at their local park watching their six-year-old get their first hit, traveling four states over for a long weekend to enter a highly touted tournament, or experiencing their senior son or daughter take a state title, baseball and softball will always be a rite of passage for a large portion of this nation’s youth and their families.

At PSG (Pasadena Sporting Goods) in Pasadena, TX, baseball continues to be the dealer’s largest spring contributor, reports GM Myles Siegel. Softball is also seeing growth due to increased headcount on teams and league expansion. Overall, however, the dealer is up “only slightly” year over year.

“On-field equipment has been a growth subcategory for us,” says Siegel. “As budgets are tighter, we have been able to provide customers with quality alternative brands to extend budgets. Outside of balls, gloves and bats, generic or less-known brands seem to provide a value not previously accepted. For example, the Crute tee from Champro is a fantastic alternative to the Tanner tee.”

Schools are also increasingly comfortable purchasing non-shoe brands for uniforms, PSG’s biggest category within diamond sports. Says Siegel: “My feel is that most of these coaches and players wear these other products in select and club sports and realize the value is much better than previously perceived.”

PSG continues to focus its efforts on school and district sales throughout the state of Texas. Many are utilizing online channels and builders to gather information and make a purchase decision.

“We have embraced online selling though online stores and a dedicated team to ensure they go off without a hitch,” says Siegel. “This brings another challenge as stores open us up to another customer base from the parents and guardians. It is also a huge upsell opportunity.”

A newer challenge PSG is facing is low-end imported sellers at the league level, but custom gear lead times have normalized after disruption caused by the pandemic.

For PSG, the growth is in travel and select baseball/softball recreational teams. Siegel expects school-level baseball and softball to remain at a “steady state” in terms of participation. “There are always existing schools to compete for, but there are not a huge number of kids joining those teams year after year.”  

Sports Plus in Fredericksburg, VA, sees baseball and softball accounting for about half of its business, says Billy Oehm, VP and sales manager. Play is year-round with college teams playing fall ball and practicing through the winter in indoor facilities. Says Oehm: “Fast-pitch softball specifically is growing faster than baseball, but they’re both growing.”

Sports Plus’ focus is on uniforms and spirit wear. The dealer also does a solid business in facility equipment such as windscreens, fence caps, bases and field paint. It doesn’t sell a wide range of bats and the gloves because it doesn’t have a retail presence.

The big growth opportunity for Sports Plus in recent years has been travel ball.

“We are blessed that we are in Fairfax County, a top five affluent county in the country. Loudoun County, right next door, is also in the top five. So we don’t feel recessions like somebody else because of the federal government and all the money that drives it. People don’t miss paychecks.”

He admits that travel teams can be a “little more demanding,” with high school programs understanding they need to buy early, but travel teams underestimating turnaround time. “It’s more of an Amazon mentality.”

Sports Plus services high schools, middle schools as well as Little League, Babe Ruth and American Legion. The dealer has an online presence because it’s become an expectation and has done more social media in recent years, but its sales team still visits schools.

“We’re still a little bit old school,” says Oehm. “We prefer, for the most part, to knock on doors and see people where we can.”

At Denver Athletic, in Englewood, CO, lacrosse has become “very popular in Colorado” to command a sizeable spring business, but “consistent growth” continues to be found in baseball, according to Eric Taylor, inside and corporate sales manager. “Youth baseball participation in Colorado has always been strong and so has high school baseball.”

Schools, recreation teams and travel teams are Denver Athletic’s primary customers across diamond sports, with many teams offering “strong spirit wear purchases” on top of their team apparel needs.

“Apparel is still the strongest category for us and that includes custom hats,” says Taylor. “There continues to be growth with cage jackets. There is also an opportunity with selling gloves, bats and equipment.” A new category is safety, including the arm and toe protectors for batters.

Goetz Brothers Sporting Goods, in San Carlos, CA, a suburb of San Francisco, continues to find baseball and softball to be the strongest spring sports it services. although co-owner Brent Goetz feels more kids are leaving the sport for year-round soccer, lacrosse and basketball.

“However, the ones that are staying in the sport seem to be playing on multiple teams, so their gear needs make up for some of the players that have left the sport,” he adds, although its baseball business remains strong with uniforms, practice gear and swag sales.

Goetz says he’s no longer seeing major issues related to inventory shortages, but a newer challenge is more vendors starting to sell direct. Online also continues to challenge the retail side across both baseball and softball.

“The trick is to get people into our store and then have them purchase here rather than online,” says Goetz. “We feel that we give superior service and knowledge to online sellers, but the customer still seems to like the convenience of having items arrive at their porch, even if they have to return their purchases. We are trying to incentivize people to buy in our store by giving coupons or doing league pant distributions.”

Goetz is uncertain if diamond sports will continue to capture youth’s attention. “For baseball/softball to start to grow I think MLB needs to make investment in grassroots efforts. Making the game faster and more exciting would help keep athletes in the game.”

A friend of his, David Klein of Legends Baseball, has come up with a game called Speedball, that speeds up the action and gives kids seven to nine at bats per game rather than the typical two or three. “Ideas like that should not be ignored, but rather promoted as a way to get kids excited about playing,” he says.

At Performance Team Sports in Miami, FL, baseball and softball are still the dealer’s biggest spring sports, with few signs of other sports emerging to steal participants. According to account manager Chris Merlo, “Both these sports are year-round here with the weather and growing interest in youth travel ball.”

Travel baseball is driving its growth in diamond sports. Categories seeing the strongest growth for the in baseball include practice gear and apparel, while individual items such as bats and gloves that are increasingly being purchased at retail or online sites are downtrending.

“The bulk of our baseball business comes in the caps and player package type gear,” he reports.

Inventory shortages continue to be a challenge, although teams are increasingly open to apparel product from brands such as Alleson, Champro and SanMar. “Customers have accepted getting generic brands quickly in the Amazon era over waiting for a brand name such as Adidas or Under Armour.”

SportStop, based in Little Rock, AR, continues to see baseball rank as its largest spring sport when all levels of play are combined. “We’ve seen growth in baseball at the Little League level, while the numbers in softball seem to be stagnant,” says VP James Rodgers.

SportStop is investing more resources into its online team stores, while business with local baseball leagues has also seen an uptick coming out of the pandemic. Growth has also come by supporting baseball and softball teams at nearby junior colleges.

“Most of our college and high school teams still want high-quality, name-brand uniforms, while most of our Legion and travel teams want very good hats and pants with a cheaper jersey,” says Rodgers. “And of course, we’ve seen a dramatic shift in the bat and glove market to online.”

Toolsport USA, a dealer in Metamora, MI, is seeing “steady growth” in both baseball and softball, with the two sports continuing to account for the majority of its spring business, although soccer has made inroads, according to owner Darren Masterson. Baseball and softball uniforms/packages drive most of the spring business with recreational and travel programs representing the vast majority of sales.

“Little Leagues are a big component of our spring sports,” he says. “But the strongest growth has been recreationally in the area of baseball. Additionally, travel baseball and softball are growing and middle and high school baseball is strong largely in part to our sales team focus.”

Masterson says Toolsport has traditionally approached baseball and softball in the same manner. “Our team stores need to be developed to drive sales for the particular athletes in the baseball and softball arena. When we better focus on providing products specifically geared for our clientele, sales have grown.”

Piesco Sporting Goods, based in North Easton, MA, a suburb of Boston, has seen its baseball and fast-pitch softball business shrink to between 15 to 20 percent of its full-year business.

Owner David Piesco says that baseball was as high as 30 percent at one point, with the decline attributed to generally less interest in the sport over the years and efforts by his team to cover a wider range of sports at the youth and school level. More recently, the arrival of travel leagues has led to the demise of Legion and other town leagues the dealer used to service.

Piesco is still upbeat about prospects for baseball and softball, believing both sports will benefit from their return to the Olympics in Los Angeles in 2028. He is also encouraged by Major League Baseball’s grassroots efforts to grow the same.

“Major League Baseball is recognizing they need to make some changes to accommodate for this much larger competition for time,” he says. “Whether it’s other sports, extracurricular activities, video games or whatever, there’s always competing items for time. You need to figure out a way to reach people at a younger age.”

Team Sporting Goods, Marshfield, WI, has seen its baseball and softball business rebound smartly from the pandemic. According to co-owner Dave Romnek, local schools and travel programs represent its healthiest growth areas in diamond sports.

“It is getting stronger for travel leagues every year, but, other than the travel team growth, our sales have stayed a pretty consistent,” he says.

Growth has been driven by online stores, led by items such as caps, socks, team or fan clothing, and backpacks. Bats have been trending down. Softball is seeing similar trends as baseball. Online growth is also being boosted by increasing demand for personalized items, such as player names and numbers.

While some lead times are longer than pre-pandemic timelines, inventory issues have largely abated. “Our biggest challenge is going to be staffing and dealing with related very high costs as well as high shipping rates,” says Romnek. “We do a lot of reconditioning and that has always been a challenge, but with increased costs in parts, labor and shipping it has been very challenging to price properly.”

Mathews Team Sports, in Franklin, TN, still sees diamond sports driving its spring business. Tate Mathews, president and CEO, says that baseball is the bigger business of the two because baseball squads in his area generally have bigger budgets and larger roster sizes.

The dealer does the bulk of its business with baseball in uniforms and player packs. “Everybody lifts weights as a team and there’s not a baseball team that doesn’t do a player pack where they want them in the same T-shirt and short in the weight room,” he points out. “A lot of them will buy two T-shirts and two shorts, then the hoodie, the pants with the dugout fleece, the BP [batting practice] jackets, the dugout jackets, etc.”

He estimates that Mathews Team Sports now does more volume in player packs than uniforms, caps and baseballs combined.

The dealer primarily works with middle schools and high schools, with a small university business. Mathews says the positives of working with schools is baseball coaches have been conditioned to order early. “The thing about baseball coaches is you have to custom order hats. It’s gotten better, but for so long, you’ve had to order custom hats so far in advance,” he says.

Mathews credits Founder Sport Group, the parent of Alleson Athletic and other uniform brands, and Champro for upgrading their sublimation techniques to bring an elevated product to market. “What they’ve done is they just made it better for everybody.”

Challenges still include securing some inventory due to supply chain disruption, including batting helmets this past season, but he’s confident diamond sports remains a growth opportunity outside extraordinary circumstances such as another pandemic.

“The great thing about team sports is it’s always going to be here,” says Mathews. “As long as there are schools, there’s always going to be teams and they’re always going to need stuff.”