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| An Interview With Gino Postorivo |
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| Written by John Amodea | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tuesday, 24 March 2009 16:51 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Gino Postorivo founded a small paintball company called South Jersey Paintball Supply in 1989. Operating out of a small section of his father’s restaurant, the company grew, and grew, and grew… and it grew quickly. Within a few short years the company name was changed to National Paintball Supply East—and then simply National Paintball Supply (NPS). Gino’s company became one of the largest and busiest paintball manufacturers and distributors in the world. Starting brands such as Empire Paintball, Invert Paintball, 32 Degrees, BT Paintball and many more, by the mid 1990s NPS was a powerhouse. About two years ago NPS was acquired by a company that would later become KEE Action Sports. After a two-year hiatus, Gino is coming back to the game of paintball. I’ve known Gino for almost twenty years. When I heard the rumors of his return I called and asked him to fill me in. Our phone call turned into a cup of coffee and a long conversation halfway between his home in New Jersey and mine in Washington DC. Here are the highlights of that meeting. John Amodea: Hello Gino. As you know we recently spoke on the phone and I asked you some questions about your possible return to paintball. But since we’re together with coffee in hand, what do you say we start again? Cool? Gino Postorivo: That sounds great. Can you tell our readers what you’ve been up to since you left paintball? On the personal front - I’ve been raising my daughter, Isabella. She’s five years old and every day is a new experience. We spend a lot of time raising animals and with family. I am blessed. On the business front – I’ve assembled a team and together we launched Valken Sports, a sporting goods company that offers lacrosse, mixed martial arts and hockey products. Interesting collection of sports. How did you come to choose these? Two things played into my choices. First, I have a genuine interest and respect for each sport. Second, each of these sports is growing and offers an opportunity for a company like Valken Sports to contribute to its growth and make a positive contribution. How have these sports been going so far? It’s been going great. Of course, there is a learning curve, but we’re working hard, building momentum and building the product line. Every day we meet new people, new players and industry participants. It’s a blast. What is a “Valken,” and how did you come up with the name? I wanted a name that could be used in all sports, that was short, strong, and memorable and when typing the core word into a Google search, didn’t point to everything under the sun like drycleaners, HVAC stores, vitamin supplements, whatever. I also wanted a name that didn’t already have a definition that would give us the opportunity to define it ourselves. That’s kind of how I decided on Valken and Valken Sports, Valken Hockey, Valken Lacrosse and Valken Paintball. Does Lacrosse or MMA belong in the same sentence as paintball? I believe not only the same sentence but in certain instances the same store. I recently went to a wedding in Missouri and on the way to the reception hall I passed six dojos, four lacrosse fields, a paintball pro shop and a paintball field. MMA is exploding all over the place; so are lacrosse and roller hockey. In today’s economy, I’d think “more business is better.” If a pro-shop is paying rent and holding on to pay the bills, especially during the slow season, the other lines Valken distributes require 4, 5, 10 feet of space to set it up and to make this product available to a new class of customer. What exactly does Valken Sports do? The vision, what we try to do is to be an efficient and streamlined sporting goods development, sales and promotion company. That sounds like it could have been a description of National Paintball when you owned it. Is Valken Sports set up the same way that National Paintball was set up? Yes and no. At the high level the general objectives are same – buy, sell, ship and service product, but Valken’s infrastructure is quite different. It uses state of the art technology and was designed to be simple for everyone in the office and all of our customers. With the benefit of hindsight and time to plan, Valken was built to be efficient and nimble with growth and service in mind. Can you give us an example what you mean about being efficient and nimble? Sure. Back in the day, enormous time and even more money was put into mainframe computers and everything that went with it. This was all necessary to handle sales, accounting, networking and connecting with all the remote facilities. Valken utilizes an internet based proprietary software that we customized where quite literally we could have accounting, sales and distribution offices all over the world at the flip of a switch. We could – we will – turn on and meet needs as required and will not be forced to carry facilities that no longer make sense or decide not to open new facilities because the old one’s are too expensive to shut down. Very nice, was that put in place with paintball distribution in mind? Yes, absolutely, and for the others sports and global distribution partners too. How does it feel to be coming back into the paintball industry after two years? I feel like I never really left. I had to sit on the sidelines but I spent the time looking at the sport and the industry, detached from the day to day selling, which I think gave a me a fresh and independent appreciation where we’ve been, where we are and where we could go as an industry. Equally as important, it gave me an opportunity to consider where I’ve been and how I would like to come back into the business and the sport. What did you do to stay on abreast of the goings on in paintball? I read the magazines, surf the web and I keep in touch with many old friends, employees and associates. By the way, if I could, I’d like to give you a plug? Sure, twist my arm… I am very impressed with your new magazine. It’s a great read… great format. I was concerned when I heard Paintball 2Xtremes was going to be discontinued, but I see you’ve landed on your feet and it appears you have done so at a full sprint. Since you posted the “Heeeee’s Back” blurb, if the amount of calls and emails I’ve received is an indication of your readership, you’ve got a great base. Thanks, I appreciate the plug. So you got a lot of calls since the Paintball X3 post? Yes. I’ve reconnected with many people. It’s all very positive and encouraging. It would appear that many players, field and store owners, as well as vendors and manufacturers that I spoke to share the same kind of concerns and interests about where the industry is and where many of them would like to see it go. Can you explain the reason you left paintball, for those that don’t know how it works when you sell a company? In November 2006 I sold National Paintball Supply. Part of the agreement was that I would be the President and a shareholder in the new company, but, things didn’t work out that way, and, so, while these issues were being dealt with, I remained on the sidelines. That sounds like a very politically correct answer. I understand there was a lawsuit and many rumors of how things went down. Can you fill our readers in as much as you can? First, don’t believe the rumors. Second, I’ve never been one to air dirty laundry, but, through lawyers I was compelled to engage, my position, the actual issues and most everything necessary to weigh the rumors is public record and available through the Delaware Chancery Court. But, who has that kind of time and ultimately who cares? What matters, at least to me, is those issues are resolved from a legal standpoint and now I am able to return to the industry and to the business of paintball. How does it feel to return to the paintball industry without many of the people including your family and friends that were with you as you when you built National Paintball? I still have many friends working at the former company, and who knows, maybe some of them will find their way to Valken eventually. Today, though, the paintball team we’ve put together is top notch and I’m confident that we have the right people in the right place to get the job done. Also, there will be new people hired as we go… Any regrets from the old days… things you wish you did differently? Sure, I have regrets. I was a kid when I started my business. I’d like to think that I’ve grown up and become less reactionary and more disciplined in my approach to business. Paintball grew so fast and got so furious that it was hard to keep pace. This time around, we plan to row along with others. How does that translate to how you intend to approach paintball this time around? We intend to build with a long term view in mind. Build on relationships. I compare Valken Paintball to a boat. It is our intention to fill the boat with oarsmen that will each be responsible to provide a certain product, SKU or service and, in turn, they will be protected and promoted. It is the seats we cannot fill that we will fill ourselves. There are many great vendors and manufacturers that over the last few years have found themselves in a precarious spot. There are also vendors and manufacturers that despite their position today that prefer to paddle alone. At the end of the day, we intend to have a full boat, full product selection from stem to stern, everyone strong and pulling hard. You said that you will have a “full line” of products, what does this mean? By “full line” I mean Valken will carry all of the core products required to play the game at every level. Many of these will bear the Valken name while others will carry the names of some of the better known and respected manufacturers in paintball. Any names that you care to share? Any oarsman you care to mention? I can’t wait to share all of them, but I don’t want to make any piecemeal announcements until we are fully stocked and ready to sell. What did you learn in your first 18 years in paintball that will influence you this time around? Influence? The single greatest influence that has shaped our plans is to keep the retailers and field owners healthy and happy. It is these men and women that are the lifeblood of the industry. The focus of Valken Sports will be to support and promote their efforts and provide them with products and services that will enable them to make money and build their businesses. You’re coming back into the paintball industry in a shaky economy and reports that indicate that the paintball industry is – at best - flat. Does that scare you? I actually view it as an excellent opportunity. Many of the complaints are coming from paintball’s biggest names and, in my opinion, are based on problems that they created for themselves. So many of the industry’s big names are weighed down with huge debts that take so much of their cash flow to service their debt that they have to cut corners when it comes to quality, R & D, service, whatever. Think about it, the money coming into the sport is going out to pay off debt that was created by leveraged buyouts. This means that fields, stores and the players themselves are being forced to bailout these investment groups that have taken a beating in today’s economy while these same fields and stores are deprived product selection and opportunity for margin and growth. I think market forces will ultimately prevail and that industry will reboot over the next few years and start to grow again. Do you have any plans to stimulate this ‘reboot”? Sure, we have plans that will be made known soon, but without coming out of the box too soon one area we can discuss is promotion and advertising. In the past, a lot of our cash flow was put back into the business to sponsor teams, do television, advertise in magazines and support really anything that could shine a light on the game or the industry. Today, money is going to debt service instead of advertising and promotion which is impacting public perception and drying up the sport. A component of our program will be to promote, advertise and stimulate the businesses associated with Valken and our program. You’ve already stated that Valken will be good for the stores, fields, players and the industry, can you tell us specifics about your plans? I will, but as I stated, for reasons that I hope you can understand, I must keep the nitty-gritty details quiet for now. I’ll make sure to contact you early when we are ready to roll out. But, one thing I will say again, our plans are to make sure that we can return profitability to the fields and stores while keeping the cost of the game down and creating maximum availability of our products. Anything you want to add? Yes, thank you for taking to the time to speak to me and if any of your readers have specific needs for products that are not being met, or they have an idea for a product to bring to market, of if they manufacture a product they want distributed, or if they have any comments, concerns, complaints, questions, words of encouragement or simply a suggestion, please tell them I’d love to hear from them and that they can contact me directly at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or 856-812-2800.
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