I would like to redefine my viewpoint in this matter. My previous post was an exercise in trying to see a viewpoint from someone elses perspective.
This is a common practice of mine and I apologize that that was not clearly stated. i quite honestly don’t give a crap if CLYW wishes to expand their operations into China, I was merely reading through the thread and noting that there were a number of people opposed to the idea. A common practice of mine is to play devils advocate and try to see viewpoints from multiple perspectives. And seeing as how no one had brought up the points i was expressing I thought it prevalent to state them outright.
I am certainly no flag waiving idealist that is ignorant to the fact that the majority of my own goods are produced in China, more so I simply wished to point out how integral the pacific northwest has been in the marketing and hype CLYW has always pursued, be it wildlife or people, and I don’t believe Chinese manufacturing fits in with that particular paradigm. If people desire budget throws and CLYW wants to fulfill that market then that’s entirely up to them.
Well, I’ll go ahead and say that Gambit is evil. He keeps bringing up new and interesting yoyos that create temptation after temptation for me. He’s the snake in my garden of eden and he made me aware of how naked my wallet had become. This brought shame upon me and my family and it was all because of Gambit.
I don’t really mind where my possessions are made. Personally, I think that CLYW manufacturing in China will be a great thing, as long as they keep the prices reasonable and maintain the same standards of quality.
There is literally nothing we can do as a company that will not draw some level of criticism. Absolutely nothing.
So here’s what we do: every single major decision comes from Chris. Period. It’s his company, and it has been his vision and guidance that has gotten it through the past nine years. A lot of people have helped, but at the end of the day it has always been Chris driving the bus.
I love CLYW. I loved it before I started working for CLYW, and I love it still. And I can attribute that 100% to Chris’ ideas and vision and guidance.
So what it boils down to is that I just trust Chris. I trust him to do what is best for CLYW, I trust him to always put the team and the fans first, and I trust him to do the right thing.
When Chris and I first started talking about all of this we both knew immediately what the backlash would be. But we also understood that CLYW has grown to the point where we either have to move forward to scale back. Scaling back means thinning out the team and making cuts in other areas and none of that sounded good to us. Moving forward meant the new challenge of scaling the business up while keeping the company intentionally small, and trying to figure out what that looks like in another 2 years and then 5 years and then 10 years. How do we bring in new players even though we’re not a “beginner brand”? How do we continue to be a responsible company while pushing beyond the very real limitations of North American manufacturing?
We’re still figuring it out. Each day brings a new challenge, and a new conversation. But at the end of each day I simply trust Chris, wholly and completely, to do the right thing. He’s one of the kindest, most honest and conscientious people I’ve ever known, and I trust his judgement.
So for our fans, it just comes down to this: you trusted Chris’ judgement, and he gave you a brand and products you fell in love with. So keep trusting him.
I’ve been excited since first hearing that Chris was thinking of doing some overseas yoyos. I’ve been looking at getting a bimetal for awhile, will probably get Maiders when it releases. And really excited about the new plastic. So many good things on the way it seems. You’ve got my support, and I know there are others that will support it fully as well.
Okay darn I need to respond here. But I haven’t read this thread through yet. I spend most of my time on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Snapchat. So if you want to reach me the best way is honestly Snapchat right now, lol. Hit me up at: clywcanada
I’ll respond with more once I read this, but just wanted to make sure people know that we’re definitely not all about money. If I cared so much about money I would have stayed an engineer and kept yoyoing as just a hobby. If you want to know how much we made March 2014 to March 2015 it was in the red (that means negative dollars). So you think we’re all about profits? YA? NO!
Everything goes back into this business, our team, employees and sponsoring contests. Our goal has always been to support the scene and the players that are doing amazing things and working hard. I’d rather be able to send 8 players to Japan then buy myself a Yaris. Actually if you wanted to know, I do freelance work right now on the side to help pay the bills, plus Steve has multiple jobs. We do this because we LOVE IT and want to help this community grow.
If we make a bi-metal in China it means you won’t have to pay over $150 for it. We actually just got the prototype and the quality is absolutely amazing. Zero vibe, no machine lines, plays exactly like how I calculated it would. Couldn’t be prouder and I can’t wait for Andrew to try his new sig. He’s going to love it!
Anyways, time to go home and hug my kids. Bye!
Edit1
PS: The only things we have plans to make in China right now are Bi-Metals and a plastic. That’s it. Mainly because these things cannot be made in North America at an affordable price for us. Maybe they can, but I can’t find them … or haven’t tried hard enough.
Edit2
PPS: The thought of a budget metal is still just in our heads. We haven’t moved forward with anything. I would like to see how the bi-metal and plastic do first.
I forgot the exact calculation that I was talking about with Chris a couple of years back but I remember it wound up in a really weird unit that I dubbed the “Yeti”.
I basically use a calculation that creates a coefficient fhat I can use to predict how a yoyo will play. I also look at a few other numbers. But ya it saves us time/money on prototyping. Orca, Maider’s yoyo, Borealis were all dead on with how we predicted they would play. It’s amazing! Yay science! Haha