BreakMark Ultimate Apparel

Mat Goldblatt, from Breakmark Ultimate Apparel, New England’s leader in Ultimate swag, answered a few of New England Ultimate’s questions;

What made you want to form Breakmark?

I started Breakmark in the spring semester of my sophomore year at Brandeis. I had spearheaded the creation of custom track hoodies for my track team in high school, and then again for Tron my freshman year. Sophomore year I created track warm ups for us, and it made me start to think if other teams out there playing would be interested in getting custom items for their teams at affordable prices. I also wanted to have some gear that I could wear in everyday life that showed that I played Ultimate. I had a hard time tracking any down and decided to come up with my own designs. I thought that this would be the part of the company that would really take off, but it turned out a lot of teams out there really wanted some gear that was affordable, a good quality and from a company that was offering good customer service.

Who runs Breakmark? How many employees do you have? and What is your home office like?

Breakmark is run by myself, and my family, but we do have sales reps around the country:

Topher Murray in the PA area

Brooke Austin in the MD area

Matt Harbaugh in the Tennessee area

Tim Gilligan on the West Coast

Courtney Crumpley in Texas

Emma Price in the UK/Europe

We do all of the shipping of products from the store at our office, print all of the SPOT SUB gear here, and run day-to-day things from here. Our screening is done by a partner of ours, and they do all the pressing for spot subs as well. Our full sub gear is done by another partner company of ours, and the production is done in their factory in the Czech Republic.

How is being located in New England helping/hindering your company?

New England has a great amount of teams, leagues and tournaments that we are very fortunate to be able to have established nice relationships with over the past few years. We do have a lot of elite level team’s at both the college and club level who are very loyal to other companies, but there are a lot of other teams who have been amazing to work with. We have noticed that the other regions in the country that have ultimate companies are very loyal to those companies. I think we are starting to build some of that loyalty in New England, and are looking forward to really increasing that over the next couple of seasons by continuing to offer exceptional customer service, affordable, quality products and delivering these products on time.

What percentage of customers/teams are from New England?

I think that more than 50% of our customers are from New England. We have some leagues around the country and some customers who we have worked with for years around the country, but a good majority of our customers are here. We work with a bunch of high schools in the area – Needham, Lexington, ABU to name a few. We also work with some great club teams – D5, Quiet Coyote, The Ghosts, Pleasuretown. At the college level, we have worked with Harvard, Tufts, Northeastern and BC over the years. We are looking forward to branching out to new teams at all levels!

Do you have any sponsorships available for teams?/What teams do you sponsor?

We do not offer sponsorships to any teams. We do however offer partnerships. The difference is that at a sponsorship level, teams are looking for FREE. We are not a big enough company to give things away. What we do instead, is partner with teams who are hosting clinics, running tournaments, have a social media presence and through all of those various things are promoting the sport of Ultimate. Through these things, we reach agreements with teams to work with them for gear and in return they wear our gear at these events, or we are present at their events.

What division comes to you most, College or Club?

I think that the high school division actually comes to us the most. The club teams are pretty set in their ways when it comes time to working with other companies. As I mentioned, we are very luck to work with D5, and the past few years Quiet Coyote and this year The Ghosts and Pleasuretown. We are looking forward to having more teams work with us – I am confident they will like our pricing and quality. At the college level, it becomes a lot tougher because these teams are looking to get sponsored. I understand they are trying to save money anywhere they can and that sponsorships from other companies are perceived as being helpful. Our prices are more than competitive with what is being offered and on top of that, we are here and ready to help teams fund-raise if they need it. We have tons of ideas, and if the teams are willing to work to raise money, we are here to help.

Any new offers/specials/products to offer this year?

We are constantly working with suppliers to offer great new things to our friends in the community. We have a bunch of sublimated products we are hoping to launch in the spring, right in time for high school season and for the club players to use over the summer. We are going to be running Facebook contests pretty regularly over the next year or so, and right now we are running a trick shot video contest with the winning prize of 36 custom beanies for a team. Please follow us at facebook.com/breakmark and on twitter @breakmarkulti. That is where you will be able to really find out about these contests.

We also recently partnered with Brodie Smith, founder of Everything-Ultimate. We are really excited about this relationship and will look forward to bringing the community some awesome gear!

On a last note, Tim Morrill, from Morrill Performance is now local to the Boston area. Breakmark and Morrill Performance are going to be working together on some pretty sweet projects as well. Stay tuned for what we have in store!

What tournaments are you going to be at in the Spring? In the Summer?

We will be at as many tournaments in the spring/summer as we can. We normally attend St Johnsbury’s tournament as the tournament vendor, and then the Amherst Invitational, Mixed/Masters Easterns and the BI as a vendor. We would love to be present at other events, and do merchandise, so please keep us in mind!