Sparx Skate Sharpener - At home sharpener

[IPv6Freely 2092]

2 hours ago, DarkStar50 said:

^^ Surfer dude isn't into sharpening eh.

Nope. Which is why the Sparx was such a good investment!

[Kgbeast 195]

14 hours ago, mojo122 said:

Of course they may be satisfied with just marketing their consumables....

It is quite likely that the consumables is the name of the game here. At the cost of the Sparks machine and the number of potential sales, it is not an exceedingly lucrative model, unless you factor in a pretty fast going consumables. This has to be a printer model to be interesting - give away the printers at basicaly cost, then make the real money on selling ink cartridges.

This model is great and generally works  great for both parties. Very smart. Doubt there is any reason to venture into pro market. Sparks is in a nice niche in home user market with a product that is very unappealing to compete against as Sparks has managed to set the standards high while price is pretty low.

[flip12 712]

14 hours ago, mickz said:

It's still quicker to get a pair of skates done on a full sized machine than clamping a skate into a Pro Sharp and fidgeting with the buttons.  The Pro Sharp is better for the more redundant actions like profiling.  Some pro teams that own both a full sized table top machine and a Pro Sharp don't even use it.  They just ship steel out to a third party shop to take care of it.

The ProSharp Home?

They say it has just one button. (https://prosharp.ca/products/prosharp-home)

[mickz 107]

7 hours ago, flip12 said:

The ProSharp Home?

They say it has just one button. (https://prosharp.ca/products/prosharp-home)

The Prosharp home takes almost a minute to do one full cycle (1 pass in each direction).  That's significantly slower than clamping a skate into a jig and manually doing it.

[dabeechman 0]

On 7/5/2017 at 1:57 PM, vinprun71 said:

Hope they're chipping in for the wheels. I'm sure you're blowing through them.

I just had them all buy their own wheel so I didn't have to worry about charging them anything for the wear on the wheels. 

[dabeechman 0]

Only real gripe I have with it is that after each pass the Sparx has to "home" itself. I figure this is to register the pass that it just took and apply that to the decaying countdown which accommodates for the wear on the wheel. However, there is a pretty significant delay here and it would be nice to speed the process up. It takes a long ass time to do 7-10 pairs of skates on the Sparx and it would be nice to speed this up.

[IPv6Freely 2092]

1 hour ago, dabeechman said:

I just had them all buy their own wheel so I didn't have to worry about charging them anything for the wear on the wheels. 

That’s the way to do it. I’ve actually considered bringing my machine to the rink and sharpening skates while we have beers in the parking lot!

1 hour ago, dabeechman said:

Only real gripe I have with it is that after each pass the Sparx has to "home" itself. I figure this is to register the pass that it just took and apply that to the decaying countdown which accommodates for the wear on the wheel. However, there is a pretty significant delay here and it would be nice to speed the process up. It takes a long ass time to do 7-10 pairs of skates on the Sparx and it would be nice to speed this up.

Likely the case, and yea it’s not necessarily quick... but on the bright side you can walk away while it runs! In my case I just run it while packing my bag.

[flip12 712]

13 hours ago, mickz said:

The Prosharp home takes almost a minute to do one full cycle (1 pass in each direction).  That's significantly slower than clamping a skate into a jig and manually doing it.

@IPv6Freely has a point: during that minute, you can do whatever you want.

But the reason I mentioned PS in the first place was this:

On 7/9/2017 at 9:03 PM, mickz said:

I don't see the practicality for larger volume shops unless they can improve on the lifespan of the grinding wheels.  During the busy season I'd do about 100 pairs of skates in an 8 hour shift.  Multiply that by 2-3 sharpeners running at the same time.

The grinding wheels have 10x the lifespan at 2x the cost.

Edited July 11, 2017 by flip12
Punctuation

[Axxion89 32]

There are plenty of reasons why the Sparx unit as it stands isn't ideal for high volume / professional use;

- Speed of the machine

- Inability to change hollow without a significant changeover compared to current tabletop machines

- Longevity & costs of a grinding wheel

- Expected maintenance & replacement costs

- Inability to perform profiling and other specific tasks

As I've said before, Sparx is pretty much Keurig since it operates on the same principle. Its marketed to consumers as an easy at home option. You pay for the machine & the company makes its long term revenue on the wheels / cups. Keurig has some use in low - mid volume applications like car dealers & waiting rooms but you will never see a Keurig in a restaurant or drive thru. I expect that Sparx will likely follow the same market, you may see Sparx machines in a low volume pro shop but I will go out & say you will never see a Sparx machine replace a Blademaster / Blackstone machine at a store or rink that sees volume or pro usage (NHL, AHL, etc.).

[psulion22 402]

11 hours ago, IPv6Freely said:

Likely the case, and yea it’s not necessarily quick... but on the bright side you can walk away while it runs! In my case I just run it while packing my bag.

This is why I want one.  Too bad they are way out of my price range.

[stevebalchunas 32]

On 7/8/2017 at 9:15 AM, JR Boucicaut said:

Thanks.

I'm not sure if the 2nd sentence is an indication that I'm close-minded about it - actually, I'm not.  I've always wanted to see everything that's out there.  I just haven't seen it.

No, I just think we have different views on it. I have zero attachment to my skills or experience, if a better mousetrap comes along, I'm going to be skeptical, but go with it if I think it's the future. We're also in different positions. I've been here for over two years now, drilled our engineers on everything possible, sharpened thousands of skates on the Sparx... All the questions and doubts you have (and everyone else has when first seeing it), I had.

It's quite possible that once you got your hands on it, we might have a similar views on it.

My biggest issue with Sparx has been the height restrictions. Simply put, if you have banana blades and your steel is worn down to the plastic holder, you're not going to be able to get the whole blade. As a retailer, I'd want to be able to hit those spots to make my customers happy, since a lot of them don't care to get new steel and are happy with what they have. Nowadays, I'm pretty comfortable with it. I think, if someone buys a Sparx, they're obviously concerned with their blades and buying new steel is a pretty easy conversation to have. If you have worn down steel and you don't care about it, then there's a good chance you're not in the market to buy an in-home sharpener anyways. That's how I've rationalized it in my mind. And another point on this too, if we allowed the average consumer to be able to sharpen that high, inevitably we'd have a ton of users setting their height too high and pushing the limits on how little steel they can skate with (better instructions would only help those who read them :)). As of right now, I'm really comfortable with where we are with the product and wouldn't change much (maybe make that Grinding Ring returning home part a little faster as someone already pointed out). 

Shoot me a message with your address and I'll send you a demo unit with a couple Grinding Rings for you to mess around with. You keep mentioning you haven't seen one yet, we should fix that.

[stevebalchunas 32]

There IS a professional "Pro" version coming out in August (it's called the PS100). The short story is we never intended for our home sharpener to be used in a commercial setting. But, we've had close to 100 retailers buy them and try to use them this way, so we've got a new sharpener coming out with external filtration and a souped up motor that can handle all of the extra use. We're launching a new site on it soon that will have all the details. If you're a retailer, there's a chance you got our White Paper in the mail already and will be hearing from us again soon.

If you don't want to read that paper , we talk about the benefits three different types of shops see when using Sparx. Low, medium, and high volume.

Low Volume: Don't offer skate sharpening? Need an option that's not 30K and won't require months/years of training? Sparx is an excellent way to break into the market and get up and running quickly for a low cost. 

Medium Volume: Maybe you already own a Blademaster/Blackstone but only have one or two employees who know how to operate it well (they also tend to be your most valuable/knowledgeable/highest paid employees who would benefit your business more on the sales floor). Use the Sparx to supplement your existing machines and give every employee the ability to sharpen skates at an NHL level with minimal training.

High Volume: Control your wait times by adding Sparx to your current solution. Have 30+ minute wait times on the weekends? Most folks who have to wait over 30 minutes drop skates off and come back. Now you can calculate the volume of skates, determine your ideal wait time (we've found that 15-20 minutes will usually keep those customers walking around in the store) and buy 2, 4, 6 Sparx Sharpeners to keep those wait times down AND increase throughput. Seriously, it's pretty amazing when you see one person manning 4-6 Sparx at a time... that's 2-3 pairs of skates every ~3 minutes--by one employee. 

So, that's my cliff notes version of the White Paper. In all of these cases, consistency and quality are huge benefits in our eyes as well. A 1/2" in California by a 17-year old will be the same as a 45-year old in New England. When we talk to consumers, almost all mention consistency and convenience as being the most important factors to them. Sparx can help retailers give them that. 

[Axxion89 32]

4 hours ago, stevebalchunas said:

There IS a professional "Pro" version coming out in August (it's called the PS100). The short story is we never intended for our home sharpener to be used in a commercial setting. But, we've had close to 100 retailers buy them and try to use them this way, so we've got a new sharpener coming out with external filtration and a souped up motor that can handle all of the extra use. We're launching a new site on it soon that will have all the details. If you're a retailer, there's a chance you got our White Paper in the mail already and will be hearing from us again soon.

If you don't want to read that paper , we talk about the benefits three different types of shops see when using Sparx. Low, medium, and high volume.

Low Volume: Don't offer skate sharpening? Need an option that's not 30K and won't require months/years of training? Sparx is an excellent way to break into the market and get up and running quickly for a low cost. 

Medium Volume: Maybe you already own a Blademaster/Blackstone but only have one or two employees who know how to operate it well (they also tend to be your most valuable/knowledgeable/highest paid employees who would benefit your business more on the sales floor). Use the Sparx to supplement your existing machines and give every employee the ability to sharpen skates at an NHL level with minimal training.

High Volume: Control your wait times by adding Sparx to your current solution. Have 30+ minute wait times on the weekends? Most folks who have to wait over 30 minutes drop skates off and come back. Now you can calculate the volume of skates, determine your ideal wait time (we've found that 15-20 minutes will usually keep those customers walking around in the store) and buy 2, 4, 6 Sparx Sharpeners to keep those wait times down AND increase throughput. Seriously, it's pretty amazing when you see one person manning 4-6 Sparx at a time... that's 2-3 pairs of skates every ~3 minutes--by one employee. 

So, that's my cliff notes version of the White Paper. In all of these cases, consistency and quality are huge benefits in our eyes as well. A 1/2" in California by a 17-year old will be the same as a 45-year old in New England. When we talk to consumers, almost all mention consistency and convenience as being the most important factors to them. Sparx can help retailers give them that. 

Very interesting & good examples. The consignment store is, IMO, the perfect scenario for a Sparx machine as it creates an all new revenue stream for them. For larger use, I am curious to see if there is a negative reception from customers who are having a machine do their sharpening vs a person & if those customers request different hollows (which require changeover, stocking multiple wheels, etc). I understand that many of us see the machine as a good source for skate sharpening but your avg customer paying the same for a sharpening might not.

I am by no means trying to be a debbie downer or hoping it doesn't succeed, one of the reasons I bought my own sharpener (A blademaster triple head from ~1980) is because I was tired of getting inconsistent sharpenings & having to spend about 1hr total getting my 2 pairs of skates sharpened. I think a lot of shops would benefit from a Sparx unit due to the consistency of sharpening / ease of use. If i was a rink retailer that derived significant revenue from sharpening, I would for sure try one unit if I had the volume to support it but would still rely on my traditional sharpener as the significant revenue driver.

PS - If there was a way to make a free-standing Sparx unit that customers can use without an operator (self use at a rink in booth or something) you would pretty much print money since a lot of ice time is outside of normal business hours and a lot of people would pay to be able to get their skates sharpened for those 10:00PM ice times (if this ends up happening let this be proof that I am owed a royalty!)

[stevebalchunas 32]

14 minutes ago, Axxion89 said:

Very interesting & good examples. The consignment store is, IMO, the perfect scenario for a Sparx machine as it creates an all new revenue stream for them. For larger use, I am curious to see if there is a negative reception from customers who are having a machine do their sharpening vs a person & if those customers request different hollows (which require changeover, stocking multiple wheels, etc). I understand that many of us see the machine as a good source for skate sharpening but your avg customer paying the same for a sharpening might not.

I am by no means trying to be a debbie downer or hoping it doesn't succeed, one of the reasons I bought my own sharpener (A blademaster triple head from ~1980) is because I was tired of getting inconsistent sharpenings & having to spend about 1hr total getting my 2 pairs of skates sharpened. I think a lot of shops would benefit from a Sparx unit due to the consistency of sharpening / ease of use. If i was a rink retailer that derived significant revenue from sharpening, I would for sure try one unit if I had the volume to support it but would still rely on my traditional sharpener as the significant revenue driver.

PS - If there was a way to make a free-standing Sparx unit that customers can use without an operator (self use at a rink in booth or something) you would pretty much print money since a lot of ice time is outside of normal business hours and a lot of people would pay to be able to get their skates sharpened for those 10:00PM ice times (if this ends up happening let this be proof that I am owed a royalty!)

You're spot on. Those smaller shops are perfect fits. That medium sized store that already has a triple head machine is most likely going to want to use that since they spent so much on it. I've seen both sides in person when it comes to customer reactions. If you're timid about it and make a big deal say "Would you like the Sparx or the Big Machine?", the customer is probably going to question you and why you are unsure and stick with what they are used to. The shops that stick with it/are confident with the results and put our in-store marketing materials to good use have little to no issues. 

The Free-Standing Sparx is tough because you need ~10/15 minutes of learning about the process (selecting height, hollow info, de-burring) to do it right. It's *just* hard enough to where this idea has kind of been on the back-burner because we feel it needs something else to be a great idea. Those old automated machines were terrible but pretty easy. Stick it in and when it's done, you take it out and skate. I've written your name down on an old dirty napkin, if this idea ever comes to life, hopefully, I'll still have it and remember to get you what you're owed :). 

[IPv6Freely 2092]

Oh man I remember those old machines. 

[marka 526]

Howdy,

3 hours ago, stevebalchunas said:

The Free-Standing Sparx is tough because you need ~10/15 minutes of learning about the process (selecting height, hollow info, de-burring) to do it right. It's *just* hard enough to where this idea has kind of been on the back-burner because we feel it needs something else to be a great idea. Those old automated machines were terrible but pretty easy. Stick it in and when it's done, you take it out and skate. I've written your name down on an old dirty napkin, if this idea ever comes to life, hopefully, I'll still have it and remember to get you what you're owed :). 

 

I think the goal is probably less "unattended" and more "the minimum wage counter person can use it without destroying skates".  The pro shops and such are usually closed when I have league games, but there's always a counter person there.

IIRC, that's kinda how your NHL teams are using it too, right?  Not as "now we don't need our equipment manager" but rather as "trained people aren't available and as long as nothing special is needed, this will sharpen well"?

For now, I'm still not a target customer because I have a good pro option available that's 'easy enough' in terms of accessibility.  Were that to change, I'm still not decided if I'd go Sparx or a traditional single head portable.  I have a workshop (i.e. dust isn't an issue), am comfortable with tools & basic metal machining, etc. but the convenience of "throw skate in and just works" is quite high.  The biggest drawback to me is that I think I can reasonably expect a traditional single head machine like a Wissota to last for my entire lifetime w/plenty of consumable support and I don't have anything like that expectation of longevity for something as complex as a Sparx in as niche a market as home sharpening machines.

Of course, if every rink's counter person had a Sparx then I'm even less likely to buy my own.  :-)

 

Mark

[flip12 712]

For those turn-and-burn big shops too, where they offer a blanket 1/2" hollow or something and can do a tremendously terrible job depending on who's manning the wheel, a Sparx could be nothing but a drastic improvement in quality and consistency. I once had my skates sharpened at what was supposed to be a specialty shop at the edge of Minneapolis and my edges on one skate were like sine waves afterwards. If they're that busy, then get the juggling-multiple-machines act going previously mentioned by @stevebalchunas and you've got the possibility of offering a little more--a machine running your standard hollow and another one where you change out for a custom hollow; maybe you charge $1-$1.50 more for the employee intervention time to control which hollow is applied on the alternative machine, but suddenly you've still got consistency and quality with less training time required. I'm skeptical about a Sparx beating an engaged veteran sharpener, but I know well the rarity of finding true crafts(wo)men in any field.

Curious, will the Pro version have longer lasting grinding wheels?

[strosedefence34 175]

I work at a small hockey shop, and I know I could benefit from having a Sparx with me as well as the blademaster.  During the season there are just so many times being there by myself I get backed up to a 45 minute wait.  I could see me doing the locals skates on the blademaster since they come to our shop specifically for the sharpening, and any out of towners that only come through once or twice a year on the Sparx.  I could also through figure skates in there, because I just plain hate sharpening those.  However my boss is very cheap, and he will not purchase one.  Wishful thinking. 

[JR Boucicaut 3793]

22 hours ago, Axxion89 said:

I expect that Sparx will likely follow the same market, you may see Sparx machines in a low volume pro shop but I will go out & say you will never see a Sparx machine replace a Blademaster / Blackstone machine at a store or rink that sees volume or pro usage (NHL, AHL, etc.).

Stores are moving to automated options to supplement manual sharpening/profiling. 

I realize that we at MSH tend to be more savvy than your average hockey player, but the vast majority of skates don't care about the inner nuances/achievable benefits of sharpening.  If I were to run a poll today in my store (without my service queue, that has our rewards members' profile saved), I'm willing to bet that 85% of customers won't know their hollow (or say "standard".)  In some cases they've never been asked, or told what they get.  All they care about is a sharp and square sharpening.

However, if a store has been giving them consistent results, I wonder what their reaction would be if I were to go and say, "I'm going to put your skates on the XXX while I straighten out soakers."

[Axxion89 32]

7 minutes ago, JR Boucicaut said:

Stores are moving to automated options to supplement manual sharpening/profiling. 

I realize that we at MSH tend to be more savvy than your average hockey player, but the vast majority of skates don't care about the inner nuances/achievable benefits of sharpening.  If I were to run a poll today in my store (without my service queue, that has our rewards members' profile saved), I'm willing to bet that 85% of customers won't know their hollow (or say "standard".)  In some cases they've never been asked, or told what they get.  All they care about is a sharp and square sharpening.

However, if a store has been giving them consistent results, I wonder what their reaction would be if I were to go and say, "I'm going to put your skates on the XXX while I straighten out soakers."

Your last point is pretty much what I think will be the biggest barrier. I agree 100% with you that most people won't know their hollow or even tell the difference between a sharpening but if you sharpen one guys skate by hand & another on the machine, I'd bet a lot of people are going to say either;

A- Hey whoa I don't wan't that glowing toaster touching my skates, you sharpen them like the other guys or I'll go elsewhere

B- Hey if that lunchbox is going to do my skates its gonna be cheaper right?

Education really is going to be the crucial aspect of this because customers will need to be educated on the benefits of the machine & stores will need to be educated on the costs / ease of use / revenue potential as a supplement or potential replacement of a freestanding unit 

[flip12 712]

26 minutes ago, Axxion89 said:

A- Hey whoa I don't wan't that glowing toaster touching my skates, you sharpen them like the other guys or I'll go elsewhere

B- Hey if that lunchbox is going to do my skates its gonna be cheaper right?

A: MakerBot

B: Of course. It saves the shop time, so it should save the customers (some) money.

[purepearl32 6]

On 7/11/2017 at 11:37 AM, stevebalchunas said:

No, I just think we have different views on it. I have zero attachment to my skills or experience, if a better mousetrap comes along, I'm going to be skeptical, but go with it if I think it's the future. We're also in different positions. I've been here for over two years now, drilled our engineers on everything possible, sharpened thousands of skates on the Sparx... All the questions and doubts you have (and everyone else has when first seeing it), I had.

It's quite possible that once you got your hands on it, we might have a similar views on it.

My biggest issue with Sparx has been the height restrictions. Simply put, if you have banana blades and your steel is worn down to the plastic holder, you're not going to be able to get the whole blade. As a retailer, I'd want to be able to hit those spots to make my customers happy, since a lot of them don't care to get new steel and are happy with what they have. Nowadays, I'm pretty comfortable with it. I think, if someone buys a Sparx, they're obviously concerned with their blades and buying new steel is a pretty easy conversation to have. If you have worn down steel and you don't care about it, then there's a good chance you're not in the market to buy an in-home sharpener anyways. That's how I've rationalized it in my mind. And another point on this too, if we allowed the average consumer to be able to sharpen that high, inevitably we'd have a ton of users setting their height too high and pushing the limits on how little steel they can skate with (better instructions would only help those who read them :)). As of right now, I'm really comfortable with where we are with the product and wouldn't change much (maybe make that Grinding Ring returning home part a little faster as someone already pointed out). 

Shoot me a message with your address and I'll send you a demo unit with a couple Grinding Rings for you to mess around with. You keep mentioning you haven't seen one yet, we should fix that.

Sir,

I do not know you at all, but I can honestly say that from reading your comments and seeing your attitude in this forum alone, I would not hesitate to purchase the Sparx machine if I didn't already have a Blademaster. Kudos to you and I hope this continues to catch on even more!

[JR Boucicaut 3793]

23 hours ago, Axxion89 said:

Education really is going to be the crucial aspect of this because customers will need to be educated on the benefits of the machine & stores will need to be educated on the costs / ease of use / revenue potential as a supplement or potential replacement of a freestanding unit 

Absolutely.  We have some non-manual options in some of our stores, so once again, this is just me attempting to localize the situation (my store is strictly manual, at this point.)

 

[stevebalchunas 32]

On 7/12/2017 at 8:00 PM, purepearl32 said:

Sir,

I do not know you at all, but I can honestly say that from reading your comments and seeing your attitude in this forum alone, I would not hesitate to purchase the Sparx machine if I didn't already have a Blademaster. Kudos to you and I hope this continues to catch on even more!

Thanks, that really means a lot. I'm just trying to be honest and share what I'm learning :). 

[stevebalchunas 32]

Just an FYI for anyone heading up to Toronto this weekend, thanks to JR, I'll be at the rink demoing the sharpener and sharpening skates for anyone that is interested. Please come by and say hi and have some good questions/comments!