Here is a link to Bill’s Blog for those who haven’t read it yet.
http://frcdirector.blogspot.com/
Not very encouraging I must say!
i have to agree…not very encouraging words
with the amount of these that will be on the field during a game, its very disappointing to know we may only have 5 or less to practice with for the entire season.
Nice catch & thanks for posting.
You would think that somebody would check with the company that makes these & the company that sells these to ensure that there will be enough to cover the teams.
Sounds like a pretty big ooops to me.
Just to piggy back on this post:
I had a parent do a little checking about the game pieces and here is what she has reported:
I just spoke with a Blip representative and she told me FIRST was going to have something on their website within the next 24 hours in regard to the balls. She also told me they are not discontinued and they are still manufacturing them. She also told me the only store carrying them right now is WalMart. Unfortunately they do not sell them directly to the public.
So I think Bill’s Blog is the info on the web. Being an Ex Wal-Mart employee, their ordering system is very streamlined. An employee can order an item and have it in the store in two days if it is stored in the local warehouse. From what I’ve been told, this item has been removed from their current line of products and cannot be restocked at your local Wal-Mart. This is a big setback to the teams that haven’t been lucky enough to grab the last few off the shelves. It’s going to be extremely hard to prototype with only one ball. With a supply being 2 weeks out ,(1 week for the site to come up and the 2nd for shipping) I hope a little GP shines through and those lucky enough to have a supply will share with those who don’t.
Sounds like an opportunityfor others for fundraising for enterprising teams.
87.77 balls per store. Hmmmmmmm
We only found 4 at 5 different stores. Is that 28,000 number after FIRST has secured enough for competitions???
My guess is that Wal-Mart might have 28,000, but probably most of them are in warehouses. I can’t imagine these things are normally popular enough to take up the necessary shelf space to have 100 per store.
Sounds like FIRST contacted Wal-Mart and verified the total # available but failed to ask how many are normally kept on-hand in a store.
Also, it’s possible they may have a smaller quantity in-store now than they would have in the summertime.
I’d doubt it John. Five Walmarts for our team - we found two balls, but one of them was so broken it wasn’t even worth purchasing. I’m still waiting to hear back from a few other Philly area teams, but the report isn’t great. We have two balls total and I don’t anticipate finding any more before we might get our hands on a few from FIRST.
The Cokeley family, on their drive home from Manchester, stopped at EVERY Walmart between Massachusetts and Connecticut - and found ZERO balls.
We, at our local Walmart, however, found 6. Being gracious, we bought 3, and saved 3 for our neighboring Allentown team. We also made sure to leave the chance of balls at the Hamilton Walmart for the teams out there in Hamilton.
I hope teams who come across this will remember to have the same principles!
Exactly my point. There must be a few Walmarts with quite a few. Once we find them, teams can get them.
FYI We bought the broken ones also. I predict that the majority of balls on the field will have one or more hoops broken.
You are also forgetting overhead. Have to account the ones that were stolen by customers/employees and the ones that are broken in store and thrown away without being accounted for.
A friend told me Wyoming Walmarts had more than a fair share of them in stock.
Road trip??? :rolleyes:
Btw, I hate that Bill used blogspot, since that site is blocked at work. :mad:
Can someone copy/paste the contents of the message here?
Here you are Señor.
Direct from Bill’s Blog:
http://frcdirector.blogspot.com/2009/01/i-know-youre-busy.html
That’s a start. If you cannot find any call Walmart in Wyoming.
Interesting point. Here’s some info on Walmart’s distribution centers:
I can’t find a list of those centers, however. Can anyone find a link I can’t find? Is there a nice/sane/proper way of finding out/shaking loose any product that might be in these places?
I hope that FIRST makes these available for sale as soon as possible.
I’m not particularly interested in buying anything from WalMart.
yea. our team isnt really hot on that idea either. i mean, if you want to buy 10 more game pieces, thats $100. and we’re really hesitant dropping that kind of money on something that a.) is going to break fairly easily and b.) will probably only be needed for roughly 6 weeks. and i highly doubt that, even if u found 80 of those in your walmart, that you’d get a bulk price.
its just an all around case of bad planning…
I guess one of our mentors picked up like nine on his way home from our meeting after the kickoff. I don’t know if there were anymore left. Also one of our teachers at the school(who is part of our team), picked one up like yesturday or today so he can have one, but it was a broken one. So there are or were some here in Minnesota.
Pool Noodles on the other hand is harder to find here in the middle of winter.
You get the car, I’ll get the sandwiches! 
The only thing I can add to this – Whyoming?
Sorry, one of the few times I can use that and it works.
The good news is that maybe in 4 or five months they’ll be at Building 19!
There are only 3 FRC teams in the entire state of Kentucky. If you know anyone there I would call them and have them look.