For anyone who, like me, spent the better part of their childhood in hockey rinks or on frozen ponds, you know the process of getting your skates sharpened can be a laborious one. It costs money. There are always lines. The guy who sharpens skates is out to lunch when you need him most. Or just not around at all. And your game starts in seven minutes. I've played pond hockey the past decade on skates with blades duller than a butter knife.
"Sparx is simplifying people's lives and elevating the level at which hockey players play the game."
It's a necessity for hockey players and figure skaters, from pros to amateurs, that hasn't seen any real innovation in decades. Which is why the Sparx Skate Sharpener, out of Acton, MA, and currently on Kickstarter, might be on to something significant.
Conceived in 2009 and launched in 2013 by Russell Layton, the Sparx Skate Sharpener is designed for safe and effective at-home use. With 17 days to go in their campaign, they've already more than doubled their goal of $60,000.
"Our goal is to deliver a consumer friendly sharpener that does one thing impeccably well and that is sharpen skates," Spark Hockey's marketing manager, Colleen Coyne, told me. Coyne is a native of East Falmouth, MA, and won a gold medal at the 1998 Winter Olympic Games in Nagano, Japan. She served as a marketing consultant for Hubspot from 2006 to February of this year.
The device can sharpen figure skates with a separate adapter. Imagine locking a skate into the top of your typical home computer printer and you've essentially got the idea. A pledge of $499 gets you a Sparx Skate Sharpener, grinding ring and alignment tool.
"The original idea was to build the Keurig of skate sharpeners," Coyne said.
That analogy is two-sided. On the one hand, Coyne explained, Sparx aims to deliver a product that's accurate, customizable and very easy to use with no training. Further, from an engineering standpoint, the device can "read" what grinding ring is being used and optimize the rotational speed accordingly – similar to how a Keurig coffee machine adjusts temperature and water volume depending on what's being brewed.
All this for a better skate sharpening experience. "Sparx is simplifying people's lives and elevating the level at which hockey players play the game," Coyne said.
So far, Sparx seems poised to change the game.
Image via Sparx Hockey
