Kenesky's shutting down

[johncho]

Tough news after John Brown shutting down 

https://www.instagram.com/p/DAQqv4DuQq6/

Edited September 23 by johncho

[indykrap]

Too bad. Always good to pop in on these guys for parts and accessories and talk goalie. They always made time for people and were a respected repair shop in town. 

[MTH]

Damn.

[Snowman30]

Sad but think they did it themselves. Alot of people online Facebook/Instagram with open orders already paid for and no response from the owners at all about the receiving the equipment paid for or there money returned from the order.  Some have been waiting over a year for gear from them with it already paid for. Very sad business practices doing that and now shutting down and running by the silence from them towards the people who's money they took.

When they started doing the NHL chest protectors I was interested but wanted to watch how they made out with them, after seeing the crap Chenner went through I wasn't going to order one, let alone put money down to order one. Way too sketchy business, sad part is they took a legendary goalie equipment name and dragged it down with them.

Edited September 23 by Snowman30

[mr_shifty1982]

15 minutes ago, Snowman30 said:

Sad but think they did it themselves. Alot of people online Facebook/Instagram with open orders already paid for and no response from the owners at all about the receiving the equipment paid for or there money returned from the order.  Some have been waiting over a year for gear from them with it already paid for. Very sad business practices doing that and now shutting down and running by the silence from them towards the people who's money they took.

When they started doing the NHL chest protectors I was interested but wanted to watch how they made out with them, after seeing the crap Chenner went through I wasn't going to order one, let alone put money down to order one. Way too sketchy business, sad part is they took a legendary goalie equipment name and dragged it down with them.

If that's true, that's ridiculous. Definitely did it to themselves. 

[Chenner29]

2 hours ago, Snowman30 said:

Sad but think they did it themselves. Alot of people online Facebook/Instagram with open orders already paid for and no response from the owners at all about the receiving the equipment paid for or there money returned from the order.  Some have been waiting over a year for gear from them with it already paid for. Very sad business practices doing that and now shutting down and running by the silence from them towards the people who's money they took.

When they started doing the NHL chest protectors I was interested but wanted to watch how they made out with them, after seeing the crap Chenner went through I wasn't going to order one, let alone put money down to order one. Way too sketchy business, sad part is they took a legendary goalie equipment name and dragged it down with them.

Here's the thing - my first interactions with Mike were great; he was responsive and loved talking about gear.  We really connected on that.  Unfortunately, toward the end things soured from my perspective, especially with the chest/arm transaction.  I even had a simple elastic strap order around the time I got my PX3s (last year?) where they sent me pictures of what they made, but never invoiced or shipped product.

The people there seemed to be really passionate about the game and position, and I am going to miss that.

What confounds me is that it does not take a year to make a set of gear (although ordering custom DOES make it feel that way sometimes...lol), there has to be some other issues in the background that led to this.
Based on posts floating around Facebook/GGSU - I do know their main business/finance guy passed from Covid a couple years ago (I think his name was Joel?), and their main builder Mike was taken out of action for a long time due to complications from Covid as well.  I don't know if we'll ever know the full story.

I don't work in hockey gear manufacturing, but I'll provide a really dumbed down scenario that I *think* makes sense, assuming we're only talking glove/blocker/pads...

1. For argument's sake, let's assume a set of gear takes 80 hours to make - we can add more if it really takes longer, but the math below is calibrated to this.
2. Given 5 employees, you should be able to turn a set every two work days (8 hours each person x 2 days = 16 hours each)
3. Now let's say you go down to 4 employees - now each employee needs to turn 20 hours in for each set - about half a week's worth.
4. So if they sold a set a day and then built that set in two to four days, how did their backlog hit >365 days?  They'd have to have well over 100 sets in their queue.
5. A full set of gear is listed at $2500 CAD; if they did actually sell this much they'd have somewhere between $467k to $912k in gross revenue in that year.

[Tommy Alisat]

Wow! Where do I begin in the Kenesky Saga! Rewinding to September 2022 I attended in person in London Ontario at Kenesky's shop a meeting with Dave Wilcox to be sized for a PP1 chest protector order. At the time submitted a $500 deposit. Fast forward after 2 full hockey seasons and numerous gaps and string along lines. I am told by Mike Howard to forward my credit card info to cover the balance of the order and my order is in the (Pile) to be done next. This was April 26th 2024. Today myself and many others find out that we have been stiffed for hard earned money. 

[Novasteel31]

Just now, Tommy Alisat said:

Wow! Where do I begin in the Kenesky Saga! Rewinding to September 2022 I attended in person in London Ontario at Kenesky's shop a meeting with Dave Wilcox to be sized for a PP1 chest protector order. At the time submitted a $500 deposit. Fast forward after 2 full hockey seasons and numerous gaps and string along lines. I am told by Mike Howard to forward my credit card info to cover the balance of the order and my order is in the (Pile) to be done next. This was April 26th 2024. Today myself and many others find out that we have been stiffed for hard earned money. 

I was in a similar position, I paid in full around December of last year. I however was emailing them on the weekly and managed to get my unit around April I believe it was but based on what I have been reading I might have been one of the last ones to go out.

[WillyGrips13]

Why does this sort of thing happen in this industry? Battram had some issues like this for a while, although I think they fixed it. Remember Agatone? Similar issues. Such a shame. 

[RichMan]

Well, this puts Dave back on the market, either as a freelance agent again or simply a free agent for another company to grab hold of.

The industry is certainly plagued with bad business decisions or something else is happening in the wings...

[IpaddyTECH]

Sometimes craftsmen are not businessmen? 

[TresPasser]

5 hours ago, WillyGrips13 said:

Why does this sort of thing happen in this industry? Battram had some issues like this for a while, although I think they fixed it. Remember Agatone? Similar issues. Such a shame. 

Not to mention the infamous Monster Hockey.

[coopaloop1234]

3 hours ago, IpaddyTECH said:

Sometimes craftsmen are not businessmen? 

Based off of the lead times, it sounds like Kenesky wasn't either one. 

[SentryHockey]

When I ordered my roller hockey set, the wait time was around 9 months. Emailed Mike a couple times back and forth. Always very responsive.

After I paid the remaining balance, my order was shipped out within a few weeks afterwards, but this was 1 1/2 years ago.

I talked to Mike awhile, and from what himself and some other people were telling me like Glenn Miller, Sara Marschand, since covid it's been extremely difficult if not impossible to get some of the foams used in equipment. Vaughn stopped using their HD110 foam simply because they couldn't get it.

Also their best sewer was diagnosed with Cancer and they couldn't keep up without them. 

Glenn told me once he can make a plain solid chest protector in a day or so. Pair of pads takes a little longer. This is back when they were hand stuffed with foam.

Why it took them so long is beyond me. They also kept telling customers wait time was 3-4 months when it was around 9. Something shady has been going on for awhile. 

That being said, I love my set and wanted to place another order for a TPS Bionic clone set of pads for inline use.

I'm sad to see them go, but it sounds like they couldnt run the business well at all.

[tubby34]

This sucks, they were kinda in the running for my next set of gear if they ever sourced the right color. Simmons if I could get the color.

Anybody know where to get SM90 Chin pads goign forward? I was going to place an order yesterday and saw the news

[Snowman30]

Dave Wilcox just post this up on Facebook. He seems to be getting lots of flack for something that he had nothing to do with and had no control over.

Edited September 24 by Snowman30

[MTH]

There's a reason why the successful hockey manufacturers have all gone to China. Not because of the labor costs directly - more that they are better able to manage the business with off shore manufacturing now. 

Doing it all in house works to a point. But your line between doing well and not well is razor thin. Someone mentioned a person who sewed was gone and the company as whole sunk. That's risky as heck business model. The big companies don't worry about that.

Obviously they had some logistic and cash issues. I'm sure one compounded the other and it made it pretty tough to survive. Like everyone says; intentions were great but things happen. Sad.

[Tommy Alisat]

Interesting to see certain parties in the Kenesky operation step forward to claim no responsibility , no knowledge or being completely blindsided by what seems to be higher up imaginary investors! At the end of the day customers were being led to believe that products they paid for in full, and in good faith were being built. When in fact they knew what was to come quite some time ago but continued to extort funds up to a lame announcement that they regret any inconvenience this has caused. Now you are seeing people trying to deflect and direct blame to save face in the Goalie community.

[daffy]

9 hours ago, SentryHockey said:

When I ordered my roller hockey set, the wait time was around 9 months. Emailed Mike a couple times back and forth. Always very responsive.

After I paid the remaining balance, my order was shipped out within a few weeks afterwards, but this was 1 1/2 years ago.

I talked to Mike awhile, and from what himself and some other people were telling me like Glenn Miller, Sara Marschand, since covid it's been extremely difficult if not impossible to get some of the foams used in equipment. Vaughn stopped using their HD110 foam simply because they couldn't get it.

Also their best sewer was diagnosed with Cancer and they couldn't keep up without them. 

Glenn told me once he can make a plain solid chest protector in a day or so. Pair of pads takes a little longer. This is back when they were hand stuffed with foam.

Why it took them so long is beyond me. They also kept telling customers wait time was 3-4 months when it was around 9. Something shady has been going on for awhile. 

That being said, I love my set and wanted to place another order for a TPS Bionic clone set of pads for inline use.

I'm sad to see them go, but it sounds like they couldnt run the business well at all.

You nailed it when you said they still advertised 3-4 month wait time when people were waiting a year.  That's what pissed me off the most after waiting for a year for my gear.  Just tell me the wait time!  Don't over promise and under deliver.  I was given the whole only 3 month wait bit and every time I checked oh it will only be another 4 weeks.  Finally after a year I got my stuff. 

Back in the day it sounded like Agatone did this so that he had funds for the current order.  Take a deposit from someone to finish the last set.  On a side note, Agatone came through for me on time with my 2 glove orders.  

 

Anyway, I use the gear now Verbero (made by Kenesky) but I hate repping the name.  Tried to remove one logo but the outline is still there.  I have such a sour taste after that buying experience that if I could, I'd scratch out the logos on all my stuff. 

[Chenner29]

59 minutes ago, daffy said:

You nailed it when you said they still advertised 3-4 month wait time when people were waiting a year.  That's what pissed me off the most after waiting for a year for my gear.  Just tell me the wait time!  Don't over promise and under deliver.  I was given the whole only 3 month wait bit and every time I checked oh it will only be another 4 weeks.  Finally after a year I got my stuff. 

Back in the day it sounded like Agatone did this so that he had funds for the current order.  Take a deposit from someone to finish the last set.  On a side note, Agatone came through for me on time with my 2 glove orders.  

 

Anyway, I use the gear now Verbero (made by Kenesky) but I hate repping the name.  Tried to remove one logo but the outline is still there.  I have such a sour taste after that buying experience that if I could, I'd scratch out the logos on all my stuff. 

There's a pretty damning post from a current Kenesky customer on Facebook, where he says he was asked for a full deposit to expedite the order.  He paid the deposit and then got ghosted.

[Snowman30]

53 minutes ago, Chenner29 said:

There's a pretty damning post from a current Kenesky customer on Facebook, where he says he was asked for a full deposit to expedite the order.  He paid the deposit and then got ghosted.

That's absolutely disgusting.

[Chenner29]

Found the post:

[SentryHockey]

If this happened to me, I would personally contact credit card company or the bank and file fraud charges. If that didnt work, I'd see if I could gather everyone and file some sort of class action lawsuit. 

But...being how it's in Canada, and if they're filing bankruptcy nothing may work. 

From what I was told by a former rep, Maltese did the same thing. Got so behind in debt, he used new orders to pay and produce older orders. So the new people all got screwed

[daffy]

1 hour ago, Chenner29 said:

There's a pretty damning post from a current Kenesky customer on Facebook, where he says he was asked for a full deposit to expedite the order.  He paid the deposit and then got ghosted.

That is terrible.  

[Tommy Alisat]

Most credit card companies state that after 100 days an attempt to re-coup funds based on a dispute for whatever reasons is the cut off for any restitution. It is clear that the tactics to get payment and then stretch out dates for supposed gear completion was front and center by the Kenesky group. Underhanded to say the least.