Factory Mad Worth the $?

[Peter36]

I messaged Factory Mad on instagram and they quoted me $450 USD for an intermediate glove! Is this the type of glove that will last you a while? Is it really worth the money?

[cwarnar]

If you love a 5500 hundred style baseball glove, yes it is.  Floating T and air tight closure out of the box.  Dennis charges a premium price, but delivers a premium product

[Peter36]

13 minutes ago, cwarnar said:

If you love a 5500 hundred style baseball glove, yes it is.  Floating T and air tight closure out of the box.  Dennis charges a premium price, but delivers a premium product

Does he only offer that type of break? I currently use a VE8 glove.

[cwarnar]

1 minute ago, Peter36 said:

Does he only offer that type of break? I currently use a VE8 glove.

Yup.  Dennis is pretty rigid in what he does.

[Peter36]

Just now, cwarnar said:

Yup.  Dennis is pretty rigid in what he does.

Would it be similar to the type of break that VE8 has?

[cwarnar]

2 minutes ago, Peter36 said:

Would it be similar to the type of break that VE8 has?

No clue... 

[Peter36]

5 minutes ago, cwarnar said:

No clue... 

Do you know what Ccm break it is equivalent to?

[cwarnar]

@Peter36 read this thread... CCM 600

[Puckstopper]

I'm in a VE8 Pro Carbon and it's the most similar catcher to my old T3500/5500 that I've been able to find to date.  I don't want to tell you you wont have any issues, but the break should not be one of them. 

[Shady80]

I own a full set from factory mad, granted I purchased them used I can comfortably say they are very high quality pieces. I have used several different catchers, and factory mad easily opened and closed the best out of them all. 

[TheGoalNet]

On 4/3/2019 at 11:30 PM, Peter36 said:

Do you know what Ccm break it is equivalent to?

Which VE8 glove? The 1 piece is def a 590 clone.

[Peter36]

1 hour ago, TheGoalNet said:

Which VE8 glove? The 1 piece is def a 590 clone.

I have the one piece, also I messaged Factory Mad and they were fine with doing a 75 break

[ULTIMA]

While I do keep reading (mostly) good things about Factory Mad gear, I don't think I could justify those costs.  You can't be charging those kinds prices with next to no pro level exposure.  And before someone jumps at the chance to give me an earful about how the big guys pay their pro goalies, lemme tell you something, those companies don't pay everyone and they certainly don't pay a lot. Fact.

Anyway I'm sure it's good stuff. But another thing about these small companies is that they don't have any specialty features in their gear. D30, Curve Composite, E-Foam etc. - these are all real technologies that exist. You can do research on them. Some say their just a fancy plastic. Maybe. I personally don't think that. But it's nice to know what's going into your gear. All these other small companies say the exact same thing.

"We use only the finest materials".

Okay......? What is that exactly? For all we know, they could still be hand-stuffing gear with shards of foam like it's still 1998. Another thing is that consumers of goalie equipment seem to have this misconception that gear made in Canada or domestic made automatically mean pro grade. Who started that myth, I'll never know. With the exception of Kenesky chest/arms in the National Hockey League, there's precisely zero evidence to support the idea that these small companies' gear is good enough for pros.

Anyway it sounds like I'm crapping all over the small guys. That's not my intention. And looking back on all that I wrote, it might stir some ish up in here and infuriate others but at this point I'v spent too much time typing all this out, not gonna just erase it all. I just think people get caught up with the smaller guys because they're saving $300 on pads when they don't really know what they're getting until they get it. One thing I just recently began to consider is the smaller brand name is gear is twice as difficult to sell if the time comes and you want to move it. Good luck.


So I guess what i'm trying to say is that if you've never seen the gear up close or felt it, you're basically taking a shot in the dark and it's a gamble. If you've got the funds, by all means. But the strangers online on the other side of the continent who say "Trust me" isn't good enough to persuade me to buy. Not anymore anyway.

[bunnyman666]

On 4/7/2019 at 2:10 AM, ULTIMA said:

While I do keep reading (mostly) good things about Factory Mad gear, I don't think I could justify those costs.  You can't be charging those kinds prices with next to no pro level exposure.  And before someone jumps at the chance to give me an earful about how the big guys pay their pro goalies, lemme tell you something, those companies don't pay everyone and they certainly don't pay a lot. Fact.

Anyway I'm sure it's good stuff. But another thing about these small companies is that they don't have any specialty features in their gear. D30, Curve Composite, E-Foam etc. - these are all real technologies that exist. You can do research on them. Some say their just a fancy plastic. Maybe. I personally don't think that. But it's nice to know what's going into your gear. All these other small companies say the exact same thing.

"We use only the finest materials".

Okay......? What is that exactly? For all we know, they could still be hand-stuffing gear with shards of foam like it's still 1998. Another thing is that consumers of goalie equipment seem to have this misconception that gear made in Canada or domestic made automatically mean pro grade. Who started that myth, I'll never know. With the exception of Kenesky chest/arms in the National Hockey League, there's precisely zero evidence to support the idea that these small companies' gear is good enough for pros.

Anyway it sounds like I'm crapping all over the small guys. That's not my intention. And looking back on all that I wrote, it might stir some ish up in here and infuriate others but at this point I'v spent too much time typing all this out, not gonna just erase it all. I just think people get caught up with the smaller guys because they're saving $300 on pads when they don't really know what they're getting until they get it. One thing I just recently began to consider is the smaller brand name is gear is twice as difficult to sell if the time comes and you want to move it. Good luck.


So I guess what i'm trying to say is that if you've never seen the gear up close or felt it, you're basically taking a shot in the dark and it's a gamble. If you've got the funds, by all means. But the strangers online on the other side of the continent who say "Trust me" isn't good enough to persuade me to buy. Not anymore anyway.

Actually- Factory gets some time in the NHL, going all the way back to Tim Thomas. CJ Motte has had a few times  in the NHL with Dennis’ gear. Scott Glass did switch to CCM, but was a Factory guy.  So there has been NHL exposure; Dennis purely refuses to pay the NHL, much like John Brown. Factory has a fair bit of exposure in the KHL. 

The more I learn about “payment” with pro gear, the more I have learnt that pay to wear is only reserved for the very top of the top of the heap; no, it is not much money.  And in general, gear endorsement deals work out to be R&D in many cases, much like it is in many other sports. Companies pay the NHL for the privilege to sell gear to teams at a subsidised price. Gear is not even supplied for free in general. It is sold at deep discount due to a lack of warranty and the fact that the teams buys in quantity. Take warranty out of the price and the costs go WAAAAAAAY down. 

If you had any pro gear from Vaughn prior to 5-6 years back, Dennis was involved in building it. So there is NHL cred with his stuff. 

Dennis’s pricing is higher because he is the only person building it. He also feels that his gear is on par with and/or exceeds the bigs, therefore HOW he justifies his prices. Take that for however you wish to take it.

I don’t think you’re crapping on it, by the way.  You make a decent argument. With the glut of new gear on the market, you can get GREAT stuff by waiting for sales. I do that on a LOT of items!

There is fine gear built overseas, and I own some. There is also great gear built in North America. It depends on how much it’s worth to you. My Factory gear is the only stuff that I buy without regards to resale value. It is also the stuff that I play best in. Do I own the leg pads? No. I have found that I can get great leg pads pretty easily by watching for sales; gloves are something that I am particularly picky on. I mod leg pads until I get them right. I would not know how to react if legs pads were exactly how I want them out of the box! 

I understand where your point of view comes from. If resale is important, buy from the majors; if you want something made with a bit more care with you in mind, buy small, but do your homework. You really have zero business buying custom* if you don’t intend on keeping the gear. Buying an off-brand can be a bargain ONLY if you use it from new to threadbare. 

bunny out.

*clarification on custom: colourways are fine; even an embroidered name is okay. Full custom, meaning mods you dreamt up yourself that ONLY work for you with something like “Eat me” embroidered onto the set is probably not going to bode well for resale. 

[Lucky Pucker]

13 hours ago, bunnyman666 said:

Actually- Factory gets some time in the NHL, going all the way back to Tim Thomas. CJ Motte has had a few times  in the NHL with Dennis’ gear. Scott Glass did switch to CCM, but was a Factory guy.  So there has been NHL exposure; Dennis purely refuses to pay the NHL, much like John Brown. Factory has a fair bit of exposure in the KHL. 

The more I learn about “payment” with pro gear, the more I have learnt that pay to wear is only reserved for the very top of the top of the heap; no, it is not much money.  Gear is not even supplied for free in general. It is sold at deep discount due to a lack of warranty and the fact that the teams buys in quantity. Take warranty out of the price and the costs go WAAAAAAAY down. 

If you had any pro gear from Vaughn prior to 5-6 years back, Dennis was involved in building it. So there is NHL cred with his stuff. 

Dennis’s pricing is higher because he is the only person building it. He also feels that his gear is on par with and/or exceeds the bigs, therefore HOW he justifies his prices. Take that for however you wish to take it.

I don’t think you’re crapping on it, by the way.  You make a decent argument. With the glut of new gear on the market, you can get GREAT stuff by waiting for sales. I do that on a LOT of items!

There is fine gear built overseas, and I own some. There is also great gear built in North America. It depends on how much it’s worth to you. My Factory gear is the only stuff that I buy without regards to resale value. It is also the stuff that I play best in. Do I own the leg pads? No. I have found that I can get great leg pads pretty easily by watching for sales; gloves are something that I am particularly picky on. I mod leg pads until I get them right. I would not know how to react if legs pads were exactly how I want them out of the box! 

I understand where your point of view comes from. If resale is important, buy from the majors; if you want something made with a bit more care with you in mind, buy small, but do your homework. You really have zero business buying custom if you don’t intend on keeping the gear. Buying an off-brand can be a bargain ONLY if you use it from new to threadbare. 

bunny out.

I'd like to report a bunny sighting (or "siting", per the preferred spelling on this site).

Maybe we should be tracking this

[bunnyman666]

1 hour ago, Lucky Pucker said:

I'd like to report a bunny sighting (or "siting", per the preferred spelling on this site).

Maybe we should be tracking this

That would be a boring pursuit!