Jack and I had thought about the project over the years,sharing our ideas
with you from time to time.
He had such good success with the Libra and I had the Deano cues with
Schmelke blanks finished by John Nemic I approached several friends in the
business about the idea before proceeding.
Larry Vigus was in no position to help with any hands on work,I talked to
Shelby and he was too busy, I went to Paul Drexler who is always so helpful
to anyone in the cue business needing help. He made the suggestion to
me that I contact David Schmelke. saying he does great work.
Schmelke is a tremendous cue making company with the ability to manufacture
cues in any price range and has experience building cues for others.
Did you know that many,if not most of the Titleist blanks so popular today
were manufactured by Schmelke for Brunswick?. Schmelke also made the
blanks for John Nemec when he made the Deano cues.
Rick Landsberg of Best Billiards in Orange County bought hundreds from Tad
who had bought the left over stock from Schmelke when Brunswick quit
using them.
When Schmelke took on the project I was very happy because among other things
I had a very reputable USA company with not only the talent and ability to handle these
cues but also Schmelke had vast amounts of great old wood and good
shaft wood available( perhaps the best in the world)
I recently bought a large amount of excellent ebony from Schmelke for some of the better
cue makers,high dollar cue makers in America.
Jack and I discussed our project and tested several cues in trial runs to be sure we got what
we wanted .a distinctive powerful responsive hit that we felt like was our own
The thing that impressed us and caused us to go forward was the great shaft wood and
Schmelke's proceedure of making great shafts. I have seen $5000 cues with shafts that were
not as nice as what we got.
Just a word ... first after several passes (cutting and sanding and processing) a vigorous
shaft pretparation beginning with sealer ,spinning and finishing, then a special 3 step process
of applying spinning polishing ending with a wax.
Why didn't we explain everything up front?
It was unimportant ,served us no purpose and both parties were feeling each other
other out,if there had been a problem with something there was no use in spreading the blame.
There was no problem
Not one customer complained about the play ,while several called and ordered as many as 4
more,great pool players claimed they loved the play.
We like to think we had something to do with that result.Schmelke did great work,
they provided great materials and payed close attention to details,provided everything according
to our specs and time tables.
We are proud of our product which we consider a great success. The cues play good,look good
and enabled us to put a nice cue in your hands for a good price.
Schmelke is a tremendous company and they have been putting great cues at low prices in
players hands for years.
A great deal of controversy was caused by people with absolutely no financial involvement,
they were not customers and had not touched the cues.
Not one customer did or could lose money because we stood behind the product with a
no question asked ,money back guaranteed if the customer wanted his money back with
a normal period of time.
Our sneaky pete was built to the same specs and hit the same.Several cues were sent
to the Philipines to support youth pool sponsored by the Anito KID
One of his 15 year old kids beat Efren and we wanted to provide these kids the chance to play
with top quality equipment at no cost.
Your purchases helped suport that project and any extra profits went a great deal toward helping
Jack with unexpected hospital bills.
Originally ,I had planned on taking my profits and having a good time with the family.
As you know I have never been ashamed to make a profit and I don't intend to start to change.
Please do not take this as an apology, I am proud of everything we did . This is just a public
explanation which I am making now unforced or coerced.
We are now facing a major crisis,perhaps the biggest since the big war.My mother had to ration gas,
and now maybe it's toilet paper. Some are losing jobs.
Our industry is certainly facing hard times for the short term.
I am grateful to those of you who increased your orders while we were being criticized,and to the
dozens of you who told us to keep our chin up and not let the turkeys get us down.
I should offer a hearty thanks to our detractors who while attempting to do us harm
have actually provided us with increased orders and letters of support from the rest of you.
Dean
Quoted for posterity