May 8th, 2015 was a special day. It was the day my partner and I decided to start Creating The Difference.
Our Mission is to inspire people to identify and reach their passion through coaching, education, mentoring, and motivating so they can unlock their potential and create a difference. We are an innovative company who is able to see when change is needed and come up with creative solutions to help.
Since bowling had played such an important role in my career, I wanted a way to give back to the sport. My partner and I designed some services to help make bowlers better and began offering those services to friends. As we started to grow, so did our services. You can view a complete list of our current services here. In addition, we also offer coaching through our bowling store in Chicago as well as when we travel around the world.
We wrote two bowling books including a #1 seller on Amazon. These books are designed to help both league and tournament bowlers. They tackle everything from what you should bring with you to what you should eat to stay energized, to understanding lane transition. These books are what launched us from a service company into product sales.
With a strong background in product development from over 14 years
in the bowling industry as a bowling ball designer; I wanted to offer something tangible to help the tournament bowler. In The Tournament Mindset, we have a list of what you should bring to a tournament. So we thought, why not bundle this up and make it easy on people? This is when we created the tournament backpack kit.
One of the items which was crucial to this kit was a new bowling ball cleaner we had been working on. We got it approved for use every shot and called it That Purple Stuff.
Little did we know that video would launch That Purple Stuff as the star product offering from CtD. You see, at Creating the Difference, we want to change the game. We understand that happens by helping people. We have used That Purple Stuff as a tool to teach people cleaning their ball before every shot is important for a consistent reaction and a longer ball life. We are now able to help bowlers all over the world by selling That Purple Stuff internationally. Bowlers are cleaning their ball with the product and as a result they are achieving improved scores and success. In fact, I won the Detroit Cup Doubles Tournament last weekend with my friend George Gohagan III. We both used it every shot.
Another a
spect of helping bowlers is through coaching. We have had the pleasure of helping celebrity athletes, PBA players and national teams; as well as college, high school, youth and beginning bowlers alike.
We opened our first bowling store, Creating Th
e Difference Bowling Store, at Lakewood Bowl & Grill in Richton Park, IL. Click the map for directions to the store. We are currently in the midst of planning our first large coaching clinic. We also offer a practice league and a youth coaching league in which we coach while the students are practicing. While working with the consumers, we started to see the disconnect between the ball companies and the customers. Many consumers just wanted the latest and greatest and didn’t really understand the importance of having a complete arsenal. In order to help them and simplify the ball selection process, we developed a chart and video showing the 4 types of bowling ball motion.
This information is not only used in our store; but, other company websites have begun to use it as well.
At Creating the Difference, our goal is to grow the sport of bowling. As a result, we like to work with bowlers and companies who share that vision. Our belief is by working together we can all become better. Because of this belief, we have built some strong partnerships in the past year.
We have partnered with the UBA and are excited to bring our first team into the upcoming season. They have made some great promos for us. They bring a fresh perspective to the sport. They are visionaries who combine the fun, recreational side of bowling with the competitive side. If you haven’t been to one of their events, find one in your area to check out. They’re a ton of fun.
For apparel, we have partnered with Boom Apparel on shirts, sleeves, jackets, hats and other items. Boom has been a great supporter of ours from the beginning and we are happy to have them in our corner.
One of our favorite new products is K Motion Tape from Genesis Bowling. The team over at Genesis is passionate about bowling and they get it. By “it”, I mean they understand that teamwork is what it will take to grow the sport. They create innovative products which truly help people - on and off the lanes.
We have created some great relationships with other pro shops, bowling ball manufacturers and distributors as well. I have had the pleasure of working for the PBA on XtraFrame. My favorite part of that has been educating the subscribers in real time on what the pros are doing to stay competitive.
Creating The Difference created a VIP subscription service which offers the ability for bowlers at the “grassroots level” to test out new products and services during the early phases of development. There are different levels which determine what the subscribers get each month.
Over the last few months, we have been overwhelmed by the support we have received from bowlers of all levels. Because of the warm welcome we have gotten from the bowling community, we recently began offering staff positions. In less than a week, we received over 200 applications! This has shown us that what we’re doing is catching hold and our vision is being appreciated by others in the industry. All of this activity during the last 12 months has grown our company from 2 to almost 200 people.
Of course none of this would be possible without my supportive family and a dedicated and extremely talented staff. They are the real stars who keep us growing and are responsive to our expansion.
I really want to thank all of our supporters and friends who have made Creating The Difference a big success. I can honestly say that this past year has been one of the best years of my life.
As a thanks to our supporters, we're giving away an original Black Widow to one of our staffers. The winner will be announced at 2 pm CDT on our Facebook Page.
Thank You!