Marcos Freitas using Marcos Freitas ALC

TTHopeful · Dec 7, 2016

It looks to me that more people still buy the older Butterfly blades such as the viscaria, maze and boll alc. All these new fancy blades you don't see to often at tournaments. I see a lot more of the blades i just mentioned than a apolonia, freitas or garaydia blade. I dont think ive seen anyone use a garaydia of freitas blade yet. Ive seen one tiago in my time...

Baal · Dec 7, 2016

Price a lot of the time. The new ones cost more and usually are not better.

laistrogian · Dec 7, 2016

TTHopeful said:
It looks to me that more people still buy the older Butterfly blades such as the viscaria, maze and boll alc. All these new fancy blades you don't see to often at tournaments. I see a lot more of the blades i just mentioned than a apolonia, freitas or garaydia blade. I dont think ive seen anyone use a garaydia of freitas blade yet. Ive seen one tiago in my time...

Innerforce ZLC is probably the most popular "modern" blade, along with MJ ZLC

Butterfly basically made a legendary blade when they released viscaria. Just imagine the blade was launched over 15 years ago and to this date, the blade along with its derivatives (TBS, TB ALC) are BTY's best selling blades. These blades and tenergy basically fuel BTY's economy for profit and further R&D

NextLevel · Dec 7, 2016

TTHopeful said:
It looks to me that more people still buy the older Butterfly blades such as the viscaria, maze and boll alc. All these new fancy blades you don't see to often at tournaments. I see a lot more of the blades i just mentioned than a apolonia, freitas or garaydia blade. I dont think ive seen anyone use a garaydia of freitas blade yet. Ive seen one tiago in my time...

Since the Appolonia is an Innerforce and the Freitas is a Maze, your statement is interesting. The issue is really price and rebranding for a specific market, not about the blades.

The Garaydia is a different story and is a remarketing of their Hinoki outer line. It is really 3 different older blades all made into a series. The Garaydia T5000 is a replacement for the Gergely/Sardius or similar Hinoki Carbon blades. The Garaydia ZLC is an attempt to replace the Amultart. The Garaydia ALC might be unique, but it might also be an Iolite replacement.

The main takeaway is that there is nothing new under the sun.

NextLevel · Dec 7, 2016

laistrogian said:
Innerforce ZLC is probably the most popular "modern" blade, along with MJ ZLC

Butterfly basically made a legendary blade when they released viscaria. Just imagine the blade was launched over 15 years ago and to this date, the blade along with its derivatives (TBS, TB ALC) are BTY's best selling blades. These blades and tenergy basically fuel BTY's economy for profit and further R&D

You can add the ZJK ALC and other such blades into the mix. This chart is always illuminating.

http://www.butterflyonline.com/Templates/BladeSpecifications.pdf

doraemon · Dec 7, 2016

NextLevel said:
Since the Appolonia is an Innerforce and the Freitas is a Maze, your statement is interesting. The issue is really price and rebranding for a specific market, not about the blades.

The Garaydia is a different story and is a remarketing of their Hinoki outer line. It is really 3 different older blades all made into a series. The Garaydia T5000 is a replacement for the Gergely/Sardius or similar Hinoki Carbon blades. The Garaydia ZLC is an attempt to replace the Amultart. The Garaydia ALC might be unique, but it might also be an Iolite replacement.

The main takeaway is that there is nothing new under the sun.

Where I live, actually I am seeing that instead of the Viscaria or Timo Boll ALC/Spirit, it is actually the Zhang Jike ALC (not Blue Dragon) which is the most popular with the beginners.

Baal · Dec 7, 2016

doraemon said:
Where I live, actually I am seeing that instead of the Viscaria or Timo Boll ALC/Spirit, it is actually the Zhang Jike ALC (not Blue Dragon) which is the most popular with the beginners.

I have never heard of Kiwis who like to spend money unnecessarily. Odd.

ZJK-ALC is a great blade IMHO, but not more so than the others and more expensive for...???? Guy's name? Who doesn't even use it? Odd. Of course it comes in three handle shapes that are very comfortable.

doraemon · Dec 7, 2016

Baal said:
I have never heard of Kiwis who like to spend money unnecessarily. Odd.

ZJK-ALC is a great blade IMHO, but not more so than the others and more expensive for...???? Guy's name? Who doesn't even use it? Odd. Of course it comes in three handle shapes that are very comfortable.

I personally think that it's because the No. 1 junior is playing Zhang Jike ALC, and since it is the newest Viscaria variant it is presumably the best. Also, it is the most expensive, so it has to be the best (!).
Also, about the Kiwi thing- most of the juniors who play table tennis in New Zealand are Chinese, so the Kiwi mentality isn't really there. But even then, they do mostly use expensive equipment anyway.
It is also about the parent's, probably. They want the best for their children, and want them to succeed so when they hear that the best blade is the Zhang Jike ALC from someone, they are more than willing to oblige I guess. And when everyone else uses it, they do not want their own child to be disadvantaged so they follow the trend, as most of the parent's are not really table tennis players, they just go with the flo

UpSideDownCarl · Dec 7, 2016

And a beginner using an ALC blade is not the best choice.

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doraemon · Dec 7, 2016

But how is that communicated to parents? They only want what is best for their children, so they are naturally drawn to the most expensive ALC blade, instead of Carl's trademark limba-limba-ayous-limba-limba beginner blade (I have read your posts on this subject-big fan), but how are they meant to understand?

What we need is more Carls

Garrison · Dec 7, 2016

In my opinion kids should start with like an ALL blade and then improve their technique and upgrade the equipment step by step as they get stronger

Ilia Minkin · Dec 7, 2016

doraemon said:
I personally think that it's because the No. 1 junior is playing Zhang Jike ALC, and since it is the newest Viscaria variant it is presumably the best. Also, it is the most expensive, so it has to be the best (!).
Also, about the Kiwi thing- most of the juniors who play table tennis in New Zealand are Chinese, so the Kiwi mentality isn't really there. But even then, they do mostly use expensive equipment anyway.
It is also about the parent's, probably. They want the best for their children, and want them to succeed so when they hear that the best blade is the Zhang Jike ALC from someone, they are more than willing to oblige I guess. And when everyone else uses it, they do not want their own child to be disadvantaged so they follow the trend, as most of the parent's are not really table tennis players, they just go with the flo

Are coaches also Butterfly salesmen?

doraemon · Dec 7, 2016

Ilia Minkin said:
Are coaches also Butterfly salesmen?

In NZ, it's a little complicated. Because table tennis is not that big in NZ, coaches typically do not have sufficient demand to earn decent living revenue. Therefore, they must search for alternative sources of income, one of which is obviously selling table tennis equipment.

Not all of them are Butterfly though. But in the capital Butterfly dominates. Or in alternative cases you have a different model where coaches are like agents for the salesmen, and I guess salesmen typically (not all of them, like the Donic one) try to sell you the most expensive one or something like that I presume.

And I think the stadium in the capital is sponsored by Butterfly, and you can only buy Butterfly in the stadium, so it is unavoidable. In NZ, because of the lack of interest, a physical table tennis store is not common

laistrogian · Dec 8, 2016

NextLevel said:
You can add the ZJK ALC and other such blades into the mix. This chart is always illuminating.

http://www.butterflyonline.com/Templates/BladeSpecifications.pdf

Well almost no one really buys the ZJK series. Like everyone says, why use a blade that the player himself doesn't use.

For apolonia, the nice thing about it is that you'll rarely find a 90g Innerforce ZLC, so it's nice to have a wider range of weight (between 82g to 93ish maybe)

rokphish · Dec 8, 2016

rokphish · Dec 8, 2016

ttpshot · Dec 8, 2016

Most players start playing TT from age between 12-16 and they make up about 80% of the registered players in Japan so Korbel instead of Vicaria is by far the best selling blade for last 10 years.

Viscaria variants are popluar amongst top players but there they only represents tiny numbers. Not sure why people are still drooling over Viscaria when TB ALC is available though. It's been discontinued in Japan a long time ago.

rokphish · Dec 8, 2016

Both Korbel and Viscaria was issued out of productions a few years back (at least here in my country), but then recently back in production and sales again.

Baal · Dec 8, 2016

ttpshot said:
Most players start playing TT from age between 12-16 and they make up about 80% of the registered players in Japan so Korbel instead of Vicaria is by far the best selling blade for last 10 years.

Viscaria variants are popluar amongst top players but there they only represents tiny numbers. Not sure why people are still drooling over Viscaria when TB ALC is available though. It's been discontinued in Japan a long time ago.

Some people like the handle shape and weight balance of Viscaria better. They are both good blades, both are used by many good players. I am one of those who prefers Viscaria, and Viscaria is cheaper. I always found it odd that you can't buy it in Japan.

I will state again, as a guy who loves (most) Bttfly ALC blades and who had used them exclusively since 2007, that the Donic True Carbon is as good as any of them, and I have not previously found that to be true for other alternatives (but never tried the Doubleday ones, which are probably very similar).

UpSideDownCarl · Dec 8, 2016

Baal said:
Some people like the handle shape and weight balance of Viscaria better. They are both good blades, both are used by many good players. I am one of those who prefers Viscaria, and Viscaria is cheaper. I always found it odd that you can't buy it in Japan.

I will state again, as a guy who loves (most) Bttfly ALC blades and who had used them exclusively since 2007, that the Donic True Carbon is as good as any of them, and I have not previously found that to be true for other alternatives (but never tried the Doubleday ones, which are probably very similar).

Where is that darn Super Like button. Great post.

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Marcos Freitas using Marcos Freitas ALC

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