About Us
Everyone begins somewhere...hmmm. Once upon a time, a long long time ago....
Actually it wasn't that long ago so here is the condensed version!
Pickleball had only been a hobby and fun thing at my 55+ parents place when we gathered at the holidays...until it wasn't! My wife was studying French in the South of France and we had our Motor Coach at a place for the winter. I went down to the pickleball courts and could not believe the magnetic field it had with me! Each day, I would arrive at 8:00 (courts forbid earlier!) and didn't leave until well after lunch. I was maybe borderline addicted!!
When my wife Debi returned from France, we decided to stay at this community that was pickleball addicted and see what we thought...Having raised 3 sons, we were ready for some recreation that was not kid centered. Pickleball was the perfect storm!! She also found the sport fun, great exercise and a fantastic way to meet people in our new community.
Flash forward and as a former PGA Golf Professional, getting credentialed to instruct in Pickleball seemed a natural next step. I did that and then Debi and I talked about how the expensive equipment we bought seemed to break down really fast yet was very pricy. We thought about desiging a paddle that was way more durable plus affordable. Not a $300+ price but what about a m9d $100-$150 range for the non pro player to have fun but use a quality paddle that worked for them.
My wife went down the rabbit hole of finding the right company to create our paddles. Trust me, she was almost as if back in France for about 2 months! Then one day she tells me, "Scott, I found our perfect match of manufacturers!" and here is where it began.
The result is our KBAUM Dropper, which has a story as well.
Our last name KRICHBAUM pronounced "KRISH-BOMB" has always been shorted to a nickname of KBAUM. This sounds like K-BOMB. Our entire life, it has been mis-spelled and mispronounced so we knew Krichbaum was not going to be part of the name. As we began our late night deep dives into creating our perfect pickleball company, we knew a graphic logo was going to make or break our company's initial impression. IT needed to be something different than what was being used by other companies currently.
Debi started sketching ideas for a logo that was both a K-BOMB and a pickleball. It was a merge between a pickleball and a hand grenade. Our initial idea was more of a bomb, so our first run of merch actually shows a fuse with a flame, but that was lost in the revisions by the focus groups who said the flame looked like a Bic Lighter!
We settled on the current logo which we call the Pickle Bomb. (However we spell Pickle Baum). I realize in German the word baum is tree so it is sort of organic that the original paddles in pickleball were made of wood! So, Germans, for you, the company name is also an origin story!
Any hoo....the origin story is getting long so let's just say, we produced a prototype of 30 paddles, distributed them around at our favorite pickleball courts, got tons of feed back and the ultimate paddle coming to you soon is the culmination of all of the feedback we got sprinkled with the special spices we wanted to make it our own paddle that no other company could ever think was a duplication. We are not plagiarists or copyers! We love doing things the KBAUM way, which means stick your neck out, agree to succeed or fail but do it right~
For this we soon will deliver to you our love child, the KBAUM Dropper. It has a large sweet spot (Because Debi is a self confirmed intermediate player and needed that) and I am a banger (I know how to dink but rarely use that skill) plus we wanted affordability and a fun look to allow you to play seriously or for fun with a great paddle that has your back.
In fun,
Scott and Debi Krichbaum