Now this is truly exciting! I have finally managed to find an open spot in the schedule of BLINDSAVE's founder to make an interview for the blog!
Let's not waste any time. It is time to meet the man behind the ever expanding goalie brand BLINDSAVE, the goalie and the businessman - #31 Andis Blinds!
He went on to tell us that he was the coach of a floorball team, that he had seen us playing streetball and knew that my brother was physically strong from playing ice hockey, and that he wanted to invite us to play floorball in his team. We were 16 years old at that time. It's weird that he know we had what it took to be good floorball plays, but I'm very grateful to this old man who invited us to try it out!
At first, I refused to be a goalie. I thought it looked stupid without the stick, but I have a pretty high running style from basketball so my brother that I should atleast try the goal, so I did. The funny thing is, I was watching the other goalies and I said "there is no need for protection, it's just a plastical ball." I still remember the first shot I took and that I thought "shit, that hurt!" I also heard the other players saying "who is that new goalkeeper? He is so bad, who told him that he could be a goalie?"
I put on some protection for the next practice after that and suddenly I felt that I can do this. One year later I was already in the U19 as the third goalie but unfortunately I didn't make it to the WFC. They called me up one day before I turned 18 that I had to stay home, they chose to bring only two goalies because of the economical problems in the team.
I was the the men's team for WFC 2004 in Switzerland two years later as the third goalie under two more experienced guys. Our opening game was against Switzerland and even though the coaches' knew that they were good, the chose to play me. I ended up playing the game of my life! I had something like 60 saves and we lost by just one goal, 3-4. It was such an amazing game, I remember it like it was yesterday. I even remember the sounds from when everyone thought they were going to score how they all went "ooooh!"
Shortly after that, I got some problems with my knees and couldn't play for two years, I had to work hard with a personal trainer to make it back. Making it back to the top was really hard in the beginning, but I made it back and kept on playing in the WFC.
Let's not waste any time. It is time to meet the man behind the ever expanding goalie brand BLINDSAVE, the goalie and the businessman - #31 Andis Blinds!
"Floorball was an accident."
How come you started playing floorball?
Floorball was actually an accident. I played ice hockey many many years ago but unfortunately I got asthma and had to quit. After that I played basketball for so many years that only just last year, my floorball years surpassed my basketball years! One day when me and my twin brother Atis were in school, some man entered the classroom and spoke to our teacher who then said "this man wants to talk to you two". We didn't know what was going on. "Maybe we had made some trouble again?"He went on to tell us that he was the coach of a floorball team, that he had seen us playing streetball and knew that my brother was physically strong from playing ice hockey, and that he wanted to invite us to play floorball in his team. We were 16 years old at that time. It's weird that he know we had what it took to be good floorball plays, but I'm very grateful to this old man who invited us to try it out!
"Shit, that hurt!"
At first, I refused to be a goalie. I thought it looked stupid without the stick, but I have a pretty high running style from basketball so my brother that I should atleast try the goal, so I did. The funny thing is, I was watching the other goalies and I said "there is no need for protection, it's just a plastical ball." I still remember the first shot I took and that I thought "shit, that hurt!" I also heard the other players saying "who is that new goalkeeper? He is so bad, who told him that he could be a goalie?"
I put on some protection for the next practice after that and suddenly I felt that I can do this. One year later I was already in the U19 as the third goalie but unfortunately I didn't make it to the WFC. They called me up one day before I turned 18 that I had to stay home, they chose to bring only two goalies because of the economical problems in the team.
I was the the men's team for WFC 2004 in Switzerland two years later as the third goalie under two more experienced guys. Our opening game was against Switzerland and even though the coaches' knew that they were good, the chose to play me. I ended up playing the game of my life! I had something like 60 saves and we lost by just one goal, 3-4. It was such an amazing game, I remember it like it was yesterday. I even remember the sounds from when everyone thought they were going to score how they all went "ooooh!"
Shortly after that, I got some problems with my knees and couldn't play for two years, I had to work hard with a personal trainer to make it back. Making it back to the top was really hard in the beginning, but I made it back and kept on playing in the WFC.
"Only 3,000 registered players."
We treat floorball as a professional sport in Latvia, which is why we are as good as we are, considering how small the sport is in our country. There are only about 3,000 registered players in latvia which is a big difference from Sweden who has about 40 times as many players. I could have played abroad during my injury but unfortunately floorball is generally treated as an amateur sport so I stayed in Latvia to do my rehab training. Only four years ago, we played a game in Umeå against Storvreta who were the Swedish champions at the time and I had a real miraculous game. With 54 minutes played the scored was 1-3 in favor of them which we were very happy with. That was my second best game after the game in Switzerland in 2004.
I have proven to myself that I can play on a high level and I have been nominated as the best goalie in Latvia 6 times in my career, which I am happy with. Nowadays I don't expect to get any more nominations, I'm being looked upon as the old and experienced goalies in Latvia now, and that award should be given to younger goalies.
From where do you draw your inspiration as a player? Do you have a role model?
I draw a lot of inspiration from ice hockey rather than from floorball. One of my idols is definitely Arturs Irbe, latvia hockey goalie legend. He is a really nice guy, everybody loves him. When I invited him to my goalie camp I was chocked with the amazing conversations we had, it was amazing to listen to him. Another ice hockey goalie who playes maybe a bit more like my style is Patrik Roy. He is aggressive, just like me. I need to be angry to be on my best and to be focused, but I'm trying to stay more calm now because of my injury.
In your experience, what is the biggest obstacle to overcome as a goalie in general? What has been your biggest challenge in your career and how did you overcome it?
"You are the last man."
The biggest challenge is definitely the mental thing. You have to learn how to deal with that. Very often when you watch a practice you can see if a goalie has good technique, if he's fast and so on but when it comes to came, the same goalie doesn't have to be that good. That is because of the mental challenge of the game. The physical attributes are important, of course, but the most important thing is your mental capacity. You have to be prepared for every game. You are the last man,m there is nobody behind you if you make a mistake. If a player makes a mistake people forget about it in no time but if a goalie messes up, everyone remember and it's not only that. If you mess up it also means a goal for your opponents. I believe that this is the biggest challenge for any goalkeeper.
The biggest challenge for me right now is living with my injury... it works fine for the level at which I am practicing now, but if I ever want to get back to a high level again I would have to do a lot of rehab, and that is my challenge; not being able to perform on the level I used to.
"You really need your confidence."
I remember a really tough mental challenge that I went through at the WFC's. I wasn't on my best for one of the games so they chose to play the second goalie who was really fired up and ready to play. He played really well and got to play the next game and the next after that, but eventually the coach put me back in again, which put a lot of pressure on me. I hadn't play to well but the second goalie had played really well, so I had to get my head back in the game to get to stay on as the first goalie. You are an individual in a team sport, you can only help yourself if your game is off. When I got on to the court I could only remember the bad game I played, but once I made some good saves, I was back again.
I guess you really need your confidence!
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Moving on to BLINDSAVE. What gave you the idea to develop your own brand?
It all started with the knee pads actually. As I mentioned I took a break and couldn't play for two years because of my knees. When I came back I tried using hockey pads... not comfortable, but they offered better protection so I wanted to try them. I asked my self and others, can you play 60 minutes on your knees with knee pads that are more suitable for volleyball players? The answers were clear - no.
A while after by comeback I said "I'm going to make my own knee pads" as a joke, bu then I started looking into it. I looked for a good material for the padding and found a factory that made that material in Latvia. My mother's friend is a professional sower and she helped me with the sowing. I still have the original pair at home.
My idea was to solve the, according to me, three problems with knee pads; protection, flexibility and to stop them from sliding down. I also wanted the paddings to be changeable since padding usually gets thin very fast. I tried practicing with them and it felt good, but I don't like changing something that I am used to since I am kind of superstitious in sports, so I thought I would stick with my hockey pads for the remainder of the championship in the Latvian league. Then one day I just said "f..k it, I'm playing with my own knee pads,"
I don't know what happened to make me say that, but at the last practice I let my coaches' know that I would be using them and that I had made them myself. I played on 0 the next game.
It was the final and no shots got past me. No other goalie had ever played a zero in a final in Latvia and I just thought, "wow." I was picked as the best player that game and when they asked me how my performance was possible I simply replied "new knee pads."
That was how I knew that I had to do something with this, so I let the second goalie try them on and he said they were great, which gave me more confidence to keep the developing going. Step by step I started ordering more material, trying other samples and eventually I even started selling them to some goalies in Latvia, which is when I started to build on my idea of making it into a business. I was thinking about actually starting a company and one day I said to my self - "why not?"
I knew that no other company was using the same strategy at that time. Every other company had a whole line of products from helmets and shoes to gloves and vests. I only had my knee pads and I didn't want to rush it and make all the gear at once, I wanted to stick to developing high quality gear even if it would take some time. Step by step I started working on developing more pieces of gear and here I am three years later, with a whole line of gear.
Floorball really is an underdeveloped sport so far, I mean look at ice hockey. Everyone knows how protection gear is supposed to look for hockey players, it doesn't change much through the years. In floorball which is such a new sport, brands are changing their concepts almost every year to try and figure out the best way to design the gear because nobody is confident that their gear design is the definitive way to go. Nobody has found the recipe yet.
When I get asked the question "do you have any new gear for the next season?" my answer is always no. I believe that I have found a very good design to which only small changed can be made. I can make them green, red or blue if they want but the concept isn't going to change, only improve. I am confident in my design. Safety, comfort and confidence. That is the motto after which the BLINDSAVE gear is designed.
When I first made the vest I knew I needed something to make it stand out, so I thought "I can make them give less rebounds." Same thing with the helmet, I wanted the safest helmet on the market with material that somehow adjusted to the shape of each goalie's head. I tried to get these thing to work, and I did. The only problem with the vest is when people try it out in the store is, they think it's too hard. The thing is, the material needs to get warm to adjust to you properly.
Explain the process of coming up with the ideas for the gear. What inspired the making of the gear?
I didn't focus so much on the design to be honest, more on functionality. The only thing I had in mind when it came to design was that I wanted it to look like a top of the line from the start, which I think it does.
At first, I was disappointed with the pants and the jersey since I wanted to go the way of snowboarding and graphic design along with bright and unusual colors, but people thought it was too bright. Most goalies don't like the bright colors and bold graphic designs so I changed it to the way it looks now, where every color combination more or less builds on black. However, design-wise every item has it's own story about from where I draw inspiration.
Your gear can be seen all over Europe and in many national teams. Did you always plan on making it this big?
My dream has always been to make it even bigger. We are only just getting started, we have only just started to get our name out there and we are actually getting more and more recognition. I am really happy, and lucky that I found and got to work with Patrik Åman for the last three years. Of course, he has contracts with other brands but he still continues to use BLINDSAVE under the jersey and pants. That's amazing and some kind of approval to what I have done with my team. He is now officially the first goalie to be fully protected with BLINDSAVE gear, using both helmet, knee pads and protection vest!
All things in my life seem to happen in a weird way, just like how I ended up working with you Pontus. One day, we will be making something big together.
For example when I went to the US to start my brand and play a tournament, I met a guy who is now the distributor for Switzerland and another guy who is now the distributor for Canada. Very often unexpected things turn out to be so big! I am confident that BLINDSAVE will only grow from here because like I said, we are only just getting started. I am hoping that goalies will start looking for gear that suits them better and not just play with something because they "have to."
I am aware that our gear is a bit more expensive than other brands, but you have to look at what you get from that little bit of extra money. Our only concern in making the gear and is and always have been these three things; safety, comfort and confidence.
The gear is very durable and will last longer than other brands. One of your BLINDSAVE goalies told me that he had been wearing the one and same vest for over two years, which is a really good result! Good for the users I mean, not so much for me! Says Andis and laughs.
I actually have a very simple strategy when it comes to promotion and cooperation with goalies.I will never pay anyone to say that our gear is good, I will only ever sponsor someone if they actually think the gear is good. I don't want there to be any dissatisfied BLINDSAVE users out there. We want to be known for our quality.
Many were skeptical at first but I just knew. I had something inside me that told me I was going to make it.
Thank you Andis, for sharing your inspirational story and thank you for taking the time in your busy day to do this interview! I really look forward to see what you have in store for the floorball goalie community in the future.
And of course, thank you to any- and everyone reading!
Check out BLINDSAVE here:
Blindsave website
Blindsave on Facebook
instagram@Blindsave
Later!
/Pontus
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