Startland News
It's gametime for holiday shopping: Eight gift ideas for the Kansas City sports fan on your list
Yardball on a list of gift ideas for Kansas City sports fans.
Press
Yardball in the press
Yardball is a leather catch ball, hand-stitched in Kansas City. Here's where it's been written up, and everything you need if you're writing about it.
- Hand-stitched in Kansas City
- Since 2022
- A ball for all
Fully funded in less than 6 hours: KC-stitched Yardball reinvents the game of catch, nearly doubles Kickstarter goal
Launch-day coverage of the Kickstarter.
As seen in
- Startland News
- Gear For Life
- Alliance for American Manufacturing
- Good People, Cool Things
Coverage
Where it's been written up
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Alliance for American Manufacturing
Kansas City's Sandlot Goods Taps into Childhood Nostalgia
A visit to the Kansas City workshop, with the Yardball as a soft first ball for kids learning to catch.
Read it in Alliance for American Manufacturing (opens in a new tab)
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Good People, Cool Things
How to Make an Innovative Product with Sandlot Goods and Yardball Founder Chad Hickman
Chad Hickman on the prototypes that didn't work and where the name came from.
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Startland News
Yardball Kickstarter ends with six-figure funding (and rapid hiring for production)
The Kickstarter wraps up, and the workshop starts hiring for production.
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Gear For Life
Yardball review: the perfect ball for playing catch?
A hands-on review that ends with "everyone should buy a Yardball."
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BackerCrew
Yardball: The Ball for All
An early look at the ball during the Kickstarter launch.
How it started
It started with a ball of tape.
Yardball started as a ball of painter's tape, the kind you wad up after peeling the blue tape off a fresh coat of paint. It happened to be the perfect size and weight for tossing across the room, so Chad Hickman and Thomas McIntyre built the real version: a ball made only for catch.
People who tested the prototypes kept saying the same thing: it got the whole house, and sometimes the neighbors, out in the yard playing catch. That's where the name came from. Yardball launched on Kickstarter in July 2022 and was fully funded in less than six hours.
Fast facts
The short version
- Size
- 10 in
- around
- Weight
- 4 oz
- light enough for bare hands
- Stitches
- 108
- every one by hand
- Launched
- 2022
- on Kickstarter, funded in less than six hours
- What it is
- A leather catch ball. A ball and a glove in one.
- Size
- Bigger than a baseball, smaller than a softball, softer than both.
- Inside
- A wool and cotton core, wrapped in full-grain harness leather and closed with 108 stitches sewn by hand.
- Where
- Our workshop at 2915 Southwest Boulevard, Kansas City, Missouri.
- Founders
- Chad Hickman and Thomas McIntyre.
- Collegiate
- Officially licensed collegiate Yardballs for KU, Mizzou, K-State, Creighton, and Iowa.
For writers
A few notes before you write
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It's YardballOne word, capital Y. -
Not a baseballA leather catch ball, made for bare hands, not for bats. -
Made in Kansas CityEvery colorway is made in the USA, by hand. -
A ball for allKids, grown-ups, coworkers. Anyone who can throw.
Press kit
Everything you need to write it up
Product photos, in-hand and lifestyle shots, the logo, and a one-page fact sheet. Use them freely in coverage of Yardball.
For interviews, samples, or anything else: customerservice@yardball.com
In the kit
- Product photos of every colorway
- In-hand and lifestyle shots
- The Yardball logo
- A one-page fact sheet
Your turn
Pick your ball
Have a catch.
A ball and a glove in one.
