Arkansas Startup: Rebounces Puts The Green Back In The Tennis Ball

In our endless quest to look past the trending (read valley based) startups on the Angel List (angel.co), we came across one that is sports related, fun, green (environment) and green (money). The startup is called reBounces and they are based in Harrison Arkansas.

Arkansas has a bubbling startup scene and we’ve covered a handful of startups from Arkansas here at nibletz.

So what is reBounces?

Well Rebounces was founded by Bill Dirst and Cannon Fletcher. The company uses a gas based mixture technology invented by Dirst to put the bounce back into flattened tennis balls.

Typically when a tennis ball has been used over and over again they start to deflate. Even if you are only a casual tennis player you’ve probably noticed this deflating.  Normally when a tennis ball deflates the natural reaction is to go buy another can of balls.  While that’s all well and good, the tennis balls are not biodegradable and even in their flattened state they go into the landfill.

With the reBounces technology tennis balls are dumped into the Green Tennis Machine. After the machine is sealed and the balls sit for three days they enviro-magically have their bounce back. The balls have the same bounce as balls that just came out of a fresh can and they are back to regulation.

More after the break

Tennis clubs have embraced the reBounces technology because it saves customers money, saves the clubs money and it’s good for the environment.  The Universal Tennis Academy in Atlanta Georgia said this about Rebounces:

“The Green Tennis Machine is the most significant product to hit the tennis world in years. As academy owners, we see the substantial financial commitment we make to keep quality tennis balls in our teaching carts. The Green Tennis Machine ensures that every ball that we feed bounces, and the savings we gain from having multiple cycles with our balls has been tremendous. In addition to our benefits, reBounces really strives to keep old balls out of our landfills. It is good for the sport and good for the planet, and that’s a winning combination!”

In April participants in the 2012 BNP Paribas Open recycled over 142,000 tennis balls using reBounces.  reBounces has a recycling initiative for tennis balls if you would rather just recycle used balls and go buy new ones. The company will pay for the shipping for balls back to their Arkansas headquarters and then repurpose the balls typically for budding tennis programs that need the extra donated balls.

Of course with a Green Tennis Machine your tennis club could recycle their own tennis balls, which proves to be cost effective after two or three uses of the machine.  To date reBounces has recycled over two million tennis balls.

Linkage

Check out reBounces here

Here’s their Angel list entry

Here’s our Angel list entry

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