PaintballX3 Magazine Special Paintball Extravaganza Edition | Page 48

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How did you get into the game of
paintball? What is your history?
Everyone at Virtue has a pretty diverse playing history, but I’ll give you
just mine. I played my first non-official
game of paintball in 1991 using wrist
rockets and paintballs as a Boy Scout in
Arizona back in 1991. We played for 3
hours, and I only had a 10 round tube
of paint the entire time. I think I was
shot at once, “fired” a shot once, and
had the time of my life. From there, I
ended up in Germany for a couple years
due to a relocation with my father’s
company. I played my first real game
of paintball on a military base near
Frankfurt. I was hooked after that and
bought a Sheridan P68 with “auto-trigger” and also a Splatmaster Rapide.
The one with the 20lb trigger pull and
40 round rotating magazine. Forty balls
was more than enough because after
shooting 5 or 6 your trigger finger hurt
pretty badly. The P68 was a much cooler gun. Played all through high school
when I lived in Chicago. Founded and
was part of a couple teams, worked at
a field, was the first employee of PaintballGear.com (subsequently Action Village, which eventually went bankrupt
and was bought by ANS), went away
to college and played for the Paraplegic
Turtles, founded and ran a fun website
called Pbstar.com for a few years, and
eventually moved over to Virtue just as
I saw the potential of making aftermarket circuit boards.
How did the Paintball Extravaganza
go for Virtue?
The show was great. We were very
happy with the reaction to our complete
line of VIOs and Spires and everyone
was excited for and dying to get the
new PF Pods. They’re coming soon.
What are your best selling products
and why?
Spire 260 sales are starting to take
over Spire 200s. I think because most
people are realizing it’s less than a half
Special PBX Edition

inch taller than a Spire 200, but sti ll
the same size (technically 1mm shorter) than the competition and holds
way more paint. Of course, right now
though, the hottest and hardest to get
product is the VIO. We’re constantly
selling out, and having to hold goggles
back from being sold just to bring them
to display at the show!
Anything new in the works that you
can tell us about?
Aside from the new PF pod? We’ve got
a squeegee, which is a barrel swab.
According to Dave Bains, who probably
shoots more paint than anyone in the
world, he keeps telling me it’s the best
swab in the world and we should charge
10bucks a piece for them. We liked that
price, but figured we’d make it a great
value and give you a 2 pack for 10
bucks. We’re not ‘gonna take over the
world with a premium swab, but when
you see the material and construction it
really is the best out there.
What are your goals for 2014 and
beyond?
Our plan is to continue to focus on the
goggle and the loader market. Our
goals involve pushing forward with the
VIO line, adding more custom colors to
freshen up the line, as well as a completely different facemask and some
other upgrades. We’re looking forward
to bringing more high end, diverse options to the goggle market. At the same
time we’re also excited about expanding both our promotional reach and the
after-sales service to both the store and
player.