ROSEVILLE, Minn. — When lifelong New Yorker James Miceli moved to Minnesota 11 years ago, he soon realized his love for lacrosse was a rarity in the state of hockey.
But wanting to continue the sport he had played since childhood, Miceli joined a club team, eventually coaching at the University of Minnesota-Duluth and then at the Blake School, a prep academy in the Minneapolis suburb of Hopkins.
That’s when he realized the gear he and his players were using hadn’t advanced much from his childhood days on Long Island, with aluminum sticks instead of the high-end composite materials standard in other sports.
“It was light years behind,” Micelli said.
The realization lead Micelli in 2011 to found Epoch Lacrosse, a tech gear and apparel company that now has 28 employees and makes a full line of sticks, shafts, nets and protective gear using carbon manufacturing.
“We understood what players needed on the field, and we combined it with new technology,” Miceli said.
“We want this to be the gear that we would use,” added Jason Daniel, Epoch’s Product Engineer. “We want to give players exactly what they want.”
For Epoch, that’s meant hometown manufacturing, moving its production back to the United States from overseas where it can closely monitor quality. And its process — which is constantly evolving — has grown quicker and more efficient, thanks in part to improvements in the materials and in how Epoch engineers are using them.
The company takes aerospace grade raw carbon fiber and processes it specifically for the design of each of its products. Its shafts, for example, are made in its Roseville, Minn. plant by cutting giant sheets of carbon into flags, then building kits that are rolled on a mandrel to create a preform. Those are loaded into a mold, and the carbon fiber and resin cure with heat and pressure. Each shaft is sanded and finished with paint and decals, then sealed with a clear coat that gives the shaft a texturized grip so that players don’t have to use tape.
“(This type of manufacturing) gives you the ability to innovate,” Miceli said. “You can really adjust and improve when working with carbon fiber versus aluminum.”
Players have noticed. Epoch says its sales are growing an average of 30 percent year to year, and it’s now outfitting more than 100 teams, ranging from college to high school to club organizations.
Epoch’s goal now is to lead the market in the next three years, and also expand to the women’s market.
The key, say Miceli and Daniel, will be continuing its strategy of innovative design combined with carbon materials. Epoch Lacrosse incorporates its 3D printing innovation and manufacturing lab to enhance the design and production process.
“We view ourselves as a design and technology company that just happens to be in the lacrosse space,” Miceli said.
“It’s a mix between science and art,” Daniel said.