When will you use the new balls exclusively?

Baal, also don't think of USA/Europe as the world. Most players in the rest of the world will be using the celluloid ball as long as they are cheaper.
The price of a ball in USA/Europe means nothing to players. But to the rest of the world that cost is very significant.

It doesn't make sense that companies want to sell the more expensive product. A for-profit company would logically want the lowest price with the highest profit. If a product has to be more expensive because it costs more to produce, resulting in the same profit, what good is that for the company?

Baal wrote: PD, my theory is that the companies will charge more for a product that at the moment may not cost more to produce to (a) recoup their R&D costs, and (2) make more money over the long term (since higher prices means higher profit as long as sales don't drop).  The change in rules gives everyone the opportunity to jack up prices, as happened the last time balls changed size and even more so after the speed glue ban (for rubber).  But I'm just theorizing, I certainly don't have any inside information.  I certainly don't know what all goes into their production costs and how this changed one way or the other with new materials. Competition could put a bit of a lid on price increases (assuming no collusion), but it's not like there are a lot of companies out there producing these things.

I can see for sure why cellulose nitrate is expensive to transport, but it is not obvious to me why cellulose acetate (the new material) would be more expensive.  Maybe wturber would know.

I have about 500 of the old balls and, so around 2019 but then again they might change the ball again till then.


Edited by ChichoFicho - 07/28/2014 at 3:52pm

In an earlier discussion, it struck me that I didn't have a clear understanding on the future direction of the celluloid ball - simply put, when exactly will the celluloid balls be phased out?

So I did a quick investigation by getting in touch with ITTF and a major TT manufacturer.

The end result?

There are currently no plans to phase out celluloid balls - they will still be manufactured and ITTF will continue approving celluloid balls.

In fact, the choice of ball by ittf tournaments will go a long way to determining which ball emerges as the "nittaku" of plastic balls.  I would imagine the deal to get their balls used in the next olympics will be pretty lucrative.


Edited by cole_ely - 07/28/2014 at 10:23pm

cole_ely wrote: In fact, the choice of ball by ittf tournaments will go a long way to determining which ball emerges as the "nittaku" of plastic balls.  I would imagine the deal to get their balls used in the next olympics will be pretty lucrative.

My guess is it will be Nittaku. Their plastic ball is better as things stand now.

The club that I play at supplies training balls so I will be exclusive when the club switches over.

I don't even use 3 star balls unless I or my opponent use our own and since the club doesn't have barriers between tables, that's pretty rare.

cole_ely wrote: In fact, the choice of ball by ittf tournaments will go a long way to determining which ball emerges as the "nittaku" of plastic balls.  I would imagine the deal to get their balls used in the next olympics will be pretty lucrative.

hithithit wrote: @Baal, Will you make a complete switch to plastic when the Nittaku made in Japan balls come out, even though celluloids aren't getting phased out?

That is the big question.  I honestly don't know.  It will depend on price (not yet established for Nittaku Japan but most likely expensive), durability (unknown for Nittaku Japan plastic, but bad for other plastic balls), and what my playing partners prefer, and the later will be determined by what most of the competitions in the US will be doing.  And since DHS seems to have bribed made deals with ITTF maybe that will become the standard?  (Even though their balls currently come with a disclaimer that they cannot guarantee durability).  One can only hope that DHS balls soon reach the standard of the Nittaku Japan balls, but since they have already paid off reached an agreement with ITTF, they may have no motivation to do this.

Having both kinds of balls still made, sold, and legal is going to make things very messy.  I know Next Level thinks having both kinds of balls would make interesting diversity, like having grass and clay courts in tennis, but my experience playing with these things is that if they coexist with celluloid balls it will be a disaster unless Sharara's idea of slowing down the sport really consists of drastically lowering the quality of play.

Since there is no "worldwide ban on celluloid" and this was probably always about money, things will stay that way for awhile unless ITTF decides to defecate or get off the pot or gets a bigger payoff from other parties.

I am playing with celluloid balls at the moment.

NextLevel wrote: On a more serious note, the events that used the balls would be different events just like hardbat is separate from ITTF table tennis.  Plastic ball events vs. celluloid ball events.

The clamor for extra events based on the type of ball is so loud I can't hear it.