5 minute read
One-on-One With Mako Tips’ Edward Altman
Widely beloved by professionals and amateurs alike, Mako Tips, headquartered in Sanford, Florida, produces high-quality pool cue tips utilizing eight layers of the finest Japanese pigskins.
Mako Tips maximizes the game play experience of each player through pool cue tips crafted to incite confidence in the players so each shot they take will be appropriately supported by their equipment, ensuring playability and consistency.
Edward Altman, principal of the company, notes Mako Tips are made with customer feedback in mind to create the highest-quality pool cue tips possible that will better their experience playing the game and really let them show off their skills.
Altman recently spoke with BCA Insider about the birth of the company, his career in the industry, and how Mako Tips is working to keep the future of the industry going strong.
By Keith Loria
FOR LOVE OF THE GAME
Altman has been playing pool since he was 12 years old, and became engrossed in the sport ever since.
Later on in life, he got into cue repair and he grew his business over the years.
“My customers would ask me to get them one thing or another and so I expanded my line of products,” he says. “The biggest thing I came across was that customers were shocked at the price of a cue tip, especially when they were paying $25 for a tip and another $20 to install, so almost every tip out there was around $45.”
Altman knew there must be a less expensive option out there, and he spent almost three years researching tips, until he finally came out with his own line of Mako Tips.
“Since then, each year, business has been doubling and tripling in size,” he says. “I’m extremely blessed to be doing something that I love doing for a living.”
The company ships tips all over the world, to places like Canada, Japan, and England, and Altman is always thrilled when he sees or hears about one of billiard’s top players utilizing a Mako Tip.
THE ART OF THE TIP
From the very beginning, Altman’s biggest objective with Mako Tips was to make a quality tip at an affordable price. “It starts with using top-grade leathers,” he says. “In today’s market, a lot of what you see is Japanese pigskin. That’s probably 80 to 90 percent of the market. People love them compared to a solid cowhide tip. So, picking out a solid grade of leather is a key component.”
If not, and the quality isn’t there, he notes it doesn’t shape as well, and won’t perform as well.
“You need to use a specific type of adhesive to join each layer together, as well as the pressing process,” Altman says. “That would totally change the way a tip performs.”
Each one of Mako Tips’ products is hermetically sealed in its own package so it’s not exposed to the elements.
“A lot of installers will buy 50 or 100 of the tips and they just sit in a garage, and it’s not temperature-controlled, so that will shorten the life of a tip if it’s not sealed,” he says.
NEW AND IMPROVED
In 2022, the company has come out with all-new packaging on its products and has released its newest product – the Mako Max. “It’s a brand-new tip that we just started shipping,” Altman says. “It’s a medium tip and what’s special about it is the processing used to make the tip. We go through a two-step process where most tips are made with just one. With the Mako Max, the first two layers are pressed together at one specific hardness, and the next six layers are put on and it’s pressed again at a different hardness.”
It’s also unique because it provides a distinctive hit because of the two different pressures.
“It helps with greatly reducing the amount of glue that will transfer between the layers of the tip itself, and in turn, the tip plays
better for the total life of the tip itself,” Altman says.
PROVIDING INSTRUCTION
Outside of his business, Altman is also a PBIA-certified instructor, and he holds classes locally, offering about a dozen lessons a month. “I prefer to teach beginners because they are more eager to learn,” he says. “To see the self-satisfaction a beginner gets during their third or fourth lesson when they see they’re improving, that makes me happy. They’re enjoying themselves instead of being frustrated.”
GIVING BACK
One of the great things Altman does is he donates 25 cents for every Mako Tips-brand cue tip sold to the Billiard Educational Foundation to promote the future of the industry. “The education of future youth who are interested in learning more about billiards is essential,” he says. “We firmly believe in supporting our customers’ love for the sport. As the industry expands and more people get in touch with their love for pool, we want to be equally as supportive of introducing them to high-quality educational resources, and we know the BEF has the same goal in mind.”
Altman has been out to Las Vegas several times to see the BEF tournaments in action and has been impressed with the youngsters he’s seen. In fact, the company is sponsoring junior player Timmy Cossey in 2022.
“These kids are so dedicated and are the future of our sport,” he says. “If we don’t do something to entice these kids to continue playing, and educate them in the sport, there is no future in billiards. We saw that happen 15 years ago, but over the past seven to eight years, there’s been a resurgence and players are everywhere. That’s what we want to see.” It’s always been a personal goal of Altman’s to do something that gives back to the billiard world that has given him so much.
For more information about the company, visit www.makotips.com.
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