CLASSNOTES
ALUMNI PROFILE
Swinging for the fence
virtually ended his collegebaseball career. “We were warming up, in the snow, at the old Louisville fairgrounds,” he recalls. Former Diamond Dawg “A coach hit me a deep fly leads Bulldog 100 with ball. I put out my hand to sports protection gear stop myself and caught it on the old metal lettering by Denise Horton they still had on the fence. It ripped a hole in my hand Justin Niefer (BS ’05) wasn’t that resulted in nerve damsure where his future lay. Having age.” completed his eligibility with the “I consider it a blessing,” UGA baseball team, he spent the he says now. “If that hadn’t summer of 2005 in Illinois with happened, I might be playing the minor league Windy City in the minor leagues and Thunderbolts but realized that this [he motions around his professional baseball lacked the Evoshield office] might not ANDREW DAVIS TUCKER camaraderie he found most aphave happened.” pealing about sports. In 2007, Niefer traveled After returning to Athens to spring training in Florida for his final semester of classes in ANGELINA BELLEBUONO to introduce the gear. The consumer economics, Niefer befirst seven major league (from left) Neifer’s dog Ollie, Stan Kanavage, Justin Niefer, gan a part-time job that evolved baseball teams he met with Stan Payne, and David Hudson. into a full-time dream. placed orders. Back home, The part-time job was with the Georgia baseball team began wearing Evoshield products All Sports Training, owned by fellow Bulldog Stan Kanavage and word soon filtered to UGA quarterback Matthew Staf(M ’78). The full-time dream came a few months later when ford (M ’10) and his football teammates. Kanavage announced that he was starting a new business, one “What we heard was that the players felt faster and focused on developing sports-protection gear made of a new more protected in Evoshield gear,” Niefer says. Independent lightweight and malleable substance that hardens to fit the testing has in fact shown that Evoshield disperses energy wearer’s body and disperses impact. Kanavage invited Niefer rather than absorbing it, which is what occurs with tradiand Stan Payne (M ’97), another All Sports employee, to join tional foam and plastic gear. David Hudson and himself in establishing this new company. The company now includes 12 different products and For Niefer, the product, originally dubbed All Sports Ar80 college and professional teams as customers. mour, offered the opportunity to be in on the ground floor of a Kanavage speaks with pride about the accomplishments commercial phenomenon that could someday be as well known of Niefer and Payne in growing Evoshield from an idea into as Gatorade. By the end of 2006, chest and back protectors were a business that was listed last year as the second-fastest-growin production and in 2007 Niefer proposed a new name for the ing business in the Bulldog 100, a program sponsored by company—Evoshield. the UGA Alumni Association that rates companies by their “The ‘Evo’ stands for how the material evolves from a soft compounded annual revenue-growth rates during the past material into a hard shell, but it also stands for our vision of three years. evolving the world of sports and the way athletes are protected “They’ve worked diligently, developing ideas, selling during competition,” he says. and showing. They’ve done everything that needed to be Niefer spent his childhood in Buffalo, N.Y., but moved to done,” Kanavage says. “Whatever Justin does, he does with Cumming with his family during his senior year of high school. passion, and he’s been very passionate about what we do and After graduation he went to the University of Cincinnati on a how we do it. He’s matured into someone who could today baseball scholarship. There he became captain and was named start and run his own company.” to the All-Conference USA Team. After three years he transferred to UGA and quickly es—Denise Horton is the director of communications for the tablished himself with the Diamond Dogs, moving into the top College of Family and Consumer Sciences. 10 hitters in the country. But a freak accident in Louisville, Ky.,
52 SEPTEMBER 2010 • GEORGIA MAGAZINE