It all started in a room above a gym...The Fight Stor(e)Y
If you'd walked into Cyclone MMA back in 2008, there's nothing to suggest one of the UK's best-known fight stores was about to begin. The gym was located on a backstreet, through a fenced door in the little village of Walbottle, just a little west of Newcastle.
Whilst I'm going to write most of this in the third person, I'm Alex Wright, the co founder of the company that I started with my dear departed friend, Terry Mason. I was asked to write an email series introducing local customers to the history of the store, so here it is!
At this time, I was still really heavily involved in martial arts. I trained with my crew Gracie Barra Newcastle with some of the best guys in the area before setting up my own place Cyclone.
We had moved from a hall in Heaton to a basement in the Old Co Op Building in Walbottle before finally taking a unit at the back of it and turning into a rough and ready mixed martial arts gym. Our own place. I still trained with my friends like Craig Jose, Pete Irving and Tiarks, my (always) best man Bryan Moore, Jiu Jitsu wizard Dave Harewood, Jeff, Eddie Ng and too many great guys to mention.
The store was something that happened after a chance meeting with a drop in Cyclone student months before. I'd been working at a digital marketing agency called Mancala.
We sold websites, SEO and adword's. This kid at a convention says to me....
"If I was any good at SEO and Digital marketing I wouldn't do it for anyone else, I'd do it for myself.....Of and I did"
When you hear the truth, sometimes it sounds very loud. I went for a pint after work with the owner of the company and told him what this guy had said. My question was:
"Are we any good at this and if so why aren't we selling products on our own sites?"
No warehouse. No shop. No staff. Just a tiny office above the gym, a handful of products and a big question...
We thought there had to be a better way. We had a question to ask ourselves
"Could we build something that genuinely served the fight community?"
Back then, combat sports looked very different. MMA was still finding its feet in Britain, online shopping was in its infancy, and most fighters accepted that finding any decent equipment usually meant a compromise or buying something that wasn't really fit for purpose.
From day one, our focus was simple: stock equipment we'd happily train with ourselves and treat every customer like a teammate, whether they were preparing for a title fight or buying their very first pair of gloves.
Looking back, it's hard to believe where that little room above the gym would eventually lead us. The trials and tribulations, the brands we'd introduce to the UK, the lessons we'd learn and the amazing people we'd meet.
This was the start of a journey that touched many peoples lives and is still doing to this day.
Over the next few weeks, we'll share the stories behind the moves, the mistakes, the lucky breaks and the people who helped shape FightStorePro into what it is today.
Some of them will probably surprise you. You may recognise many of the faces that appear in it, but one things for certain, you'll get to know the whole story warts and all!
And if you've ever visited the shop, trained locally or ordered from us online, you're already part of this story.
