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It is not easy to find a top, reputable company among Slovak sporting goods manufacturers for some of the parasports. One of the positive exceptions is Bashto Sports, a company dealing primarily with Boccia sports accessories. It is designed for people with the most severe forms of disability.
Since 2013 Bashto Sports is a manufacturer of professional equipment for disabled athletes. With a priority focus on the Paralympic sport Boccia. At the same time, it is a distributor of the Portuguese Tutti per Tutti brand, Craft Hill International and the first distributor of Korean Victory boccia balls in Europe.
Therefore, the editorial board of Vozickar.info took the opportunity and Ondrej Bastak Duran, the owner of Bashto Sports, asked for an interview.
Design of up to 190 colors and their color combinations
First of all, I would ask you to give our readers a closer look at the focus of your business.
Within the Bashto Sports brand, we develop and produce mainly our boccia ramps. We offer up to six different types, what makes a world rarity. They differ in the materials used, the technical design and significantly the price too. Almost every boccia ramp we make is unique. Athletes can choose from 190 colors and their color combinations. They can choose to engrave their name or sports club logo. And there are many, many more variations.
What specific merchandise do you have for your customers?
We focus mainly on registered boccia players, national and world champions. However, to popularize boccia we also offer affordable sports equipment for the general public. For amateur players and beginners.
We sell all sports equipment needed to play boccia, for players, their assistants, coaches and referees. We have developed and manufactured them all ourselves except boccia balls. We sell them only as a distributor of foreign manufacturers. We have recently become the first distributor of Victory boccia balls in Europe. Just to remind you that these balls are one of the best in the world with their game features.
Equal conditions for domestic and foreign clients
Your activities focus on Slovakia and abroad. What makes the Slovak customer different from the others?
The boccia sports community is small within the world, not that within the country. This means that in Slovakia everyone knows each other, they meet in the league and international tournaments. The biggest difference is perhaps only the form of communication. We are in contact with foreign customers mainly via e-mails, or we meet at some international tournaments. Their orders account for 80 per cent of sales.
With many Slovak customers, we are longtime friends or at least acquaintances. Communication is, therefore, most often personal or by phone. We participate in the organization of boccia events in Slovakia. I will mention the international tournament Boccia Tatra Cup in Liptovský Ján or the boccia training camp in Čičmany. So, we have space to meet our customers quite often.
What assortment do you supply to Slovak customers?
With the same as the foreign ones. We do not differentiate the offer of our goods for foreign and Slovak customers. Rather, it would be appropriate to ask what goods Slovak customers are interested in. Slovakia is a very small market for boccia products, and experience to date shows that Slovak customers mainly buy boccia balls and small items.
The boccia ramp market worked anyway when we started production 13 years ago. At that time, the offer of boccia frame from abroad was poor. And that was regarding both the price and quality. At the time we worked closely with the OMD Farfalletta Žilina club, whose members were testing our first ramps. And they also bought the first models. That helped us a lot because we could invest in further development.
Competition at tournaments is getting stronger
Are there products, goods that the Slovak customer can’t get and therefore has a worse position in boccia competitions?
We currently offer six types of boccia frame in price ranges from approximately 300 to 2,000 euro. I think everyone can choose according to their financial possibilities. Perhaps it would be better to elaborate on who our customers are? In addition to classified athletes - individuals there are mainly sports clubs OMD Boccia Bratislava, Club OMD Farfalletta Žilina and Boccia club ZOM Prešov. Then there is a group of customers, such as civic associations focused on working with the physically or mentally disabled. Organizations dedicated to seniors and schools focused on education of children with disabilities should also be mentioned.
And what about payment of invoices for products sold?
Many orders are paid from project money, subsidies or sponsorship. It should be noted that only a few solvent boccia players can afford to buy the highest quality sports equipment from their own money. Are foreign customers doing better? I don't know, but I wouldn't be so sure. I have also met reactions that do not tell us about it. And they are from countries we consider rich, such as Sweden or Austria.
What news can we expect in the near future?
Boccia is one of the most intensely developing parasports ever. The number of amateur players and more ambitious registered athletes is increasing. Competition is getting stronger. Players are increasingly aware that the victory is determined not only by their talent, sweat and tears in training, but also by the quality of sports equipment.
This is one of the reasons why we are preparing a project for the development of a variable boccia ramp completely adapted to a specific player. It will be such a jigsaw, a building kit, where the athlete chooses a preferred module for each part of the ramp. He chooses the material, design and technical design, functionality and so on. And he will all be able to put together through an interactive online application.
The Boccia ramp moves according to the player's instructions
Speaking of individual assembling of the ramp, what is the essence of this game?
Boccia is a petanque-like game. It is most often played in a gym with leather balls filled with plastic granules. Two individuals, two pairs or two three-member teams play against each other. Each of the two sides plays with six boccia balls of red or blue color. Their goal is to get their balls closer to the white ball called Jack as the rival player.
Boccia players with the most severe physical disability who are almost motionless are not able to throw their balls into the gamey with their limbs. Therefore, they are assisted by a sports assistant who manipulates the boccia ramp according to their instructions. A boccia ramp is something like a slide for boccia balls that gives them speed and direction.
Awareness of boccia sport is low
What is the awareness of this sport among the healthy population, for whom boccia is also an open sport?
Almost everyone can do sports. Regardless of your disability. For example, in boccia, with the help of an assistant and with technical aids, it can be fully realized to the highest sporting point, as the Paralympics. Even a person who is motionless from the neck down. Who can ever imagine such a thing in our society if fate did not associate him with a severely disabled person who is involved in boccia?
What do you specifically mean?
Awareness of the possibilities of boccia sport and a full lifetime realization through this sport is unfortunately low in our country. This also results from the overall set-up of the society that only marginally sees the lives of people with disabilities. Boccia has the potential to extend our perception to the world of those who live next to us and are part of our society. Also, thanks to the paradox that combines - severely disabled and top sports – how is this possible!?
Can you apply your opinion to domestic conditions?
We have champions from European or world tournaments in Slovakia, including Paralympic winners. From Rio 2016, our athletes have brought the most precious metal and are ready to fight it in the upcoming Tokyo 2020. They fight for themselves, for our country, for the sport of their choice. In a broader context, also for the change in the optics that most society looks at people with disabilities.
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Who is he?
Ondrej Bašták Ďurán was born in the picturesque village of Gemerská Poloma in south-eastern Slovakia. And there he does business. It started when he first came across the sport known as boccia. It is a Paralympic sport for people with the most severe disabilities. During his university studies, he became a personal assistant for people with disabilities. Later, he took the role of a sports assistant for boccia players of various categories, then a coach and a aj trénerom a certified national referee.
He actively participates in many national and international tournaments. He learned everything there was to know about the game and the players' needs. He wrote a book on how to train boccia, and in 2013 he started to produce and sell sports equipment for boccia.
Currently, with his team of collaborators under the Bashto Sports brand, they develop their own professional sports equipment not only for boccia. Also, for other sports designed for people with various disabilities. The company exports its products to thirty countries of the world on five continents.
