Warstic Wood Bat Co was founded by former minor league baseball player Ben Jenkins, and for the past two years Warstic and Shinola have collaborated to make beautiful, yet fully functional maple wood baseball bats. Just in time for Detroit’s Opening Day, we sat down with Ben to learn more about why he started his Dallas-based company in the first place.
Read the full interview below.
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Ben Jenkins, CEO of Warstic Bats
Why did you start Warstic Bat Co.?
I played college baseball and I was a minor league baseball player for the Philadelphia Phillies a long time ago. Doing this was a matter of me combining my two passions. I’m a graphic designer and I’ve had a design firm called One Fast Buffalo for about 17 years.
About five years ago, I decided I was going to spend a little more time on projects of my own and do what I do for my clients, for myself. This was just a matter of doing what I do best, which was other than design, baseball. It’s a world I know. I know the lingo and I know how players think.
I was really just sitting down from a personal perspective and designing what I would design if I didn’t have any rules. I think that’s what made it work because there was really nothing to lose — no risk to it. I knew this is what I would make if I could make anything I wanted.
About how long does it take to produce one bat?
It takes about 15 or 20 minutes per bat. It ends up turning into a full day because the drying process of just the stain, but the actual manufacturing of the bat itself is not that long, 15 or 20 minutes.
How do you choose and where do you source the wood for your bats?
We use a nice, heavy maple wood because it’s the most stable kind of thing we can do. We bat manufacturers really don’t have that many choices, to be honest with you. It’s all about the quality of the raw wood product.
Quality in terms of performance is a huge deal to us, and it’s really all in the quality of the wood, the raw part we’re working with. Wood that has straight grains and is pure throughout, that’s just part of the process to make sure we’re working with mills that know what they’re doing. It’s a big undertaking because we’re kind of fighting over that same stuff that other wooden bat companies want as well.
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Shinola + Warstic Baseball Bat in Green
Why did you choose to base your business in Dallas, Texas?
I was born and raised here, simple as that. I’ve got a huge family. I’ve got three kids. I’ve got eight nephews. I’ve got brothers and sisters. I’ve got huge family and I mean, that’s why I’m here. My wife is actually from here as well; I’ve known her since I was 12 years old. So this is home. It’s a great place to work from everything I do. From a design standpoint. I like the outdoors. I like to get outside a lot and surf and fish and stuff like that. And I travel a lot, too.
Your baseball bats are beautiful. Should people be afraid to actually use them?
I’m glad you asked that. No. We actually think they actually look even cooler when they’re all dirty. You know, when a baseball player uses a bat, not only does it get dirty by use of hitting balls or rolling around in the dirt, that kind of thing. Players purposely throw a sticky, gooey substance called pine tar on them, which helps them hold the bat. The dirtier the bat, the cooler the look. However we do get a lot of people that are not players that buy our bat and maybe hang it on the wall or give it as a gift to someone, and I think there is a hesitancy to play with it because it’s so pretty, but we absolutely make these bats for people to play with.