Veteran hits a home run with baseball bat biz
His passion for the game feeds a mission to make lives better
Air Force veteran Juan Baret has loved baseball since he was a 9-year-old Bronx kid eagerly waiting at the gate of Yankee Stadium, hoping to get in. Years of chronic pain have left him unable to play, but he’s found a way to stay in the game – as a maker of custom wooden bats.
In February 2013, Baret created his first product in the garage of his Woodbridge, Virginia, home. It was a Little League bat fit for a child. He remembers his kids grabbing the bat and celebrating the accomplishment.
“Even though I was still in pain, it made me feel confident that this is probably something I should pursue,” Baret says.
Now 39, Baret landed in the South Bronx in 1988 after migrating from the Dominican Republic. On spring afternoons, after school let out, Baret walked “by faith” to Yankee Stadium. He had no money for game tickets, but he always felt strongly that he’d get in.
Consistently, strangers began approaching him with free tickets, not knowing he came from a low-income household. “Hey, here’s a free ticket, kid. You can go to the game,” they told him.
“Pretty much, it happened every time I would go down there. I wouldn’t even ask people,” he says. Baret eventually picked up the bat himself.
His father was a volunteer coach and umpire for the Alfonso Little League team in Manhattan. They spent every day in the summer of 1990 playing baseball, practicing the fundamentals. The next summer, Baret was ready to play.
Baseball followed him through childhood, school and a military career. He enlisted in the Air Force in 1998 but left in 2007, three days shy of serving nine years. That same year, he stopped playing. Injuries he sustained during service had left him with severe pain in his hips, knees and back. It would be a half-decade before he picked up a bat again, and he didn’t last long.
In 2012, back pain forced him to leave his team in the middle of the season. But this time, he walked away with inspiration.
“One positive thing out of playing baseball that year was that I was using wood bats,” Baret says. He recalls a day in his last season when his bat broke after a hit. He took it home, put it back together with glue, then used it in his final game. He got in two good hits – and that’s when the idea for a business clicked. By early 2013, Baret Bats was up and running.
Baret makes each customized wood bat in his garage using a wood lathe. Once a customer selects a bat type, Baret shapes the raw wood to the desired weight and size and finishes the bat with a custom paint job, personalized decal letters and a clear coat.
As the brand expands, Baret hopes to purchase an automatic bat-making machine. Right now, among other challenges of owning a startup business, he lacks the space. And though he is able to control the quality and the process himself, he also loses time.
“My output is not as much as it could be if I had a team of other people helping,” Baret says.
On average, he is able to make two to three bats a week after working full-time as an office engineer for a military construction agency and caring for his three children – Alexis, 7; Alexandra, 6; and Gabriel, 5 – and wife, Darianella, 31. Baret’s youth bats range from $60 to $80, and his adult bats cost $80 to $200, not that much more than mass-produced bats.
Baret is devoted to providing exceptional customer service. He believes “it’s all about relationships” and often forms great bonds with customers during the production process, as each bat is personalized for the size and weight of the player.
“At the end of the day, you’re solving a problem for the customer. If you could go above and beyond, and it fits within your means, then why not?” Baret says.
In 2015, Baret crafted a bat in honor of fallen Army Specialist Sean Cutsforth, who was killed by smallarms fire in Afghanistan. Cutsforth’s cousin, Andrew Widiker, 21, of northern Wisconsin, ordered the bat to honor his life and time as a baseball player. According to Widiker, Cutsforth put the sport on the back burner in college to serve in the military.
The top half of the bat was painted blue, the bottom half red with seven white stars trailing toward the handle to represent the core Army values: loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity and personal courage. At the top of the barrel were the words, “SWINGING FOR SEAN.” In 2016, Widiker used his custom-made bat throughout his final baseball season in high school. He knew that’s what Cutsforth would’ve wanted him to do.
“The moment I was up to bat, it was just amazing. I felt him there with me,” Widiker says.
It took Baret a month and a lot of deep thought to create Widiker’s bat. Then Baret got his biggest break: An entire Pennsylvania little league team purchased 16 bats from his website. He’d never received that much demand at once. Baret’s recent partnership with Competitive Edge athletic performance center also has gained his business more attention.
Baret’s grand vision is for his company to be one of the top suppliers for Major League Baseball (MLB). He also wants to spread a personal message that baseball has the power to change lives. “Baseball has changed my life for the better. If I can do that for someone else, then I’m doing my mission in life,” he says.