A behind the scenes look into how and why the company was started
Court Dry was officially founded in December of 2022 by my brother, Parsa, and I. Since then, it’s been a journey full of ups and downs, which we completely expected as neither of us has ever had any real entrepreneurial experiences. We’ve spoken to friends and family about the founding of Court Dry many times before, but have never officially spoken about it on our socials or written about it in our blog. Although legendary entrepreneur and venture capitalist Kevin O’Leary would grill us at this stage of our business by saying “You’re a product, not a business!!!” since we only have one product on the market at the moment, I still wanted to take some time to explain how we got here. Enjoy.
Our Process
Everyone has their own personal values which dictate the types of actions they take and also contributes to how they handle certain situations. People who share similar values don’t always take exactly the same set of actions or respond to events in exactly the same way, but they use their values to narrow down the set of potential actions that can be taken. In business, and in life, it’s important to have values that reflect the type of person you want to become. Without values or principles, we’re forced to instinctively react to events without carefully considering the inevitable consequences that will follow. Values guide us to make decisions in ways that we will ultimately be proud of as we reflect on our previous life experiences.
From the beginning, Parsa and I discussed the values that we lived by and thus wanted Court Dry to embody. The largest of those many values was integrity. We believe that no matter what the consequence of acting in an integral manner, it must be done. One way that this value translates into the way that we run our business is that we will only produce products that we would legitimately purchase ourselves if someone else had made it. This means that our products need to be high quality, reasonably priced, and have value that exceeds its selling price. We are not the type of people that will sell any product, we need to really believe in the products and use them ourselves. Parsa uses our towels at all of his tennis matches and practices for the University of Oregon club team and I use my towel at home since I don’t play much tennis anymore.
Parsa using the original Icon Towel
The Early Days
As we’ve both discussed before, Parsa and I started Court Dry to fill the gap in the tennis market which was that there were no adequate towels that catered specifically to tennis and pickleball players. After we decided to pursue this venture in the fall of 2022, we got right to work by brainstorming various names, having graphic designers create our logo, and more. By the summer of 2023, after taking care of backend details, we began sourcing samples. We ordered 14 blank towel samples from different suppliers and tested each one on the court until we found the right towel that absorbs sweat well, feels gentle on the skin, and has the right thickness. We tested these towels both on and off the court to ensure that the towels were durable and could withstand various uses. After selecting a towel that met our needs, we began customizing the towel until every detail was perfect. We added our key features, which included a lip on the back of the towel, a zipper pocket, and a clip for users to hang on a fence.
Original Court Dry Icon Towel Sample
We then settled on a towel size of 40” x 20” and added our logo to the area just below the zipper. After settling on a size and confirming the placement of the logo, we went through three different rounds of ordering custom towel samples until everything about the towel was exactly how we had envisioned it. We needed to have the final version in our hands to confirm every detail before it was mass-produced. For example, in the initial sample, the button used to secure the clip was made of plastic. Parsa and I pushed for a black metal clip to ensure that the towel could be used over a long period of time as plastic clips get worn out quicker, even though it came with an extra cost and took longer for our supplier to incorporate. Eventually, we crafted the perfect tennis towel that we call the “Icon Tennis Towel.” Months after bringing our idea to life, we finally put in our first order with our supplier which we received in October 2023 and went live on Amazon!
Early image of the Icon Towel’s Amazon Listing
Perpetual Improvement
When we finally went live on Amazon, we knew we couldn’t just sit around waiting for things to happen. We wanted to get feedback on our product so that the next version of the towel is even better than our first. We did this by enrolling over 18 trusted friends who were to use the towel in various situations (for example, some played tennis, some only workout at the gym, etc.) to test out our towel and let us know what areas could be improved for the next iteration of the towel. We wanted to strip down the original Icon Towel and enhance the features that proved useful while eliminating parts of the towel that didn’t provide enough value. After collecting information from our testers, we came away with a few key insights. The first was that people found the “Hang” feature, shown below, to be unnecessary.
“Hang” Feature on the original Icon Towel
Although it did its job by allowing people to hang the towel on chairs of various sizes, it didn’t create enough value to where people felt like the towel really needed it. People said that they could just hang the towel on chairs without the lip anyway if they really wanted to. Given many people gave us the same feedback and we genuinely agreed with the feedback, we ended up taking this feature out completely for the Icon Towel v2. Another significant change we have made on the Icon Towel is that the zipper has been upgraded. A lot of the tennis players we got feedback from said that the small metal zipper was hard to grasp while their hands were sweaty.
Upgraded Zipper for the Icon Towel v2
The upgraded zipper is now rubber and has a larger surface area that is much more grippable than the small metal zipper the old Icon Towel has. The last change we made for the new towel is that we shrunk the size of the towel to 32” x 16” (down from 40” x 20”) as almost all of our testers found the original size to be too large. By shrinking the size, the towel will be a much more appropriate size and will take up less space when traveling. This doesn’t mean that we’ll never have a larger-sized towel again, it just means that the Icon Towel v2 needs to serve its correct purpose, and shrinking the size helps us achieve this.
The feedback we’ve gotten has been extremely helpful so far and we plan to continue talking to as many towel users as possible! If you have any feedback or suggestions please email us at court.dry@gmail.com.
The Future
While Court Dry has only released one product so far, the Icon Tennis Towel, this will not be the case for long. We have a plan in place to release more products this year and will be taking the brand to new heights as the company grows.
As many already know, we’ve been sold out since late December. This will change as the Court Dry Icon Tennis Towel v2 will finally be available as early as next month! We’ve been working hard with our new supplier to perfect every detail and release a better product than the original Icon Tennis Towel. We’ll never rush to restock/release a product. We’ll be patient and get it right. Every time. As cliche as it may sound, this is only the beginning for Court Dry and we’re excited to continue this journey with you. Thank you so much for your support.
Court Dry Founders - Nima and Parsa Nasri
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