Have you ever wondered what all the companies are that manufacture your high quality baseball gear that your rely on so much?
Every player needs gloves, bats, shoes and more gear to perform at his best. Of course all this gear needs to be manufactured by somebody, which is where big companies come in.
Not all companies manufacture every piece of equipment, and not every company has the same level of expertise with every piece of equipment.
The following companies are the best known brands there are. These are by no means all the companies that manufacture baseball gear, but the ones with the biggest market share.
What are your favorite brands when it comes to baseball gear? Did I miss a big manufacturer? Let me know in the comments and now enjoy this list. 🙂
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Wilson
Founded: 1913
Founder: Thomas E. Wilson
Website: Wilson Baseball
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: yes
Baseball balls: yes
Wilson is probably the biggest name in baseball. I bet everybody has seen the red W, which is Wilson’s well known logo.
The company was founded in 1913 by Thomas E. Wilson under the name “Ashland Manufacturing Company.” After multiple name changes the current name “Wilson Sporting Goods Company” was established in 1931. Â
Most people don’t know, that Wilson actually has a parent company since 1989, that is the Finnish group Amer Sports.
Wilson offers a lot of baseball products for baseball equipment. Actually whatever you need, you will find it manufactured by Wilson. Nevertheless the best known pieces of equipment are probably Wilson’s baseball gloves. Here, Wilson offers three different lines for all kinds of budgets. Currently Wilson sponsors 27 MLB players.
Rawlings
Founded: 1887
Founder: George and Alfred Rawlings
Website: Rawlings
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: yes
Baseball balls: yes
Rawlings is a private company based in St.Louis, Missouri that produces every kind of baseball equipment you can think of.
Founded in 1887 by George and Alfred Rawlings, their company is mostly known for their incredible high quality baseball gloves. Up to this day Rawlings is the most chosen brand for baseball gloves by MLB professionals.
Rawlings was moreover known for manufacturing their gloves in the US, which is sadly no longer the case.
The company offers three separate gloves lines called Heart of the Hide, Pro Preferred and Gold Glove, which is their most high end kind of glove line.
Apart from this Rawlings also offers to manufacture a custom glove just for you. Prices start at $460. But remember, gloves are not the only piece of baseball equipment that Rawlings makes.
Marucci Sports
Founded: 2004
Founder: Kurt Ainsworth, Joe Lawrence, Jack Marucci
Website: Marucci Sports
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: yes
Baseball balls: yes
Marucci was founded in 2004 as Marucci Bat Company by two ex-players and an athletic trainer. In 2009 the company was renamed into Marucci Sports and now manufactures all kinds of baseball equipment. Marucci Sports is currently the fastest-growing brand in baseball and moreover the most used brand in the Big Leagues.
Like nearly every American company success story, Marucci Sports started out in backyard, where the founders manufactured wood bats by hand for the local community and some of the best Big League players at that time.
Marucci bats are now used by 33% of all MLB professionals, with players like Bryce Harper or Giancarlo Stanton promoting their baseball equipment.
Interestingly Marucci Sports does not sponsor any of these players. Instead they make all their players company owners, so they are interested in making Marucci Sports more valuable.
Mizuno Corporation
Founded: 1906
Founder: Rihachi and Rizo Mizuno
Website: Mizuno Baseball
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: yes
Baseball balls: yes
Mizuno is a big corporation from Japan that manufactures equipment for any kind of sports. It is seriously breathtaking to look at their product portfolio.
Founded in 1906, the company started its rise by selling baseballs before anything else. You could say this wonderful sport made Mizuno what it is today.
Mizuno is also mostly known for its amazing baseball gloves. The company offers what seems to be an endless amount of different baseball gloves with certain specifications suitable for every position.
Most interesting is probably that their top baseball gloves, simply called Pro Limited Edition, can be send in by the player for a one-time , free refurbishment. This is supposed to make your used glove feel like a brand new one. Pretty cool idea and I really like it.
Nokona
Founded: 1926
Founder: Storey family
Website: Nokona
Baseball bats: no
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: no
Baseball balls: no
Check out this cool video to learn more about Nokona. This company is based in Nocona, Texas and is known for its high quality, handcrafted baseball gloves.
Baum
Founded: 1993
Founder: Steve Baum
Website: Baum Bat
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: no
Protective gear: no
Baseball balls: no
Baum Bat is the inventor of the composite wood bat. Founded in 1993 by Steve Baum, Baum Bat introduced the first composite wood bat to the game of baseball. It felt like wood, looked like wood and reacted like wood to the impact of a baseball while at the same time being 400 times stronger than traditional wood bats at that time.
Steve Baum noticed how fiberglass was finding its way into the aerospace and boat industry and wanted to combine this new material with wood bats. After 20 years of research and testing, he unveiled the Baum Bat in 1993, changing the game of baseball forever.
Baum has stayed true to its origins and has continued to manufacture only baseball bats. The company does not manufacture any other kind of equipment.
Current bats start at $230 and go up to $300. Of course they have a BBCOR certification and are allowed to be used in middle or high school leagues.
Easton
Founded: 1922
Founder: Doug Easton
Website: Easton Baseball
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: yes
Baseball balls: yes
Easton was founded in 1922 and has a long standing reputation with the Little League World Series and the NCAA collegiate teams. The company made a name for itself by introducing the first aluminium bat in 1972 and is still known for its extensive research program.
What nearly nobody knows is, that Easton has been on the moon. Easton manufactured the thermal shroud for the Apollo lunar landing. Pretty cool!
Easton nowadays offers everything from bats to balls, but of course the company is still mostly known for its bats.
The price range for these is pretty big. BBCOR bats start at $70 for beginner bats or training bats and go up to $360 for high quality ones.
DeMarini
Founded: 1989
Founder: Ray DeMarini
Website: DeMarini
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: no
Protective gear: no
Baseball balls: no
DeMarini was founded in 1989 by Ray DeMarini and specializes in manufacturing baseball bats. DeMarini is actually a daughter of Wilson and belongs to the Amer Sports group.
Interestingly the rise of DeMarini did not start with baseball bats but instead with softball bats. When DeMarini introduced double wall bats with increased power in 1995 it started a meteoric rise.
Nowadays more than 150 colleges use DeMarini bats for their baseball teams and in 2005 a newspaper called their bats the “Mercedes of baseball bats”.
This also shows in price, as their best models come with a $450 price tag.
If you want to have a custom bat, be ready to spend upwards of $580.
Louisville Slugger
Founded: 1855
Founder: J. F. Hillerich
Website: Louisville Slugger
Baseball bats: yes
Baseball gloves: no
Protective gear: no
Baseball balls: no
This company has probably the longest history of all baseball equipment manufacturers.
First of all it is important, that the Louisville Slugger bats were produced by the Hillerich & Bradsby Company till 2015, when they sold the division to Wilson. So nowadays Louisville Slugger bats are manufactured by Wilson and belong to the Finnish Amer Sports group.
You can argue that the Hillerich & Bradsby Company was founded in 1855, when J. F. Hillerich opened his woodworking shop in Louisville.
Hillerich did not plan to make baseball bats, but one day his son came home with the Louisville Eclipse player Pete Browning who broke his wood bat the day before.
Hillerich manufactured a new bat for Browning, but still was not interested in manufacturing any more bats. Only when his younger son took over the company the company started to manufacture wood baseball bats on a bigger scale.
In 1916 the salesman Frank Bradsby became a business partner and by 1923 the company was the biggest and most successful seller of baseball bats in the US and famous players like Babe Ruth played with their bats.
Nowadays Louisville Slugger is still famous for its wood bats, but has also started to manufacture aluminium and composite baseball bats.
Under Armour
Founded: 1996
Founder: Kevin Plank
Website: Under Armour Baseball
Baseball bats: no
Baseball gloves: yes
Protective gear: yes
Baseball balls: no
Under Armour was founded in 1996 by the then 24-year old Kevin Plank. It is now one of the biggest manufacturers of sports clothing and other sports related equipment worldwide.
The company started by manufacturing the first ever T-shirt made out of moisture-wicking synthetic fabric. This happened, because Plank was tired of always changing his sweaty T-shirts after his football practices. He noticed that his compression shorts always stayed dry, which lead him to manufacture a shirt out of a similar material.
Under Armour is not as known in baseball as some other brands, but they are working hard on changing that. UA sponsors big names like Bryce Harper in order to increase their popularity.
UA even planned to become the MLB’s official provider of on-field uniforms and signed a contract to do so in 2016. In 2018 UA decided to back out of the contract which lead to Nike becoming the new official on-field uniform provider starting 2020.
Maybe you are now wondering why I did not mention Nike, Adidas or some other big brands like these.
In my opinion these brands are just apparel brands and if I mentioned all of them as well, you would have to read until you are ready for retirement.
In this post I wanted to focus on brands that have a really close connection to baseball.
Let me know if I missed a crucial company and I will add it asap.
Get home safe,
Jan