LIGHT Helmets aims to break its heavier rivals’ hold on the market for football headgear.
It’s not easy being a disrupter in the football helmet marketplace. The list is long of companies that have tried to take market share from the two behemoths of the industry, Riddell and Schutt.
But LIGHT Helmets, a Carlsbad, California-based company, has taken up the challenge even though it feels like they are starting on their own 1-yard line and need a 99-yard touchdown drive to secure a permanent spot in the helmet manufacturing space.
Founded by Nick Esayian, LIGHT Helmets offers headgear that is based on performance and safety. With roots in military-grade materials and a passion for innovation, the company’s flagship product – the Apache Helmet – is making waves from Pop Warner fields to NFL locker rooms.
Part of what makes LIGHT helmets unique is reflected in the company’s name. Its helmets are lighter than other football helmets, reducing mass into the safety equation. LIGHT Helmets weigh just 3.5 pounds compared to the industry standard of 6.5 pounds.
“If you can reduce the weight, you are reducing kinetic energy in the equation,” said CEO Esayian. “I think the best example is if you have a wide receiver running a seam route and he gets hit, it’s a 70 g (unit of acceleration) impact where 3 pounds all of a sudden becomes 210 pounds snapping around on your cervical structure.
“There is also an acute impact like when you shake the Chobani yogurt around a lot harder and it moves around. That’s what is going on in your head.”
LIGHT Helmets was formed in 2019 by Esayian and a group of investors that include former NFL players Tony Romo and Drew Stanton, and current players Cam Jordan, Tyrod Taylor and Darius Robinson. From the business world, backers include Fred Smith, the founder of Federal Express who passed away recently; Richard Green, part of owner of the Philadelphia Eagles; and entrepreneur John Sarkisian who founded SKLZ.
Esayian says the company’s advisory board consists of 10 doctors across the nation, five of whom are investors.
Helping guide LIGHT Helmets into a closed-off marketplace is its favorable rating from Virginia Tech researchers who annually rate football helmets.
“We have the number-one helmet in all the new position-specific categories for the NFL as tested by the independent lab at Virginia Tech that rates all of this stuff,” said Esayian. “Our Varsity Apache helmet is rated number one at Virginia Tech against all other makes and models.”
Currently, LIGHT has helmets in 30 NFL locker rooms and approximately 50 NCAA programs, with a handful of athletes in both leagues using it.
Former Hall of Fame New York Giants linebacker Michael Strahan is an advocate of lighter helmets and has donated Apache helmets to his alma mater, Texas Southern University, saying, “It’s night and day. When I played, we didn’t have helmets like this.”
Concussions are all too frequent in football and Esayian sees an opening for a modern take on helmet construction to reduce injuries and their severity.
“We changed a high school here,” said Esayian. “Mar Vista High School went from 17 guys with concussions to, with our helmet, they went down to two suspected concussions for the full year. No helmet can protect against all impacts, but you can reduce the frequency of the injury and severity by reducing weight.
“The energy equation is 2 x the mass x the velocity squared. We can’t do anything about the velocity in football; the players are getting faster. But I can do something about the mass. So, if I cut the mass in half, I can reduce the kinetic energy in those events by half.”
LIGHT Helmets has its headquarters in Carlsbad where they assemble, conduct research and development and ship helmets to customers that include both teams and individual buyers.
“Every face mask is made in Chicago. All the fitment pads are made in Washington State and some of the foam liners are made in Indianapolis,” said Esayian. “The goal over the next 24 months is going to get everything made in the United States.
“The shells are done in Montreal but we’re going to start doing them in the States this year, so the tool is being brought here. So face masks, fitment pads, liners, shells those are all made exclusively in the U.S., or they soon will be.”
LIGHT Helmets are not just for the pros. The company offers volume discounts and flexible financing to underserved programs, including HBCU’s and youth leagues.
The company has just released a $300 youth helmet that is 5-star rated by Virginia Tech that Esayian says is going to be “a home run.”
“We knew we needed a new youth helmet, so we came up with a $300 helmet that uses the same shell, same mask, same fitment pads as our other helmets,” said Esayian. “On the inside there is an EPP (expanded polypropylene) cap that just snaps in there and it only costs us $7.
“So now I can go out and sell against these helmets that are 400 and 500 bucks with a $300 helmet. I can grab market share, and we can assemble six or seven of these in an hour because you are just sliding this cap in there that has the fitment pads.”
The American football helmet market is projected to reach $139 million in 2025.
“Riddell has 78% of the market and Schutt has 21% and we’ve got 1%,” said Esayian. “This year we’ll sell under 10,000 helmets, next year we will do almost 50,000 of just football helmets.”
In his younger days, Esayian participated in motor sports, driving cars on the Pirelli World Challenge circuit. It was there that he met Bill Simpson, a pioneer of safety features that have promulgated in today’s auto racing world.
Esayian says there are no immediate plans to develop helmets for auto racing, but he is already preparing to expand into the helmet space for bicycle riders, lacrosse players and hockey teams.
But now with a foothold in the football helmet space, Esayian is stepping on the gas on LIGHT Helmets production.
“You have to have the NFL visibility because even though the helmets the kids are wearing in high school and youth football aren’t the same kind of helmet, they look the same,” said Esayian. “You have to have that kind of credibility.”
Esayian is using strategic planning for LIGHT Helmets. Now that he is playing with the big boys, visibility and the early education of football players play a vital role.
“We have so many different people on our cap table, everybody knows people are better off when they are done playing football than others were before.
“I want everything made in the United States and like the military, it has to be made here. LIGHT Helmets is owned by the players, for the players.”
While most football helmets are purchased by the players respective teams, LIGHT Helmets offers direct-to-consumer headgear on its website at www.lighthelmets.com.