Hockey players, how familiar does this scenario sound? You battle hard along the end boards, freeing the puck to one of your teammates; you slide out into the slot and open yourself up for a pass. The puck is coming your way, you corral it and as you go to wrist the puck into the top corner your stick snaps in two.

At this point you will probably assume there is one option, and that is to cut your losses and toss that stick into the garbage. What about a second option? In Whitehorse you can now get your composite stick repaired for a fraction of the price as buying a new one.

Ed Oulton is now a franchise owner of Integral Hockey Stick Repair, servicing all of the Yukon. The company founded by Randy Langille, who applied his knowledge of laminate repair he learned from working on aircrafts, to fixing composite sticks, has been in operation for eight years; with over a hundred locations across Canada and the United States, the Yukon is one of the newest locations.

Hockey, a lot like other sports has made the push to make its equipment stronger, lighter and more effective. A composite stick weighs significantly less than a wooden stick, and has more bend, so the player can fire the puck harder. Oulton assures any hockey player that the process of fixing the stick will not affect the weight and the flex of the stick.

“A composite stick is hollow, and we do a hollow repair,” says Oulton. “We do not use a plug or anything like that, so your stick will remain hollow. The repair adds about a dimes worth of weight to the stick.”

Unable to go into full detail about how the repairs are done, Oulton was still able to give some information on the process.

“The whole process takes about four days,” said Oulton. “We cut the break, where it is broken on each end of the shaft. Then we check the stick for any nicks and any internal fractures that may also affect the stick, we have to make sure it is repairable. It takes four days for the epoxy to set.”

We warranty five inches around the repair zone. Before we give the stick back to the customer we have to check the repair, make sure the epoxy set properly and then by flexing the stick afterwards. It is a lifetime warranty on the repaired part of the stick, if it breaks in another spot then that is a new repair.”

As well as the shaft of the stick, Oulton says he can also repair broken blades. There is only one part of the stick, which cannot be fixed.

“We cannot fix the part of the stick where the shaft meets the blade,” says Oulton. “It is just not hollow enough for us to fit our equipment into. We can fix the blade though, as long as we have each half of the break.”

If you are a pre-existing customer with Oulton, you can be given a loner stick while yours is being repaired. Oulton receives shipments of broken sticks from junior teams to fix, which can also be bought.

“The last batch of sticks we brought up were from the Red Deer Rebels, a WHL team,” said Oulton. “A brand new composite stick on sale will cost about $150, if not (on sale) you are looking upwards of $300. We sell ours for a fraction of the price, about $80 - $120, and they are still warrantied if it breaks in the repair zone. We are trying to get more, so we have a variety of makes and models.”

As well as saving people money, the stick repair has an environment factor to it, as composite sticks will not decompose in a landfill.

“There is 2 million hockey sticks made in North America yearly, and they do break,” says Oulton. “Most of these sticks, I would say, end up in a landfill because people don’t know they can be fixed. If we get a stick that cannot be repaired, we are going to ask the customer what they want to do with it, eventually we would like to start making canes for people.”

A hockey stick takes a lot of abuse that can compromise the integrity of the stick leading to breaks. A typical repair to the shaft will cost $60 while the blade will cost $80. Depending on the degree of the break, the price will vary.

Goalie sticks are also able to be fixed.

As Oulton’s company moves forward he just wants people to know that composite sticks can be fixed.

“I believe people don’t know that they can fix their broken sticks,” said Oulton. “I hope they realize that they can, because it can be extremely wasteful and costly to throw them out.”