hey guys, just got back from the London Ontario leg of the north american pro championship today. i ended up playing in the london open on saturday but was swiftly beat out in the first round by american jeremiah millar. got to meet and watch a lot of great dart players this weekend but i noticed that many of them were sponsored by japanese companies as well as over 75% of the pro players were using molded flights (either laro or cosmo, and not just john part and jeff smith).

cosmo was hands down the biggest sponsor there followed closely by laro and monster darts. i was warming up on the same practice board as jeff smith and another young cosmo sponsored player and i overheard them talking about their flights and designs for future flights. after i was out i wandered around a bit more and got looking at the different player's sponsors and set ups (which like i said were mostly molded japanese flights) i didn't see any unicorn or target sponsor patches on any of the players either. it definitely looks like the japanese companies are snapping up the majority of the north american steel tip dart players though which in my opinion is great to see and will hopefully be great for the promotion and growth of darts on this side of the atlantic.

i figured some of you guys would be interested in this, seeing as how little is reported on competitive darts in north america.

also forgot to mention, unfortunately there wasn't much for sale or to see vendor wise at the event. despite the amount of cosmo sponsored players there wasn't a single cosmo or monster product to be sold to the public there. it was disappointing to say the least. there were laro products however. i was also hoping a set of the new target carerra darts would be on display (as the local dart shop is the canadian target supplier) but there weren't any of those either, what a bummer.

I go on the Cosmo site quite a lot and have seen they have picked up several North American players - as well as the ones you have mentioned they also recently picked up Darin Young and Dave Fatum and a few others, and Trish Grzesik and a couple of the other lady players. It's good to see them expanding their market - they've also started here in the UK with Justin Pipe.

As far as Jeff Smith is concerned, I like the look of his darts, and I definitely want a set of his flights lol:

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Yeah it does seem like they are taking a hold in the U.S. It could be because they have already built up good relations with the likes of Rob Heckman and Chris White, and they may have spread the word to other players as it seems like Unicorn and Target winmau etc are concentrating mainly on the UK and European markets.

Can only be a good thing for the U.S, players and darts in general that they are getting good interest from the Japanese companies, I think the Japanese companies could pose a threat eventually for the other more established brands, but they really need to sort their prices out to be as competitive.

I think while Target, Unicorn, Winmau, Harrows etc continue to cost half as much (even more compared to some designs) as Cosmo, Bottelsen etc then they will remain the main brands particularly here in the UK, as it all boils down to cost.

Whilst I like the look of some Monster and Cosmo darts, and would like to try Bottelsen Mega Thrusts particularly if they were fixed point, I can't justify paying upwards of £70 a set when I could take a picture of the design I like and have someone like Elven make me a set identical fo £40 or so.

jeff's darts did look nice and he was using his signature purple flights. would have loved to have picked up a set of them at the open but like i said there was no cosmo dealer there.

i understand what you're saying rebel but here in canada, those same cheap darts in the uk are usually more than double the price here plus 14% tax. we'll take my target lewis zirconium for example. $125 dollars canadian plus tax at my "local" dart shop (6 hour round trip drive away) yet i can order them for close to $50 CAD plus shipping and no tax from the uk. now i'm not saying the price of the japanese products aren't a turn off, but when we're already paying over 100 dollars for a set of mass produced unicorn, target or winmau darts, it really isnt that far of a stretch financially to buy a set of cosmo or monster darts in north america. especially after seeing how much they promote the sport in north america, i'd have no qualms shelling out that much for a set of darts i liked.