What's happened to Carlton?

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brennanlord

Regular Member
So I've only just started playing badminton again after I stopped for 5 years and I live in England. 5 years ago at my club it was extremely rare to find a racquet that wasn't made by Carlton, today everyone is using yonex, head or karakal. I looked at Carlton and amazon to get a rough idea of the pricing of Carlton racquets and I was surprised. It used to be that you could get a good performing and reliable racquet for £40 to £70 whereas today you are looking at £100-£150+ for a racquet that I hear lots of mixed reviews about. Now I know new more expensive materials are being used and inflation may have had caused a fluctuation in the price but what has affected the quality?
 
depends on what you want to get out of the racket, i've used a few carlton rackets, there's nothing wrong with them. my favorite is still my vapour trail tour. it's just a wonderful racket where i have enough communication for soft net shots but heavy enough to carry a punch on a smash shot.

even 5 years ago Yonex was still more popular than carlton where i am at so nothing's changed here in california. prices have definitely gone up due to inflation. i remember when i bought my yone isometric 900 tour, it was around $900HKD in 1993 and it was top of the line racket i think. now for a top of the line yonex racket it's around $1400HKD. double the price in 20 years, it's alright.
 
brennanlord said:
So I've only just started playing badminton again after I stopped for 5 years and I live in England. 5 years ago at my club it was extremely rare to find a racquet that wasn't made by Carlton, today everyone is using yonex, head or karakal. I looked at Carlton and amazon to get a rough idea of the pricing of Carlton racquets and I was surprised. It used to be that you could get a good performing and reliable racquet for £40 to £70 whereas today you are looking at £100-£150+ for a racquet that I hear lots of mixed reviews about. Now I know new more expensive materials are being used and inflation may have had caused a fluctuation in the price but what has affected the quality?
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imo, carlton is a good brand....
carlton is from England if im not mistaken, am i right?
no wonder lots of people use it 5 years ago...
but dont know why that's not the case nowadays....
i think it about the marketing strategies of each company....
yonex sponsored a lot of great player, LCW, taufik hidayat, PG, even LD used yonex before change to Li ning.....
that may twist people's mind, "oh, they win titles and they are using yonex, so yonex racket is great", who knows that can happen.....
but dont you think skill and technique is everything in badminton??
but that's called marketing, they try to convince people that their racket is good and it looks like their strategy is a success...
about the price, it's because inflation, just like gundamzaku said...
not sure about the material, but i think there mot much differences....
 
Theres an easy answer to this.. Carlton is owned by Mike Ashley of Newcastle Utd FC fame I not sure he cares a great deal about what it is doing for him its just selling cheap badminton rackets via SportsDirect (although on the plus side Carlton have just started sponsoring Badminton Ireland)
 
carlton rackets are great, and some of them are not cheap, the Razor series as well as the kinesis series are just as expensive as top end yonex rackets. luckily there is one store in the bay area that i know of that sells carlton rackets. i've had carlton rackets since the late 90s so i'm not new to the brand and i am glad to see they have a few great low end rackets for people on a budget.
 
carlton have produced a great no of good racket..so far..

perhaps.. their R&D n marketing budget isnt as big as other brand such as yonex...

in asia... the one brand so far..i stilll..yonex...
 
a|extan said:
carlton have produced a great no of good racket..so far..

perhaps.. their R&D n marketing budget isnt as big as other brand such as yonex...

in asia... the one brand so far..i stilll..yonex...
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I know Carlton isn't big over in asia but they used to be massive in The Uk where the company is based. Nobody used yonex years ago, now nearly everyone does.
 
gundamzaku said:
carlton rackets are great, and some of them are not cheap, the Razor series as well as the kinesis series are just as expensive as top end yonex rackets. luckily there is one store in the bay area that i know of that sells carlton rackets. i've had carlton rackets since the late 90s so i'm not new to the brand and i am glad to see they have a few great low end rackets for people on a budget.
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They used to make great racquets in the past, that's the reason why I still use my Carlton aeroblade Ti Iso. It's just recently I've heard lots of reviews about the kinesis and the razor series being awful. They say that the kinesis frame breaks where the twists are and the razor strings keep on falling off. Now I know I should rely on reviews on the Internet and make a decision without testing myself but there is a great abundance of these reviews. I have a friend who says that the kinesis isn't a good as it's made out to be. The only racquet I have heard good praise about is the vapour trail elite.
 
The strings don't fall out of the Carlton Razors, that was the Prototype rackets that came before the Razors which look very similar. I think Carlton rackets are very good quality in my experience and some of there recent rackets such as the vapour trails are very good looking rackets too.
 
There's no doubt about how good they look they are much nicer looking racquets compared to anything yonex, victor or li Ning have made.
 
brennanlord said:
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They used to make great racquets in the past, that's the reason why I still use my Carlton aeroblade Ti Iso. It's just recently I've heard lots of reviews about the kinesis and the razor series being awful. They say that the kinesis frame breaks where the twists are and the razor strings keep on falling off. Now I know I should rely on reviews on the Internet and make a decision without testing myself but there is a great abundance of these reviews. I have a friend who says that the kinesis isn't a good as it's made out to be. The only racquet I have heard good praise about is the vapour trail elite.
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i guess i baby my rackets so i never break any unless on purpose, but i will agree that the vapour trail series is a way better series than the kinesis. the razors are also nice with the innovative stringing pattern.
 
gundamzaku said:
i guess i baby my rackets so i never break any unless on purpose, but i will agree that the vapour trail series is a way better series than the kinesis. the razors are also nice with the innovative stringing pattern.
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Just out of interest have you ever owned a racquet from the old aero blade or fireblade series?
 
5 years or so ago Carlton started their comeback with the Vapour Trail series (primarily in the UK and Netherlands). Maybe Carlton was so popular at your club because it was cheap (probably being old models and all) and Emms and Robertson were still around and successful. There is no way nobody was using Yonex in the UK five years ago ...
You can still get Carlton rackets at a midrange price today. Aeroblade Ti Iso doesn't exactly sound like a top of the range model ...
I have seen one report on a Kinesis breaking at the thin area and all of a sudden it's rife?? :D
Also the strings popping out was with regards to the Prototype version of the Razor 1.0 and since the actual release version it seems to have been corrected.
 
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brennanlord said:
Just out of interest have you ever owned a racquet from the old aero blade or fireblade series?
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i think i have a few from the early 2000 but i don't their names now since i've retired them. i have to look at my wall and figure the names, but i only remember their handles are fairly shorter than the vapour trail series and the rackets in general are lighter than what i'm used to now. i have to go home to check for the exact specs.

the only carlton i still remember by heart is the powerflo 85g, and it's made one piece all the way to the handle. it is so light to me at the time that i can barely general any power to clear from baseline to baseline, and that was back in high school. :)
 
I had a Vapour Trail Ignite (probably some cheap made up thing by sports direct tbh) and it was nice for a while, but I dno. My taste sort of just changed, it started feeling weird but then at the end I swapped it away cuz something was rattling inside the handle
 
I've got quite a few Carlton's, and they're all pretty good performers.

Started with the Fireblade FX8, then the Airblade and the Powerblade and the Vapour Trails came into my collection.

Probably like the Fireblade's performance above all else, but I have admit that the Carltons just seem to fall short when you pit them against powerhouses like Yonex and Li-Ning.

They're great rackets, but when I want to up it another notch, I'll probably reach for my Voltrics or ArcSabers.
 
This is mainly due to the price hike by Carlton UK when introducing their "innovative" Razor and Kinesis series. I think they have got their marketing wrong as they thought the previous Powerblade/Fireblade/Vapour Trail series have brought them back to life. But that was due to a good combination of lower prices and relatively good performances with those series. Considering that I am paying over 120quids for a racket, I would always go for a Yonex, which, at least, is made in Japan. Carlton will have to be something very special to compete at the price bracket.

By the way, that Newcastle FC owner also owns Dunlop/Wilson/Slazengers as well.......
 
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