By: Wingman

This is one of those questions that most serious paintballers will eventually come across. Do you wanna start your own team or do you want to join a team? Well lets start by discussing what it takes to start up your own team.

First things first, you're going to need atleast 5-10 people to start your team with. Once you've found those people that you want to start the team with then you need to ask yourself just how serious of a team you want. A lot of people that start up a team for the first time don't have any clue just how much work it takes to actually start a team.

One of the first decisions you have to make when starting a team is are you going to set a dress code? This may seem like a simple thing, but with todays rough economy a lot of 'ballers can't afford to go out and spend 50-100 on new matching gear. One way to remedy this situation is by setting a certain date that you want your team to be wearing the same gear. And push it to a date close to the end of the season, this allows your team members to have plenty of time to save up. Another thing that a lot of people don't think of is a code of conduct. Any serious team has a list of rules and regulations that their members are required to follow or face penalty. This is one of the hardest things to decide on, because what you'll find is a lot of players don't want to adhere to a strict set of rules. When writing your first rules and regulations, keep in mind the members of your team. Think about what they'll be willing to do, and if you're actually going to enforce those rules to players who don't follow. You can't set rules and then not enforce them, or they just turn into a joke.

One big thing about starting a team is deciding if you're going to collect dues. Most large teams require that their players pay a certain amount of dues each year. These dues can go towards things that the team needs. They can go towards paying for a website, or helping to lighten the cost of a few games during the year. This is one of the biggest decisions you have to make, because if you're dealing with outlaw players as your new team's members, most of them don't like the idea of paying to be on a team.

Now once you've gotten those things taken care of there are a few more things you need to think about. Do you want a website and forums? Do you want to try and gain sponsorships? How many events are you going to play each year? And how many of those events are your members going to be required to attend? Are you going to require that your team has a certain number of practices per year? One thing thing that a lot of new teams do is set way to many goals for the first year. They want to get a professional website and forums setup, they're trying to land sponsorships in their first year. You can't do that. You have to set reasonable goals and work your way up. What I suggest doing when founding a new team is setting up a website with Paintball Carolina. We can set you up with a very affordable site attached to ours, and do revenue sharing for any ads you sell for your site.  Another suggestion would be to have a team meeting with all your new members and sit down and talk about what upcoming events that you want to play. Decide upon 3 events that every member can make in the year. Showing up to 3 big events in a year for a new team is plenty to get your name out there. When it comes to sponsorships the best bet is to wait until your second year, and start with small sponsorships. Don't message a company asking for discounts on 1000+ guns and expect them to take your seriously! It's not going to happen!

Those are just some of the basic things that it takes to start your own team. As you can see there are a lot of things that you need to take into consideration. It takes a lot of time and effort to start a team, and that's the reason that most new teams don't make it. If you're going to start a team you need to have a solid base of players to push off with, and you have to be willing to put in all the time and effort it's going to take!

Now next week we'll go over what it takes to join a team! It's not as easy as just walking up and asking to join. However that would be nice! So come back next week...and we'll cover a bit more!