Review — It’s How We Play The Game

‘It’s How We Play The Game’ is a solid business book. Probably because its author Ed Stack is your everyday guy and a guy who laid it all on the line to build Dick’s Sporting Goods into the country’s largest sporting goods retailer in the country.

Stack is Chairman of Dick’s Sporting Goods and was until earlier this year it’s CEO as well. It’s a company founded by his father in Binghamton, NY and one that has certainly seen it’s ups and downs. His father had to close the store once, pay off the debt and then start it up again. Ed started working there at age 13 and had a few near death experiences of his own along with plenty of business fights during his tenure. The engaging part about this book is his candor with those experiences. It cannot be easy to be at the helm of a company your father started only to get over extended and nearly lose it.

Most know Stack’s name for his stance on guns after the Sandy Hook and Parkland shootings. He dedicates the final chapters of the book to these and his efforts to lobby for gun reform on Capital Hill. He goes into some detail about his efforts including his conversation with Pennsylvania Senator Pat Toomey (Dick’s Sporting Goods is headquartered in Pittsburgh):

“Would you support a ban on assault-style rifles?” I asked him.

“No,” he said.

“Would you support a ban on high-capacity magazine?”

“No,” he said.

“Would you support a requirement that everyone has to be twenty-one to buy a gun?”

“No,” he said.

I stood up and thanked him for his time.

Stack walks the reader through the steps he and Dick’s took after both shootings and why they came to the decisions that they did. If you are for or against what he and Dick’s Sporting Good’s did, you can at least understand the why behind their decisions.

So if you are a business student (graduate or undergrad) this is a good read for you. Stack has some great lessons to teach young executives and entrepreneurs. Things like how to handle growth, develop new systems and pay attention to changing consumer habits. But even if you’re not a business student and you’d like a good read about a growing American company, this is your book.