About Hockey Sauce / How we do this
Buying a hockey stick used to mean opening six browser tabs. Same stick, six prices, six different ways of describing the flex and kick point, and a pile of reviews scattered across every retailer that carries it. Hockey Sauce pulls all of that into one place: specs, live prices, and real buyer reviews for player and goalie sticks, side by side.
This page lays out exactly what we are, how we collect the data, and how the picks get made. No mystery sauce. If we earn a commission, we say so. If a pick is the best, it's because the numbers say so, not because someone paid for the slot.
What Hockey Sauce is
Hockey Sauce is a price-comparison and review aggregator for hockey sticks. Right now that means player sticks and goalie sticks from the brands that actually matter on the ice: Bauer, CCM, Warrior, TRUE, and Sherwood, among others.
For each stick family we put the specs, the lowest current price, where it's in stock, and the aggregated reviews on one page. You compare in one place instead of bouncing between retailer sites trying to remember whether the Vapor was cheaper at the third tab or the fifth.
We track sticks across six major retailers. Four serve player sticks and two serve goalie sticks, so whichever side of the crease you're shopping for, you're comparing the whole market, not one store's shelf.
- Player retailers: Pure Hockey, Hockey Monkey, Ice Warehouse, Perani's
- Goalie retailers: Pure Goalie, Goalie Monkey
- Coverage: hundreds of stick families, with buyer reviews aggregated on a large share of them
- What we don't do: we don't sell sticks, hold inventory, or run checkout. We send you to the retailer to buy.
How we collect the data
We pull prices and stock status directly from each retailer's live product pages, then refresh on a regular cadence so what you see is close to current. A stick that's $40 off this week and full price next week should reflect that, and the lowest-price-first ordering updates with it.
Specs come from the same source: flex options, kick point, weight, grip, blade patterns, age groups, and paddle sizes for goalie sticks. We normalize messy retailer titles, so a colorway, a flex number, or a junior height baked into a product name doesn't spawn five duplicate pages for what is really one stick.
Reviews are aggregated from those same retailers plus YouTube and social, then summarized so you get the signal without reading 200 individual write-ups. A rating built on 6 reviews and a rating built on 140 are not the same thing, and we surface the review count so you can weigh it yourself.
- Prices and stock: scraped live from retailer product pages, refreshed regularly
- Specs: flex, kick point, weight, grip, blade pattern, age group, paddle size
- Reviews: buyer reviews from retailers plus YouTube and social, summarized
- Review counts are always shown, so you know how much weight a star rating can carry
How we pick
The editor's pick and the best-deal callouts are driven by data: review ratings, how many reviews back that rating, current price, and availability. A stick has to actually be in stock and available in the sizes a typical buyer needs to earn a top spot. A glowing 5-star average from three reviews doesn't beat a 4.6 from a hundred.
No retailer or brand can buy a pick, a ranking, or a better placement. The affiliate relationships described below have zero influence on what we recommend. If the cheapest stick is also the best-reviewed, great. When it isn't, we don't pretend otherwise.
We're also honest about where gear is a matter of preference, not a leaderboard. Kick point is the clearest example: low kick favors a quick release for snapshots and wristers, mid kick stores more energy for slap shots and one-timers. Neither is 'better.' It depends on how you shoot. We'll tell you the tradeoff and let you make the call.
- Inputs: review rating, review count, current price, in-stock availability
- Ratings are weighted by review volume, not just the star number
- Picks are editorial and cannot be bought by any brand or retailer
- Where it's down to preference, we explain the tradeoff instead of faking a winner
The affiliate model, stated plainly
Hockey Sauce makes money through affiliate links. When you click through to a retailer and buy, we may earn a commission from that retailer. That commission comes out of the retailer's margin, not your pocket. You pay the same price you'd pay going to the site directly.
Here's the part that matters: the commission does not change our picks. We don't rank a stick higher because a retailer pays a better rate, and we don't bury one because it doesn't. The data decides the order. The affiliate link is just how the lights stay on once you've already decided to buy.
You deserve to know exactly how a free comparison site funds itself. That's the line between a recommendation you can trust and an ad dressed up as one.
Always confirm at the retailer
Prices and stock move fast. A deal can sell out, a price can jump, or a size can disappear between our last refresh and the moment you click. We refresh often, but we're not the cash register.
Treat our price as the reason to look, and the retailer's checkout as the source of truth. Before you buy, confirm the price, the flex, the blade pattern, and that the stick is actually in stock on the retailer's own page. If something looks off, the retailer's listing wins.
And one last gear note while you're here: flex is roughly the pounds of force it takes to bend the shaft about an inch. A common starting point is around half your body weight in pounds, then adjust for strength, position, and how you shoot. Cutting a stick down stiffens it; an extension softens it slightly. It's a starting point, not a rule. Confirm the spec, then go bury one top corner.