It has been knocked out of the headlines recently, but officiating shortages have been among the most-discussed challenges facing the youth sports industry in recent years — particularly through the lens of physical and verbal abuse from coaches and fans.
A startup in the space comes at the issue from a different angle — allocation.
Refr Sports provides unified communication, coordination and scheduling tools for assigners, but also brings gig economy dynamics into play for individual officials and gives operators more visibility into the process.
The platform has raised close to $3M so far, co-founder and CEO Huck Sorock told Buying Sandlot. Refr positions itself as a disruptor in a space dominated by established players like Arbiter that, it argues, rely on antiquated methods and tech.
“Yes, we might have a shortage when it comes to a varsity football game in Texas,” Surock said. “They’re all high-level officials and the games all happen on Friday nights. But a 10U flag football tournament in San Antonio, there’s no excuse for why we can’t get people out on the field. We’re trying to open that up.”
About 10K users on platform
Live in 42 states, Canada, Germany
Officials sign up for free, apply to join assigner pools
Officials can set availabilities, upload certifications, get instant payouts
Integrated background check partnership
Facebook-like communities for officiating pools
Usage-based system; revenue largely comes from transaction fees
Surock, 26, played junior hockey and reffed as a teenager. He found the experience inconsistent and inefficient — assignments 45 minutes away when an open game was around the corner, incorrect (or no) payments, little guidance on how to do the job. He would also pick the brains of other refs and learn his experiences were largely universal.
If the estimated 50-70K assigners in the U.S. were taxi cab companies, Refr originally aimed to be Uber. But the platform has evolved to a B2B model.
Assigners build their own official pool, but officials can be in multiple pools. Assigners, not Refr, set pool standards and are responsible for vetting officials.
The platform also brings added transparency on the league side. Surock said Refr has worked with major basketball tournament operators who send wires in the high five figures to assigners they have never met, taking their word they are dispersing the money and handling tax information.
This is another industry narrative that is more nuanced than typically presented.
First, the NASO and NFHS statistics that initially signaled a shortage are outdated.
Yes, there are still some shortages. But the number of working officials nationwide is rising and has exceeded pre-pandemic levels.
Recruitment and retention remain also issues, but not necessarily ones that can be solely attributed to the physical and verbal abuse of officials — the other friction points mentioned above loom large as well.
Surock said Refr is designed so an official who happens to be in a different city or state temporarily can log into the app, search assigners and try to get added to a pool for short-term work.
I couldn’t help but think of The Good Game as I was reading this section (James wrote it).
Not because it’s a direct comp (though The Good Game offers a platform for hiring officials, among other professionals), but because their Clear2Join portable passport aims to be a single credential that can be brought by market participants to platforms like Refr.
On the marketplace side, may the best platform win. Focusing on assigners seems like a smart move here. But I continue to think the proliferation of software will be a race to the bottom. As Fastbreak AI CEO John Stewart explains, the ones with the best distribution will win. Refr may win on it for officials. That’s the application layer, whether it’s B2C or B2B.
But I also think interoperability and portable data will be prominently featured among the best digital businesses of the future. AI is abstracting away the UI layer, meaning the real business sits in the backend and in the data. The Good Game, in this case, can benefit from the growth and proliferation of platforms like Refr if Clear2Join becomes the credential layer those platforms rely on.
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