Flying Tents and Falling Gondolas

The sale has begun. We have gotten through the first weekend and it was super. Saturday was pretty uneventful it seemed. Maybe the first day I have high expectations of chaos? Anyway, the sales numbers were good at the end of the day, so that part worked. With about 15 staff members including all the Sales Reps, we covered everything easily. Sunday got a little more hairy. I had a number of reps and an in house employee that needed to leave early and so, of coarse, the afternoon was quite busy. Still smooth- but busy. On top of that we had a small gondola we recently installed fall down in the middle of the sales floor with a pretty impressive crash (you can see it in front of the large Mammoth gondola in the photo above). Then the tent in the parking lot took a little stint as a para sail and ended up on Gilman Street. Becky saved it from an untimely end with her lightning reflexes. She was out the door and on it before anyone else even realized it had happened! In the end I was a bit frazzled but psyched. It was super fun day.

It is always great this time of year. The regulars come by to say "Hi". Many don't even need to pick anything up. They just want to come by. It's a bit like a reunion of old friends. To you folks, I think, it means that ski season is upon us soon and it's time to start thinking about it. And it's not just the hard cores. It is always fun to work with all the customers right now. We are selling them toys after all, but this time of year there is a certain anticipation and excitement. You can see it in their eyes and hear it in their voices. It's palpable. Even though they will not use their new toys for a few months, they are really excited about the thought of it. This feeling is contagious so it gets us all excited too. That is when the shop is most fun for us too- when the customers are psyched and we can help stoke the fire.

What a great job I have! Even so, after a week of being pretty hard at it, it was nice to get a day off today. Tomorrow we are back in to organize and get ready to do it again!

The Virus is spreading!

Well the store is prepped for the sale. The reps will be here and we are ready. I can't wait to see all the "regulars" as well as the new customers that will come in. I love my job and this weekend will be as good as it gets. After a summer off it will be "all out" right from the get go. In addition to sales prep I have been scrambling to get a lot of other things done. One is to come up with an order for the new Virus boots from Dalbello. I have had just a few days to come up with an order for the 12/01 release. How many can we sell? I don't know. What I do know is that I had to come up with my best guess today in the midst of sale prep. I did about 8 lites and 10 Free models. Dalbello is great about helping the dealers and I got images and award notifications from them right away. The boot won the Editors choice award from Backcountry magazine. Here came photos of the finished product. Glen loves the final product testimonials. The photo from a few days ago is from the sales rep and the colors were wrong, so he is freaked that it is not represented properly. I can't get it to load correctly so just imagine it to be more of an orange color for now. lol A peak into my world may be the email that our sales rep (will) sent to dealers. It reads as follows:. Labor Day is right around the corner and so is our season. If ever there was a year to generate early sales this is it. To assist in achieving that goal Dalbello is launching the Virus AT program. This boot has been in development and testing with Glen Plake at our Chamonix lab and around the U.S. It is the first AT boot allowing planter flexion. The ability to point your toe creates a much longer stride; every step covering more grounded with less effort. You will definitely be the first to the powder stash. Dalbello builds ski boots. The Virus is capable of pushing around the widest beefiest skis on the Market. The Quadrablock™ Stability Pylons, 2 Piece BioStride™ tongue, Dynalink Rear foot Retention, Alpine designed stance, ID Thermo™ Custom LiteTour (w/Tongue) liner and more aims at giving you the best skiing experience available once you arrive. The Virus is being brought in on 12/1 and that will be it until the spring. This is a 2010/2011 model and will be unchanged. The program carries 3/5/2010 dating . This is the best intro program available on a product that already has won Backcountry Magazine Editor's Choice Award. Take a look at the write up or look on Epic or TGR boards. This is a highly anticipated release. I’ve attached the order form and will be placing orders this week. So there you go. It is here. It seems to be the next great thing. It is outside of our bubble a bit, but if we don't order them they will find someone who will. I think it will sell out and not be re-orderable. How many will we sell? All of them...I hope! If you want one early, you can pre-book now. Let me know!

In the meantime I will be at my sale!

It's crazy like that...

We are almost there and (coincidentally) almost ready. We have been trying to get the shop prepped and have been handling the phone calls precipitated by the ads at the same time. It is distracting to do both. We did about $4500 in sales today shipping skis around the country. That's great. We also got behind in our work. Not so great. Oh well, another long day tomorrow!

I have been like the conductor. My prep work is done so I simply oversee the big picture stuff and let people do their jobs. Mackey (finally) finished the gondola display. Martin has put up most of the sale signage. John is always thinking about improving the shop. He just found a 36 drawer cabinet (that took one half day to retrieve 2 days before the sale). He has also been working on new boot fitting forms and getting the boot department all set up. Jennifer has made all the computer generated sale signage and helped in "all the little ways". She will go to the store for more scotch tape, she will get lunch, and she is willing to come to work 3 hours early in the Miata with the top down. That's my girl! Gary, Becky, and Erle all worked Tuesday. They will be back tomorrow. Tuesday was an "all hands on deck" day and tomorrow will be too. We do what it takes. We will have 7-8 employees working tomorrow to be ready. We WILLbe ready for your visit.

Boots are always interesting when we have a sale. We will have tremendous pressure on our boot department this weekend. There will be 6 benches set up and it will likely not be enough. Out come the folding chairs. The first boot fit of the season and the 6th boot fit of the season will happen the same day for many of us. New shapes are always tough, and so we will concentrate on selling the older stock (which are also SUPER deals) first. We have about 700 boots in stock so we should have something for everybody. The question is how many customers can we handle in the boot department in one day? We shall see...

In the end, our prices are awesome and we don't have a bad ski or boot in the shop. The people will come. The deals can't be beat. Hopefully people will see the values we are offering and make a purchase. The economy is the wild card. Lot's of people will buy skis or boots that that they will live with for 20 years. Others will but skis that they will replace next year- just because. Some will choose to wait as they are worried about the economy. Others will say "what the heck, let's buy 'em!" Either way, I hope we make Lot's of people happy this weekend with our sale. More importantly, we should convince any new customers that this is the place to shop long term.

Overall the store looks pretty ready right now. Everything is about ready for the onslaught!Helmets at 20% off should do great. Clothing at 50% off is always a winner! Poles at a great price- why not? Everything is marked down to "why not" prices so we expect a huge success. Why not have a party on your anniversary? No reason not to! Come on down and join the fun! Bring your checkbook!

Trust me- we will be ready.

It's not just us by the way. The sales reps are also all jacked up! They have been waiting like us and now it is starting to happen. Reviews of the 09/10 skis are hitting. The preseason sales events are happening. Winter is around the corner. They will be getting their first real taste of the 09/10 season this weekend when they work our sale. Also the news stand magazines have their ski test results this month. The skis we chose have been ranked highly. Not that we pay too much attention to the mag reviews... we don't (because we think they generally stink), but they do influence buying patterns, so we at least read them. The reps will be telling us what we did right and did wrong- like they knew all along. No matter, we stock what we believe in. Good reviews or not, the reps will be at the sale. You can discuss the merits of their skis with them personally! All in all it is a great chance to save some dough and have a great time.

That being said, Blizzard is our "new" brand and they kicked butt in the reviews. Elan also did great. Stockli as usual was pretty much absent. I wish they would send their skis to the magazines for testing! Head was less than stellar, but they have not had a "new" ski this year that is we thought was awesome, so that is not unexpected. Head has been mainly trying to figure out what graphics to use on their already great skis. Line is our "cult" brand and we are pleased that they tested well. Fischer got their usual great reviews with the caveat of "nobody takes this ski seriously but it kicks butt!" being a common thread. We will sell the snot out of Fischers this year and EVERYONE will love them.

I truly believe that we have something for everybody that is ideal for their needs. That makes me feel good. Tired. Done for the day. But good. Off to bed...

The Golden Slipper?

In the midst of hectic sale preparations, I got a call from Will, our "most excellent" Dalbello sales rep. The Virus boot will ship this year! The Virus is a boot that is designed for backcountry skiing. This is the first time that a major alpine boot company has entered into "backcountry" boots. They are different than Alpine boots in that they will be "hiked" in, with skis attached only to the toe for going uphill, as well as skied downhill with the heel held down. The boot needs to have some fore/aft movement to be comfortable during the hiking part of your day. Only a few small manufacturers of boots exist for this part of the sport. Primarily because of the lack of options available to the consumers, we have done a lot of boot fitting on this type of boot. Less boot shapes available mean less foot shapes are happy with a stock boot. Hence the flow of these boot owners coming in to have their boots modified.

Why do I care? I care for the same three reasons as Dalbello does.

1)There is a need for more boots in this category.

2)It seemed like there had to be a better way to build them. We always thought so anyway...

3)If you can build a better boot, you can sell a lot of them. And make people happy too.

So Dalbello has been working on this boot for some time. We have seen prototypes, Glen Plake has been testing them, and Allesandro Dalbello himself showed me the Virus' features and benefits and reinforced his companies commitment to building them. Still I was not convinced. I would believe it when I saw it. This was a revolutionary design that would blow the competition away. But the company would still sell a very small number of boots as the market for them was so small. Also the R&D costs would be racking up.

Well they have come through. A year and a half after Mr. Dalbello promised me they would ship when ready, they have indeed done so. Three models will be available. We will stock two of the three. They have a number of advantages over the rest of the competition. It is not our core business, but really aren't we the perfect shop to carry the boot? The backcountry forums have been buzzing about this boot for the last 18 months and people are going to find them and buy them simply based on their merit as a superior boot. Since they only come in one last (foot shape mold) many will need to be modified. Ready for that!

Even though we don't get heavily into this aspect of the sport, I applaud Dalbello for pushing the technical envelope wherever they see a need. Dalbello has become a cornerstone of our boot selection for good reason. They pay attention and they are quick to react. There is something to be said for being a family owned privately held company. Dalbello is the only big boot brand you can say this about. While this is a tough economy and a mistake on my part could be costly, I believe in Dalbello and I believe in the Virus. If you need one come on by...

Here is what I first thought: http://www.backcountrymagazine.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=317&Itemid=64

Today the Virus was confirmed to be an editors pick after they tried it!

The Virus is spreading!!!

The glass ski boot- a Cinderella story

Christian comes in to work the kickoff sale every year. He has been in the industry for a long time and is a master boot fitter. He has also developed into a close personal friend of mine. In 2004 or so, on a typical Saturday sale afternoon, we had four or 5 boot fits going at the same time. Lot's of employees working as well as a store full of customers. Christian finished up a boot sale and was ready to help the next person in line.

Heather had come in with two friends. She was in to buy ski boots. Christian was available and helped her. By the time the boots were sold every person in the shop know that there was some serious chemistry between the two of them. You can guess the rest of the story! Heather gave birth to a wonderful baby girl last week. She is named Catherine. I thought that naming her after the boots would have been cool. What do you think about a baby girl named FR9.5? I guess Christian and Heather didn't like it either. Anyway, congratulations to the three of them! Certainly the best and most important boot fit of Christians life.

Around here we continue to move towards the anniversary sale. Thursday was typical. We re-merchandised the base layer items. I got Jennifer going on sale signage which she will do at home. Goves were received, more helmets came in. Boots were re shuffled as more had arrived. Typical day right now. The bigger picture is going well also. Staffing is coming together. The boxes keep coming and it looks like most of the gear will be re on time.. I don't know where I can display all the skis. I don't know where to store all the back stock boots. The store is looking like a person in clothing 2 sizes too small- bursting at the seams. Perfect!

The web site is also looking pretty ready (I like our site and hope you all do too). The web is becoming a more and more important aspect to advertising, so I have invested a fair amount of time and $$ into the site the last few years. It's fairly complete per my list of changes/additions/revisions. I have a few pages that are ready but not live as I typ these words. I can live with that. They will be on line in a few days. The site will be getting a lot of hits right now due to our sale flier finding customers mailboxes. I also did an "ad" on the SFGate site that will direct them to our web page. Google analytics will tell me the traffic counts on the web site, but in the end the proof is in the pudding. The sales numbers for the reunion sale are what really count. That is the true test.

Meanwhile the preparations continue!

The boxes keep coming...

It was Friday. I had worked all week. I thought I was getting ahead and planned on taking Friday off. I thought Friday would be ok. Ship dates from the manufacturers were August 1st. So I went to up to the Napa/Sonoma region to do a three day bike tour with a few friends. A last Hurrah. We do it every year. Good times. Friday in the Hotel I turn on the cell and there was a message from Royal Robbins. Lot's more boxes. Gave me something to think about the rest of the weekend.

The boxes keep showing up. We keep opening them. John and Martin were both in today. They took the shop's interlocking mat floor apart and cleaned it well at the car wash. It lives in the workshop under and around the stone grinder. They also did a first round of cleaning on the floor that lives beneath the mats. Not a pretty job. Tomorrow I will scrub from hands and knees and put it back down with the two of them. Can't wait.

I worked with the web master today to do some final tweaks to the "new look" web site for 2009/10. Hope you all like it. Let me know! I also got some of the sale info up on the site. Final tweeks to the postcard that will be mailed in a few weeks were reviewed. Tomorrow I will download the mail list, clean it up, and forward it on to the printer. The postcard will be put to bed. Actually it is not a post card. It is the first "folding" ad I have sent, so I am a bit nervous about it. More money, but more room to give particulars about the sale. Better I think? We shall see.

Got a few promo things going as well. They seem to be ongoing and about 20% get implemented. You gotta hear it all and wade through and discard the other 80% however. Royal Robbins wants to partner with some "cross pollinating" in our ads and promos. I am going to give her a few lift tickets for a raffle to start with. No big deal. I have to meet with the UC Berkeley Ski and Snowboard club as well. This is a long term good relationship but is high maintenance since they change leadership every year and there are other entities involved that are sponsors. Destination 1440 around the corner on San Pablo does the snowboard side. We cover the ski side. Works out fine, but finding dates that work for three groups takes a bit more time every year. It adds up, ya know?

Anyway, that is it for today's report. No cool or interesting stuff came in (unless you are into underwear or socks). Tomorrow is another day and who knows what it will bring? Not me- and I own the place...