John Bresee

Let’s be honest, no gear will ever equal the pure excitement of a new pair of 1. Keds. That one week when your new sneaks could actually make you jump higher and run faster was the best week of the year. The feeling of added power and performance became my desire—whether the improvement was real or not. I remember running down the sidewalk outside the shoe store and leaping with every ounce of spring I had to try to tag the low hanging signs. Smacking just one finger on the No Parking sign was scientific evidence of the higher jumpability of new Keds.

Twenty-eight years later I’m still making my gear purchases with the hope that they will give me that same thrill. Here are the ones that did:

2. Motobecane Nomad Sprint 10 Speed—Mountain bikes didn’t exist when I was a kid. Everything was a 10 speed…except for my bike. I was riding a three speed Schwinn that might as well have had a flowered basket on the handlebar. My parents never understood that one lame Wicked Witch of the West-style bike could ruin a kid for years. So when that Motobecane was sitting underneath the tree one Christmas, all sleek grey and red pinstriped, I knew my ship had come in.

3. Teva Sandals—That first leap off an improbably high cliff into deep green water was the first sign I was onto something cool. My feet spanked water with a sound like a dominatrix at a Weight Watchers convention. But the souls of my feet were blissfully pain free. I wore that first pair of sandals every moment I was awake until they fell from my feet in worn rubber shreds.

4. Webbing for my first harness—The first time I tied the narrow blue webbing into a climbing harness was a victory like no other. I think it was about three hours and 30 false starts before I got something that my instructor would allow me to risk my life on. Still, I loved the way that webbing looked coiled purposefully in the bottom of my backpack, as if it were saying, “Yeah, I could climb El Cap, I just choose not to…”

5. Patagonia Fleece Sweatshirt—What happened to that heavy thick fleece they used to make? My favorite hung on me like the pelt of a synthetic bear. It’s been with me on almost every hike, every peak that mattered to me, descents, insane powder days, one horrendously bloody car crash and been “borrowed” by two errant girlfriends.

6. Ortovox Dual Frequency Avalanche Beacon—It remains the coolest piece of gear I have ever owned despite its early design flaws. With the Ortovox strapped on, I stopped being a wayward college student avoiding a first job and instead became a backcountry skier.

7. Dynastar 4X4 Big—These skis were a true testament to the power of gear. They added an easy 20% on the top end and made me feel like a god on snow. Ullr, watch out. I regretted selling them the moment the deal closed and I’m still looking for the skis that can replace them.

8. The North Face Mountain Bibs—I was too poor to afford decent outerwear; dishwashing at Snowbird isn’t the bling job that it appears. My sympathetic brother kicked down the crazy $300 to get me the bibs. Forty bucks to hem them for my stumpy legs, and 12 years later they still make the scene each winter. Every time I pull them on I hear Mike Hattrup laughing as he says, “going lobstering?”

9. Kelty External Frame Backpack, Red—I mean bright red like a cherry. I was 13 years old heading out for five days on The Long Trail North when I first overloaded my Kelty. A big block of Cabot cheddar cheese is heavy, it turns out. But the Kelty hung tough. By the end of every day it was like a mill stone strapped on my back, crippling me. But every morning it packed up beautifully. I would hike it onto my back, cinch the waist belt down and feel tight. Canteens jangled off the outside like a one man band; where I hiked wilderness would cede into the background, animals fleeing for their lives. But when I got the groove going with that big pack everything was just alright.

10. Sea and Ski sun lotion—Slapping on the thick goozle with that sweet coconut smell remains the sign that something good is about to happen. You don’t often put on sun lotion to clean the house or scrub pots. Pretty much it means you are heading to the hills or the ocean, and those remain the places where life actually happens.

Popularity: 1% [?]

BackcountryStore.com Gets No Love

LoveSac wins Ernst & Young Entreupreneur of the Year Awards

HEBER CITY, Utah (Draft) – In a lopsided victory LoveSac beat the stuffing out of BackcountryStore.com to become the 2003 Entreupreneur’s of the year. When asked for his reaction BackcountryStore.com CEO Jim Holland said, “Dang.” Co-founder John Bresee’s reaction was “Once again we’re standing in the shadow of Love.”

The upside was that the BackcountryStore.com execs finally had a reason to have a dress code, even if it was just for an evening. They knew the awards ceremony would be a glitzy affair, broadcast to a live audience of 1,200 on abig-screen televisions and attended by the governor–the pair decided that the GORP-centric attire they sell on-line wouldn’t be appropriate apparel in which to accept their award (bahahaha-jokes on them…there’s no award for second place). Bresee and Holland donned formal garb and neck ties for the first time in the companies history. BackcountryStore.com employee number two, Bob Merrill, quickly labeled them as “sellouts” and “corporate suck ups”.

However, when the winners of the respected awards were announced, and LoveSac, a Salt Lake-based manufacturer of beanbag like furniture, was named the winner in the emerging category, the web-based purveyors of high-end outdoor equipment knew they had underestimated their competition. “We got beaned by LoveSac” said a dejected Bresee. LoveSac has been a corporate rocket ship, achieving $5 million in annual sale in only two years of business and signing up new franchisees at a rate of one every two weeks.

“In truth”, said Holland, “I’m incredibly impressed with everything that LoveSac has accomplished and we’re very honored that Ernst and Young included us in their competition. It’s an honor to be in the same room with such a talented and brilliant field of entrepreneurs.

BackcountryStore.com was one of 24 finalists for the 10^th annual Utah 2003 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Awards, which are co-sponsored by Utah Business magazine. The finalists were chosen from approximately 50 nominations, and the “emerging” category focuses on relatively young businesses.

BackcountryStore.com – which was named one of 2002’s top 50 e-commerce sites by Internet Retailer Magazine – sells high-end, specialty gear for backcountry adventures, including skiing, snowboarding, climbing, trail running, camping and hiking. The company was founded in 1997 by Holland, a six-time U.S. National Ski Jumping Champion, and Bresee, former Powder Magazine Editor. For more information, visit www.BackcountryStore.com.

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Popularity: 4% [?]

Ski shops rule. I’m not talking Sports Authority’s generic pile O’ crap, but the real deal ski only ski shops. The kind of shop that smells of funky burnt p-tex, shuts down when summer rolls around and is filled with the pure love of sliding on snow. As a kid I spent hours hanging around Omer and Bob’s Ski Shop in Hanover, New Hampshire; dreaming of when I would get my first new pair of skis (Kastle) or when I would be able to ditch my lame Salomon 101s and get a sweet pair of Burt Bindings (never happened).

Fast forward 20 years and I find myself launching a ski shop. Hopefully the ski shop. For some reason shops on the web seem to lack the passion of brick and mortar shops. Instead of purely focusing on skiing they seem to veer off and sell any damn thing. Wooden summer chairs, fanny packs, and butt ugly one piece powder suits.

Not in this house. At Tramdock we are selling the best ski gear on the planet backed by the best service. We have a room, somewhat stinky, filled with full-on 100 day tram riding fanatics, sitting by the phone waiting for you to try and stump them. When the phone isn’t ringing they are picking and packing boxes or writing reviews of the gear. Our catalog manager hit Alta’s slopes at 6 am this morning and skied 24” of fresh Charmin smooth pow. Alta doesn’t open for another 20 days.

This company is an offshoot of Backcountry.com, the hardcore outdoor gear fanatic’s site. Tip of the Toque to the hippy’s across the hall…we love ‘em but we’re over the patchouli lovefest and wanted our own patch of the Internet. I’d been bitching at my business partner, Jim, for the last three years about this idea. Saying, “we can build the most core ski site on the web…just kick down the cash you motherless tightwad.” It’s understandable that it took him awhile with that kind of cajoling. At any rate, it looks like a goer. By this time next year the Tramdock crew will have several thousand more days under their belts, millions of feet of ‘vert and be running the Best Ski Shop on the Planet: Tramdock.

Pray for snow,

John

Popularity: 1% [?]

1. What skills are important to becoming a writer for any form of periodical?
   1. The most important skill is the confidence to pick up the phone to call an editor, introduce yourself and ask for some work.
   2. Clear and concise article queries…and many of them. An editor should have the ability to choose between a wide variety of article ideas that are topical to the magazine’s mission.
2. I have read that a portfolio is important to maintain to be able to get jobs writing. Do you agree with this assessment? What other tools do you suggest?
   1. The most important tool is patience and persistence. Anyone with reasonable writing skills can get published in a national magazine with enough hard work.
   2. Portfolio…yeah, it’s important to see where a person has been published.
3. How do you recommend that someone gets their start writing and getting published?
   1. Choose a local media in which you would like to get published, study the front of the book “news” sections and other very small segments. Look for areas of the book that have items with fewer than 200 words. Study this area until you feel you understand what the focus is, and then write many articles for this section.
   2. Call the magazine/newspaper and find out who the editor for that section is.
   3. Submit your articles. Ask them for feedback. Continue submitting until they publish.
   4. All submissions should be printed double spaced, edited VERY CAREFULLY. One spelling error and you’re toast.
   5. Include a cover letter that states that you are submitting these “spec” articles and would appreciate any feedback you can get.
   6. Include copies of these articles on a burned CDROM in Microsoft Word.
   7. Throw in a bag of M&Ms with your package…bribery works and should not be overlooked.
4. How do you feel about writing on the Internet? Is it different, similar, easier, etc.?
   1. The Internet is an endless maw of mediocre content. They’ll publish anything. It’s a good way to get started but don’t expect to get paid.
5. What other forms of publications have you written for?
   1. Newsweek (paid insert for US Ski Team)
   2. Powder
   3. Bike
   4. Skier’s Journal (bahaha, I owned this. It’s not a real publishing coup. )
   5. Outside (it was short but they put my name on it)
   6. Utah Outdoors
   7. And a bunch of other mags I can think of t the moment. Lots of gravity oriented things. Most of ‘em are dead now.
6. What tips have you acquired through your experience writing?
   1. See above
7. What resources do you recommend for writing?
   1. Strunk and White
   2. Dictionary.com
   3. McDonalds

1. Has a piece of your work ever been rejected? If so, how do you deal with this? Do you use rejection as an aid to help critique your work, or ignore it? DO you see any value in it?
   1. Not that I can think of.
   2. Lots of aggressive editing and that can be hard. Sometimes the editor just doesn’t understand what you are trying to do.
2. Is there anything else that you feel is important to writing for a publication?
   1. Edit, edit again, edit again…then start all over. Every item that I published was edited at a minimum of 10 different times after we received it. There’s nothing an editor likes more than someone who takes the time to do their hard work. The cleaner the copy, the more likely you are to get published.
   2. Editors will change your work…don’t assume it’s for the worse, talk to the editor and try to understand why they made the changes.

Popularity: unranked [?]

10 years of trying to become the best outdoor gear etailer (written in 2005)

Ten years ago we placed an order from our first vendors: one pair of Atomic Tourcap Light skis, one pieps 457 (pre opti-finder), Life-link probe poles…that’s all I can remember, but it may well have been our entire inventory for the first year. It was peaceful in those days; a man could put the answering machine on and tour in piece back then, knowing that no business would disturb him. Oh how it’s changed.

We began working on a t-shirt to commemorate this anniversary, something for those who have been part of the freight train…and we batted ideas around and one that seemed to stick was a word cloud, a collection of words that resonate with the people in the company, shaped like our venerable goat logo. Here are some of the words that made it and some that didn’t:

Glenn—the long suffering UPS driver who had to endure ever larger piles of gear going out the door. Sandy Brown—the sales rep who first took a gamble on us. Christian—the one man locomotive, don’t get in his way. Breezecom—the wireless network that occasionally connected us to the internet from the sticks of Heber, Utah. Rhett—who answered the phone when the Breezecom wouldn’t talk. ShopSite and BarneyBooks—you were so good to us when we were young, but as in all dysfunctional relationships, someone had to grow up. Patient partners—the enduring constancy of my partner who had the stick-to-itiveness to know that there would be light at the end of the tunnel. Sid Ewing—first developer, ‘nuff said. Spaletto/Lajoy/Uhland—there isn’t a golf swing amongst them, but good partners are hard to find so we’ll keep ‘em. Snake Creek—sucking two-stroke fumes at seven am from the company snowmobile on the way to the Backcountry.com private reserve. Grover—for his honest feedback. OR—for putting on a show in our back yards. Google—Sergey, Larry, nice work boys, we owe you one. Interchange—the hardest working open source platform in the business, why must you be so complex. Sara and Beth—who suffered and celebrated along with us. Dustin—who put up with my half-assed management style at three different companies. He has gear and ecommerce more deeply embedded in his DNA than any other man on the planet. Jeff Carter—who took our cold-call while at the Sundance Company and was visionary enough to see where we were going. Midnight server crashes, Hat in a Bag, Backcountry Bob(s), water filters, snow clogs, Suunto’s, Erin, trekking poles, SnowThug.com, SteakFry.com, bcstore.com, Axis41, Luther, WebSideStory, Cheryl, Sam, and on and on…too many words, memories, people.

Gearheads–the people who work at Backcountry.com, the people who wake up dreaming about gear, live for testing it, and have worked their butts off to make this the company that it is.

Gear Freaks of the world–For ten years we have fought to bring you the finest gear on the planet, describe it in an honest light-hearted way. Ship it to you faster than you thought possible and always, always treat you as we would like to be treated, with honesty and respect. Thanks for your faith.

The Wasatch Mountains—without our church none of this would have been possible.

Popularity: unranked [?]

The risky way is the safe way and the safe way is the risky way

We stood at the top of a line we had never skied. It was steep, three tight moves over small cliff bands, straight line, then done. Fast, fugly, but doable. As always the Tan Farmer dropped in first, nailed it and moved on. Loki followed seconds later, looking kind of spazzy all backseat, no rhythm, another displaced east-coast bumper trying to ski the West. But he was through cleanly, no lost shoes. I was left with Lawyer-boy, a better skier than the rest of us, smooth. Lawyer-boy said, “I have a job, I have a wife, I love skiing, I have a bad back, I don’t need to do this shit, I’ve got nothing to prove.” And then he dropped in and proved the thing that didn’t need proving.

And like a thousand days before I stood alone at the top of a line, fully gripped. Riddled with self-doubt…and then I dropped. And I came out the ass-end of the chute–jacket chattering in the wind—ripping like I was channeling Seth Morrison, alive! Seth would have laughed at this shot but it was great to be me.

It’s amazing how we have to keep relearning the same simple rules; the risky way is the safe way and the safe way is the risky way. There isn’t much difference between dropping that line and taking a risk at work; or committing in relationships, having a child, starting a company, riding your first century. In all cases the easy way, the safe way is not to go, to stay at home, stay single, stay on the couch.

Eddie Aikau was one of the pioneers of big wave surfing. He disappeared in 1978 attempting a 20 mile life or death paddle between islands. Afterwards his friends would look at the surf and say, “Eddie would go.” I think about Eddie, I think about him in the boardroom, in the backcountry, on top of peaks and during especially tense and painful moments in relationships. Eddie would take the risk, Eddie knew that only in risk is there reward.

As I look at 10 years of work on this company, the hundreds of thousands of man hours that have gone into this, I see the fruition of many hard and painful decisions. Every worthwhile thing seems to come through hard fought gains. Appreciation only comes with sacrifice. And thankfully the people at Backcountry.com have had the courage to ask and answer the question of whether Eddie would go. And they do, time and again, hang it/out risk it all, until they succeed.

Every time I have to relearn this lesson I am surprised at myself, surprised that the lifelong battle is always against fear and if I am not consciously fighting it then I am quietly losing to it.

Thank you Edward Ryan Makua Hanai Aikau

And thank you Larry Hamill for writing the inspiring book, Leading the Revolution. I use your ideas to shape my life.

John on the Playa, happy

Popularity: 2% [?]