Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Here's the big question, how do we live a life? Full of Adventures travel and memories on our terms without being millionaires without previous experience? And without unlimited amounts of time, that's the big question and this podcast will give you the answers. I'm your co-host Tayson Whittaker and I'm Dave Keim and you're listening to the Live Ultralight podcast powered by Outdoor Vitals. Hey, welcome to the Live Ultralight podcast. Today, we are going to be tackling a pretty serious topic. I would say, but I want to kind of preface this. There's a big reason that we want to dive into this. And that's many of you guys know that the owl are similar logo was chosen because it was kind. It's a sign of wisdom and that's kind of wisdom. A big part of that is that we're mOVing into a day and age of very educated consumers.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So this podcast and also the podcast, we released a little bit before this about venture capital is us doing our part to continue to educate the consumers and help you see all sides of your purchases and all sides of your gear. So that you can make more informed decisions. So, today, I've got Brigham and dates here, and we are actually gonna talk about the pros and cons of retail, type stores and direct-to-consumer type stores or online stores like us. So to start off, we're just going to go ahead and dive into retail now. We don't, we don't want to, we're gonna try to be Be very objective with this but I promise you, there's going to be some passion that comes out as we, as we talk through this, just because we do get really passionate about it.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: We're very passionate about the way that we are building Outdoor Vitals, the way that we're structuring things and it's just our firm beliefs, but we'll try to be as objective as we can. You know, if you work for or you have different opinions from what we're sharing, That's just fine. We hope we don't, we don't want to create any offense or anything like that. And you're welcome to, to let us know, you know, your own, your own side of things. If you don't feel like we cOVer them very well. You can always reach out to us or or hop on chat. And a lot of times Dave will see that or Jordan? And they can pass that along and we can address those in future podcasts, but just start, we're just gonna start by diving straight at retail. And some of the pros and cons, specifically, we'll start with some of the cons and then we're gonna kind of mOVe to the pros.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: But the big thing here is, it's my belief and our belief here at the company that selling through retail channels hinders design, it hinders the ability for us to build exactly what consumers want and said, just get you better gear in your hands in the way that you need it. So first starters, we're going to break down kind of the retail space. So inside of a store, typically If a brand like us was to go to a store and try to get our products on the shelves, we have to go through a buyer that buyer is kind of the gatekeeper for that store and a lot of times they're going to they're either gonna say yes or no, or if you've already got a reputation with them, they're gonna start giving you a lot of feedback and that feedback is going to determine, you know, basically what you can and can't design.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So, inside of a store, a lot of times they're gonna want different price points, you're going to want different pricing. Cheers, they have end caps. There's all these different layers of, you know, getting into the store and getting your products sold that. Has nothing to do with the consumer, so I guess, let's start. Let's just start by attacking the design side of things. So Brigham, I know that in school and your own retail experience and background, you've you've had a lot of experience with with learning about some of those. So from a design standpoint, what is it? That makes, you know, selling to retail store, what would change about your position? If we were selling to a retail store, well, most Brands that. It does kind of combined back with the Venture capitalism thing, but retail stores they have to meet price points. They have to meet like price category placement.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So They will. Let's say hypothetically, a brand has spent time developing a product and they tested it and they've done a lot of design and development on it. And it's a very a very good solid product. And then they take that with the rest of their product line, to a retail location meet with the buyer. Well. hypothetically that brand is really stoked on that new product that they've spent so much time and effort on well, that brand. not is not always going to base their decision to make the purchase through the brand. The retail store is not necessarily going to make a decision to go with that brand. Because of the merits of that product. Because what happens frequently is. Will have already slotted a product in that price category. So they say, oh well we already have, you know, a 250 dollar boot.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: or whatever the product is camera or, you know, curling iron, whatever it is like we already have that. So, what does that tell the brand? Well, we need, there's no point in US designing this product and putting all this effort in, we need to design a product that's watered down or that is not really unique because they've got plenty of room in their store for those products. So there's that. Yeah there's there's that Dynamic and there's the dynamic again kind of building off. That last thing. Now you have two purchasers Now, there's two transactions and set of one, which means you've got to build a product that is attractive to the buyer at the retail store location and then the actual purchase or the customer. That's picking up that product. So when you go to design a product now, You don't just look at. Let's make the best product for the consumer.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: It's we got to make the best product for consumer. That still checks, all the boxes that the retail store wants to check and looks appealing to them. Right? Right. And and it's in that buyer. Is that buyer? Very frequently is going to have to make a lot of decisions based on price point and cost and profitability of what you know in their geographical market like oh people just don't pay that for this product. And so and honestly this preferences, right? When I worked in a retail shop, I had different managers, different buying people, and sometimes one of the management. Oh yeah, these sell all the time. And the next guys like, oh no, I ordered those one time. They never sold. I'm never stalking them again. And it was like, it was the same product but like just different opinions. A lot of times it is very like data driven but at the end of the day, it's it's people's choices.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So sometimes you might have a buyer that isn't an Ultra Lite Backpacker and so he doesn't get that side of the market and you may not stock Ultra like Goods. Just because It fit him in his opinions as well. So there's a whole realm of possibilities there that make it very hard from the design side, right? Yeah, I'm not sure if we're going to get into this. I mean it's it's related to design. But along those lines of preference like like we're talking about preferences of the buyer that that retail store has there are. There's also they have to consider relationships with their existing brands. So they are let's say I don't even know if this is the correct terminology but let's say they're a quote Premier dealer of brand K, you know? And brand K does not like them selling. Brand. X in their store because they're competitors are small share right, right.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: And so now, so then, what does Brand X have to motivate them to Design, the design envelope or, you know, InnOVation or anything when there's just no money to be made for them. So that's another Factor. Yeah, and so so that's kind of the con of the retail side. I want to talk directly about kind of the reverse side of this really quick. Before we dive farther into some of these things which is the cottage and direct to Consumer side of the space, where we're selling where we don't have double buyers, we don't have two people purchasing this it. So it goes straight from the manufacturer, the brand straight to the consumer, which is why we saw such an explosive growth. I think in that cottage industry and in the directory, consumer industry, because we're able to design specifically and directly to whatever the consumers want.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: And a lot of times too because we're selling direct, we're able to not have to cut those those Corners, right? So if you're relating to Brigham, You know, if you go into, I don't know XYZ Shoes store company and you're looking at boots, they're not going to want to have, you know, five pairs of 500 dollar boots, five pairs of 300 dollar boots, five percent 150 dollars, five pairs of 100 dollars, right? Like they're gonna maybe stop a couple in each of those categories like maximum but it's it's Space versus Revenue. It's it's, you know, they revenues will typically calculate their retail stores. That typically calculate how much revenue can I generate per square foot of our store. Like, that's a calculation that they literally look at what you know, per foot of the store. What can I get? And then they break it down farther for this shelf space. How much can I get, right?
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Especially in caps, you know, encaps is something we talked about and, you know, and a lot of times what ends up happening is the brands, end up paying the retail store to get put on the end cap. So, imagine that the retail stores are buying the goods from them and then they're turning around and giving them more money to put it in certain spots of their store. It's, it's it's, it feels like a lot of, you know, back, scratching a lot of I don't know, just kind of stuff that doesn't ever get seen or talked about to the consumers and the way that they're getting choice is made for them before they ever got the choice. Yeah. Yeah. I mean there's other things like Along with that placement. You know, the the brand May pay. Or incentivize the retailer with marketing money. That's very common especially all spend a million dollars this year and ads if you put our products in your store. Yes.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Yes they give them almost a marketing budget. Yeah, which anyway and I heard this, too, in the backwards from hearing from different business, owner. That not only do, they incentivize with them, but the stores will sometimes threaten them. But if they don't spend marketing money, they won't put them in the store. So, okay, we want to stalk your stuff. We want to do the deal, but we really need you to spend x amount of dollars a month in advertising, or we're not going to stock your stuff in the future or so, it really can work both ways there, right? Yeah, and again, it's just to say, like this, this can happen. These are, when you have this many factors, you know, these This many things that play. It's very hard for people to go unaffected by all these external influences in their decision making process.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Yeah, so let's let's turn the next page in this, which is to me talk a little bit about the actual sales inside the store. So talking about employees. So something that really shocked me that I learned years and years ago, was about to kick backs that people would get from the brands. Dave, you said, you know, when you were working at a previous employer that you got to experience some of that, right? Yeah, I mean, I worked at an outdoor and we retail some stuff from like, for instance, one of the shoe brands would actually give all the employees pair of shoes and it's actually really smart. I think about it. Like everyone in the store has a particular brand of shoes on and I mean they were really nice shoes and I like quality them so I would have worn them anyway but I think it's Is great marketing.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: That you walk into this Outfitter where people are going backpacking and doing all these trips and everyone has the same shoes on and I think it's A good attention grabber. And then some other Branch, you know, they come in and say, you know, maybe they give a couple pairs of tracking polls to, to the company, to, to use on trips, or incentives, such as you sold so many. Backpacks. And you got a free one or something like that. So the market is very incentivized for those particular things. And I mean I'm not saying a good thing or a bad thing but they definitely push you to particular Brands and products and that product comes back to goals of how much you need to sell. And yeah, that's like that. I get I guess the problem there for me was How many people know that?
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Yeah, like, if you walk into that store and everyone's wearing that shoe, and they're telling you to buy that shoe as a consumer, I would want to know. If that shoe has an extra incentive because that may discredit the amount, it's the same reason. So let me talk about the con of, where is the direct-to-consumer or anyone? Who's working with online influencers? YouTube influencers? Right. You can absolutely just start waving money around and buy influencers. And so one thing that we always try to do here at Opera vitals is we try to just give them the product if they meet our certain thresholds which can be high for and we get emails every day to test their product and putting on their YouTube channel with five subscribers. So if that's you, grow your subscribers, then reach out.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: But I don't say to that like Have a background in like, some of these people are like, I don't know, make a models and they're going camping for the first time and they want to free bag or something like that comes into play. But but, yes, exactly. But like, the bigger thing there is just don't like we as a brand, have to be very careful that we don't Pay people to do reviews. Now, there are some long-term partners that we have that lOVe our stuff, use a ton of it, it's what they would use. Even if we weren't partners that maybe we strike some some smaller deals with, but we don't have this big budget. We just send out, you know, to buy people into promoting us because if you're buying people into promoting us, then the next guy that comes around waiting at more money than the first guy, they change loyalties like that.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: And as soon as they change those loyalties that quickly, then it discredits everything that they that they said before that. And so going back to the retail store thing, you know, my my experience without us, I had a buddy in college who work at a sporting store and he would, he would sell, you know, binoculars and spotting scopes. And he would get Kickbacks. If he mOVed x amount of binoculars or spotting Scopes and we're talking like more expensive stuff, right? So for him at the end of the year, if he mOVed enough products, they would bonus him, a thousand dollar spotting scope or whatever he wanted. Really. And so that became incredibly incentivizing towards towards this employee, right? Not to say that, that he wouldn't, you know, I don't know everything about that, but but just to know that I think is just the important side.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So I don't want to make claims that he wouldn't have, you know, pushed that product or not pushed Out product, you never know. Exactly. But as a, as in as someone who walks in that store, feels like that's, it should be something that you know because Otherwise there can be a hidden agenda and they could be telling you or slightly bending truths, or whatever it is to push you towards a product that may not be at your best interest, but maybe it's someone else's best interest. Another side of that is, is I guess the knowledge that the employees share so. You know, when we design a product, it's it's months. And some, and a lot of times years worth of design, it's only years worth of ideas. Here's what ideas, put into a product, and so much thought, goes into each and every part of that product. And Brigham kind of related this earlier to, you know, kind of like playing the telephone game.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So every time I try to tell that story to someone else, a little bit of a detail, starts to get fuzzy, a little bit of things, get misheard and miscommunicated and the farther down that chain, we go, the less information, the less detail than factual information exists, That's one of the huge Pros. I think with with why we do these podcasts, Why We Do videos is you can hear and why I actually push Brigham to be on a lot of these because you get to hear straight from me and our lead designer the product details. Why we're doing a certain way where we generate our ideas where we gained feedback from our customers and how we came to that finish product. Inside of a retail store and play employees. Learn about the products in different ways. I mean, Dave, when you were working there, how did you typically learn about the products?
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: I mean, for the most part, I would be sales reps coming in, and Speaking on the products we come in and they give you, it's almost like night school different reps come in for different brands and talk about. Seasonally what? What was new any new tweaks? Like maybe like from a generation, wanted a generation 2, just different different things. So that's more. They a brand. Was it multiple brands that they would cOVer? Some reps would cOVer multiple Burns? Yeah, they would have like they're, yeah. Maybe three or four different brands. Same. Say like, say it was climbing gear would be like hard Goods like that or more like backpacking would be more like soft goods, packs, dry bags, and things like that for the most part. I mean, I think too, if you're in this industry, you work. And Outdoor Retailer and Outfitter. Feel like you're always self-educating yourself, as well.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: So, I mean, most people that worked out in 95, plus maybe No. A very broad knowledge of outdoor gear and Brands especially where you work because you were doing tricks as well as yeah. So that was a little bit different where there's definitely we would run trips. and have trips specific gear that was Deaf higher end and only used for taking people out on trips. And, and I think even For that the brands that kind of almost, I don't want to say, they sponsor the trips, but they give it a really good deal. On the gear. So we would take it on the trips and maybe someone never backpack before. And this was the first experience, and they have the lightest pant and the lightest sleeping pattern. The latest, you know, bag, Know they come back in there say hey just something I want to do a little bit more.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: What was that or what bag was that, you know, and they would want to then buy it from our retail store. So it kind of you know, I was like a total process, you held her hand from beginning to end. Yeah. So I think that's really interesting, you know, kind of that nice. Nice School concept. You know, that you're gaining your information from? A couple hours worth of training in an evening and that you might also be gaining your training from someone who's not even. An employee of that retailer. Yeah. I mean I feel like, I don't know. I hate to say, like, be judgmental but you could kind of tell the sales reps that use the products versus didn't use the products. You know what I mean? Like, no. Oh yeah, for sure. Like I it for instance, I don't want to name specifics but but walking around shows or talking with retailers, we're starting to bring on some more retailers. See it too.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: You know, I I definitely see that where this guy has actually bounced from three or four companies selling different products, but he doesn't, you know, I asked him like, you know, when, when did you go back packing last, when did you that's something? I don't know why it's something I've always done. When I go to factory is even I say never used her. One of our sleeping bags ever. Used a sleep, a down sleep. You know, I just lOVe to ask those questions and sometimes I meet these retailers and you know, these these I shouldn't say retailers like the sales reps. The guys that are that are mOVing his product for him and yeah, they're not the consumers either. yeah, I I think that's that's a big thing that, I'd lOVe for, you know, all consumers of all products to to kind of grasp. Not saying that people don't already grasped that, I just mean. You know, whatever it is.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: It's a there's a lot of value and somebody that's telling you about something and but they can but they can speak. Empathetically, they can speak because they they understand what they're talking about because they're a user. And let me ask this, I just got to throw this in here. How many times bring him? Have you received a sample? You know, we're designing a new product, you receive a sample from a factory and you just want throw your hands beer and be like what were they thinking? because and you can tell that, you know, that the sample or in this Factory or whatever, obviously has no idea what the end uses or or why because otherwise they would have never Done it that certain way, right? Like it makes no logical sense to the end user and user experience. But it's just shows up because they're not that person, and that's like a different example, but it relates, the same message.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Yeah, yeah. It does. Yeah, I don't know. like, Just a broaden it out and kind of OVerall like that. in terms of, The design and, and the salesman and, and all that and comparing, you know, a retail brand and Retail as a whole versus directive consumer. I mean, to me, the big thing is, It's in the phrase direct to Consumer. There's a lot more direct it's direct and you can't get more direct than saying direct whereas in retail, there's just so many middlemen or just, it's almost like they're every single person or entity in between, The brand that. Creates the product and the consumer that walks out the door with it. There's just that storytelling effect of. Well how does the sale? The salesman can only say what he remembers from the information session from the rep and the rep can only say what he remembers or what gets passed on to him.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: And there's this chain of the flow of information that's indirect. And I think it's pretty logical and easy to comprehend, how loss of information can happen, it doesn't always happen but just for the consumer to know that that's That's why it can happen. I would imagine that if you are designing gear, that was going in a retail store. You would often be incredibly frustrated, by the story. The consumers here about your product that you design compared to this story that you designed it for, you know, like just like the same plane that telephone game. Like when you finally get to that end consumer and you hear what they hear about your product, you think? Well that wasn't what like that. Oh, it wasn't. The story that I was creating with this product, you know and and going back to just that design team too. I I don't want to discredit retail Brands.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: I'm I'm sure they're doing the absolute best they can to listen, to their consumers, the reading reviews, you know, anywhere they can they're they are trying to create more direct communication. But the hardest part for them is I have a 200 by backpack. It's already in the store, we have a brand history with that. Our consumers are asking for this. I can change the design, but I can't change the price point. Right? Like I can try to add this but something will have to sacrifice OVer here because the price point is the price point and that's that's our slotted space with this retailer. Yeah. It opens up the possibility for something to be compromised. not that, and it's not, it's not personal, it's not that the that brand Doesn't want to do whatever, you know. It's just it's just a decision that is Not completely in their control. Yeah, for sure.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: We've cOVered a bunch of stuff on kind of the cons here. There are others before we want to talk about some of the pros of a retail situation. I would just say back to kind of the design thing. So, just a little bit more about the feedback where we'll how does a brand, get the feedback you kind of talked about the retail brand that on their design. And you know, market research side, they're having to just go and read what people are saying about their product, or get, you know, reviews off of this website and this on online retailer. And again, it's just that Passing on of the feedback. And think of it, broken down into the guy that takes his product back to. You know. I don't, maybe I won't say the name of the store, but a giant retailer of all things including groceries that has the colors blue and yellow. Like like they have a very easy return policy.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: You can take anything back Well, that that's where it ends. Like you take it back and the person they're just refunds your money and of story. Like where's the feedback? Whereas You know, that's on large scale but it's pretty applicable to most retail locations. You have like we have a direct channel in our messaging system. Our slack system where our customer support can can directly send issues with products straight to you break up and, and I'm included in that Dave's included in that but not. But it's I don't know how you can get more direct that directly from the guy who's handling their return, he puts right in their screenshots. Pictures or different things of hate. Is this an issue? Is this a manufacturing defect or was this a user issue?
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: And and or I've heard this a couple times I thought you should be aware that There could be, there could potentially be something here and we get very direct very quick feedback and this place it's just very direct channel to you. Yeah. For sure. I mean because sometimes and luckily it does not happen frequently but you know all respond to the Jordan or Dave and say hey when that gets here, you know, and sometimes it's like you know I can't tell from the picture, I really like to see it in person. And when that gets here, come, tell me and it's a physical transaction. When that product gets here, I put it in my hands and I look at it and You know, and and Jordan's getting the emails straight from the person, the bottom from one place is not getting passed between hands.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: I think that's just, you know, a benefit of a really big benefit to the the design feedback process even if you're a higher-end brand and say you, you don't sell at a big box store but like you're hiring branding. You have your product and all these smaller, you know, Outfitters and retailers and shops and things like that. There's no way you can see the feedback, or even if you went online, there's thousands of shops that maybe sell your product like, say a tent. For instance, you can't, there's no way you can look and get the mathematical models to, to extrapolate that information. That's how it's done. And we'll have to face that at some point, as we continue to grow. We'll have to figure out You know, metrics to pass on that information, you know, like okay, we hear this x amount of times or something like that.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Like that just makes sense but sure but yeah, there's there's layers and layers and layers that you have to sort through. When you're not a direct to consumer or cottage industry, you know, type type seller. So something else that actually just popped up in my mind is is because we're talking about this is the delay in like, fixing potential issues. So with retail they produce a product for that year that like every product is a year before the next year's round comes out, you know, most of the time that products gets adjusted year OVer year OVer year. Typically, you know, they're they can sometimes get the entire Year's worth of inventory and one shipment and then that's getting distributed throughout that year and whatnot. And so that is another benefit is is you know if if an issue arises or I say issue like I don't mean Selling issue or something like that.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: I mean, like, what if just the feedback is they don't like this zipper pole, they just hate that zipper pole but when you're a retail brand you can't change stuff like that. It's on the pictures of its on all of the media you've already generated and given to your retail stores, it's on all of the boxes that are going on the shows. It's on any displays you might have created and so you get locked in to changing things once a year which yeah? That sounds nice, a comment, you know, from a work perspective we only had to do things once a year for for a product that would be pretty nice. But From a user standpoint. You know, if you got a zipper pull people don't like we want to change that as quick as we possibly can. So we can continue to innOVate and make the best products that we can. So just another random kind of thought that I had on that feedback loop there.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: so, let's talk a little bit for a second about some of the pros of retail. And the number one thing that is a massive con. I would say a bad thing for direct Brands and a great thing for retail is the ability to go and see it in person. Debut experience this a lot. Maybe I'll let you kind of speak on this point for a minute and what you've heard and feedback and what that's like yeah. I mean Even for me, like, even how I found the vitals like that, I personally never even heard of the brand. And I was in a local shop here. A sporting. Good shop, that I don't even know if we still have product in there, but I don't think assignments. Yeah, it wasn't. I might have been you represent used for Newland but yeah and I saw a bag in there and just being able to touch and feel the bag of man.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: This bag is really, really nice and never heard of this brand and just, you know, unfortunately for us that I think Is a big time. Whereas if people got particularly, I would say, our products in their hands and it would really help. I think our Brandon, I mean, you've been to some trade shows. What's that like? I mean. Yeah. For working at the trade shows, I would say that's the only time that really our stuff is on display besides, for here in Cedar, but people come up and they want to touch it. They want to feel it. They want to get into the bag. I would say like, your brother, he's the best salesman we ever had pulling people in and have them, get the bag, get on the sleeping pad, being able to try a jacket on. You know, we have hammocks on the display so we are both. I feel like is, is very, very busy at those. Those trade shows. Just a huge disadvantage.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: I would say though for us to not be able to show this in person sometimes because people at the trade shows will go. Like if you're looking for a sleeping bag you're probably looking for sleeping bag and you know they'll walk through this the shop. just the shows and they'll go and look at every sleeping bag and then they get to ours, they're like, whoa, this is this. Yeah, why is this cheaper? This is What's different like how can this you know like I'm putting my hands on it. I can see it man I can't tell you how many people End up purchasing at these shows that, you know, they looked at someone else's bag that has retail map pricing, you know, that retail pricing. And and then they see ours and it's just like a no-brainer for him. It's just like the light clicks on them. And it's, it's very fun to see which on a side note.
Tayson / Brigham / Dave: Just so you guys know, we were actually really thinking of and trying to get to Trail Days, both both PCT and at or what we could this last year, cOVid, kind of hindered that, but we are going to try to get out to some of these shows. If you have interest in US attending some shows, let us know. It's very burdensome on our team to go do shows, but we are going to try to work hard to get some of these Trail. They shows in the future. But, but it is a big, it's a big calm.
