EP 48 - You Asked, We Answered: Members Q&A

Tayson: So here's the big question, how do we lighten our gear and build our confidence so that we can start living a life full of Outdoor Adventures and memories without having unlimited amounts of time, money and previous experience. That's the big question and we are here to help you find the answers. This is the little trolley podcast power, bi Outdoor Vitals. Hey, welcome back to the Live Ultralight podcast. We are super stoked to have you. And today, we're gonna be going through

Tayson: some questions that have been submitted by our Live Ultralight members and our Live Ultralight closed Facebook group, a friendly with that. That's actually people that are signed up for our store credit membership. They get access to our closed Facebook group, but we're gonna be going through a bunch of questions that were gathered by the team and compiled for me and Brigham to read through and just start answering them. Some of these, we've kind of briefly gone through him just as we

Tayson: barely sat down, and some of them are product related. Some of them are process related, some of them are upcoming things, there's kind of a big variety of different things. We're going to be going through even trip related and different. I don't tactics that we have for certain aspects of it. So should be a fun podcast, we've been having a lot of fun around the office and by fun, I mean, doing a lot of hard work to get ready for a

Tayson: launch, that will be having next week. Long, as I can get this podcast out within the next day. It'll be next week but we have the Ventus study coming out. I did see some questions that are in regards to the Ventus Hoodie. So, we'll talk a little bit about that and just wanted to make you aware of that. Make sure that you are looking for our emails to come through. Because those that do act very quickly on the kickstarter Campaign, which

Tayson: is how we're launching that into City. Those that act, the fastest are going to get the best prices. They're all going to get earlier ship times if those are still available. But there's there's and I think there's one other thing that I'm having the top of my mind. But there's basically just some big advantages to acting really, really quickly on that campaign. So, all right, Brigham, it's time to dive in. How you doing today? Good.

Tayson: This will be fun. Keeping up with with everything in the design Department of Outdoor Vitals. Yep, that's right. Block going on with your kind of design meeting today and a lot of open projects, a lot of stuff going on a lot of stuff to keep track of, but was it so much better though? Absolutely.

Tayson: Yeah, a lot of good things, a lot of good things to come. A lot of things. Good things going on right now. So we're stoked. One of the best things. Obviously, is the sentence City. We've been super stoked to bring it out. So Okay. Starting down the questions. I'm just going to read them straight off this this paper and they did put names on them. So I will, I will call out where the questions coming from. Some of them do seem

Tayson: To repeat. So I'll kind of skip through them. But for starters, chip, cornice is the first question that made it on the list. And I just gotta say, chip for those of you that are in the closed Facebook group, you know, chip My Name, by this point. He's, he's got to be the most active User, it's just very active in there, he's a huge fan. In fact, two days. We got to get a gift box for me chip. So thank you

Tayson: for that. We definitely it. We have been working hard and just appreciate you as a customer and also just you know, supporting us and whatnot. So you get the first question here and we'll just Dive Right In. So what he does a great job in passing in, The design and development, decisions and processes lately. There seems to be a lot of questions on delivery schedules and exploitation of shipping processes would be interesting and show obese commitment to getting product to customers

Tayson: as fast as possible things. It's actually a really good question. There has been a lot going on lately, and it has been quite the process. I'll tackle this in a few different ways, a few different things. So very first off, let's just talk about the shipping delays. There is an element of stuff that we can control. There's an element of stuff, we can't control and there's an element of stuff. We just have to adapt to and definitely we saw some massive

Tayson: delays in shipping that were out of our control. They you know, we shipped off a massive inventory in December, and had some, some shipping delays within that. And then, you know, a lot of things basically that the post office got totally overrun and we did react to it. I think in retrospect it would have a nice to maybe react to a little bit faster, but the problem was it started to get better. And then February hit in Texas, hit and all

Tayson: the stuff that went on down there. And we saw another delay and we were really struggling to figure out what happened and what, you know, why were we seeing these delays? Some packages were getting there in two days, and others weren't there in 20 days, and we actually were able to trace it down to a single aircraft that was stuck in Texas, with a bunch of our product on it. We had to go through a bunch of Hoops, but Tyler, thankfully

Tayson: did that she'll talk about him here in second. But yeah, we were able to trace it down and they're just, there wasn't a whole lot. We could, we could do with that one either. But as of right now, we have adapted, we probably are going to start using the post office a little bit again, because they are a great shipping method, but we did adapt. We started shipping, almost everything UPS. It cost us more and different things, but it was Definitely

Tayson: worth it to get the packages there. Get the tracking clicking and everything that goes on there so that's one element of the shipping delays and everything's like that. But let's talk a little bit more about the processes. We had some very unfortunate things happen with the delays of the Satu Pants and the dragon wall and those ended up literally getting delivered on top of Black Friday and so in a matter of a couple weeks we shipped out well over a million

Tayson: dollars for the product which really overwhelmed our system and our processes typically we would have been able to handle that quite well. but when you stacked, you know our biggest sells week of the entire year on top of Shipping out 6700 thousand dollar 700 plus thousand dollars worth of product that was on pre-sale. It really started to overwhelm us and break down processes. The best thing about Kickstarter. A lot of times though, is that uncovers areas where we need to improve.

Tayson: It shows us like a glimpse of like what if we were shipping out a million dollars worth of product every month? What would need to change essentially? And so we learned things every time we do that and one of the things that we've already adapted to is, we have brought on a new employee Tyler Kandi. I'm sure you'll hear him on the podcast to see him on videos. He's You know, his his title is in the operation side. So he is

Tayson: spending all of his time, on things like that, you know, smoothing out, processes Staffing and, and shipping, and warehousing, and returns, and just making those processes go, a lot more smooth. They can make sure that as we bring people on for Staffing, that the training is crystal clear and everyone is just on the same page and he's only been here. Since the first of March, we had to wait a little while for him to transition out of his old job. He

Tayson: gave them notably a good amount of time just a good guy and so, We've only had them a little while, but I already can see some massive impacts. And so, I think you as customers will see some massive impacts as well. In everything from, you know, shipping getting getting same-day shipping done. Very, very well. You know? And and just every aspect of the shipping process the picking packing but also even down into the customer communication, the warranty side of things or

Tayson: the Exchange things, that's all gonna get better. More dialed faster response times and it'll be here to help us grow. As Brigham keeps launching amazing products, Tyler will be there to hold everything together and and so we're really looking forward to that side of things. Is there anything else that I missed just on that. Operation's cider or part of his question there. If chips question oh thanks. So yeah. I mean we wish

Brigham: we have absolutely wish that a lot of these things, out of our control, hadn't happened and You know, even though some of it wasn't our in our control, we apologize for any unexpected. Wait times of people have been experiencing

Tayson: yeah there's there's no I I would be upset myself if I had a 20-day wait time and I think that it's very common for customers to immediately think that like the company is at fault when a reality like the company could have done everything, right? And it's shipping carrier and it gets tough. But I know a lot of you guys that had issues like that were super patient with us, we ended up shipping out, multiple products to you A lot of

Tayson: times, but we do appreciate your patience with that. So good question chip, we're definitely excited for the operation side of things. And how much smoother they've gotten and how much better and how much, how much more we're in a position to continue to grow and scale, and maintain consistent, processes, and deliveries, and response time. So All right, next question from Taylor MacDonald. This is a trekking pole tent coming. and the answer to that is, Yes. Um, yes. Yes, it has experienced

Tayson: some delays. It has been a thorn in mine and Brigham side. Not from the design side per se. We know exactly what we want. It is literally at the finish line, but we have had some manufacturing things, come up, where we maybe are switching factories to make this all come together and work. And just just delays that we had never foreseen, we'd worked with this Factory for quite a while. And just, you know, covid affected, everyone in different ways and it

Tayson: seems as if this has been a big effect to this specific Factory and so it's good chance that we're going to have to move some things around. We are actively pursuing all of our available options and we hope we have a better update for you. I will say this though we definitely had hoped that we would at least have we thought? First we could have it on the spring and then we have Delays and delays and then we're like, okay, we'll

Tayson: have it out in the summer for sure and then there's delays and delays. And at this point, I'm gonna refrain from saying anything on when that's going to be available. It may yeah I won't say anything but if you're someone who needs something right away I I'm sorry. I really wish that we had something available for you right now but but we don't and we'll continue to work on that as fast as we can. So, Barbara J Smith will you get

Tayson: an aqua color? I can stock with Loft Tech jackets, I love that color for the gals Barbara, we won't be getting the aqua back in. Stock, we actually only ever ran one run of that, I believe maybe two, but I will say that we are prepping for quite a few more color options in the next winter season. So you won't see anything kind of through the summer, but by next winter season, we are hoping to have some new colors out and

Tayson: available. So stay tuned for that. And as you mentioned, you know, one of for you gals, you'll also want to pay attention to potentially some fit changes for the gals. So Matt West. Why the 015 and 30 degree temperature, spread on bags and quilts industry standard seems to be 020 and 40, just curious about the reasoning behind this. I had actually done this before Brigham was here, but I'm going to ask Brigham to speak on this and I don't know, maybe

Tayson: he doesn't even like it. Maybe we'll discover this right now, but what do you think about the temperature spread of zero, 15 and 30 degrees?

Brigham: um, I'd say I I generally would prefer that spread the 015 and 30. I think 15 degree bags. Have really a lot of Versatility. Especially with the center zip. There's a zipper you can unzip it from the bottom or the top. Meaning, if it gets too warm, you can actually release some heat on the zipper a little bit easier.

Tayson: But this other argument that he's saying is like 0 to 20, so it's even bigger spread.

Brigham: Yeah, so, like 0 to 20. That's just a big gap to me. Where is like 0 to 150 smaller spread. And 30. I I have a hard time. Really seeing much. Utility to something. So limited as a 40 degree like even the 30 degree can handle a lot of three season backpacking. But You know, my thought is like a 40 degree is. is very It's more limited in. The time that you can use it. So like there are a lot of

Brigham: places in the US where you could get by many months of the year with just a 30, but I don't think they're as many places where you can get by with just a 40.

Tayson: Yeah. Well, I think we always kind of laugh and talk about this. The fact that we often see like gear loadouts and they've got like, Thermos, Uber, light pad. And they've got a 40 degree quilt, and they've got this and this and they're like a nine pound bass weight and we just laugh for like that's not us. That's impossible. Like 40 degree bag. Like maybe a handful of days in the middle of summer. At least where we're going backpacking, we would

Tayson: be able to use a 40 degree Bagley, right? So often even in the summer months, we're camping into the four in, you know, into the 30s, excuse me, you know, when we're, when we're high elevations. And Super appealing. I would say for us to go very low and into the hotter, you know, 50 degree evening, because in the daytime, those are going to be, you know, 90 degree temperature sometimes. So it's like here in the desert, I feel like with us,

Tayson: 40 degrees is just not very used. And then, I would just say, two on the spread. I the 15 degree increments seemed very useful to me. They're they're like, they're not too far but not too little of spread going from a zero to a 20 or 20 to a 40 like just thinking of 28 to 40. For instance, a 20 degree bag is a great three season bag. But just jump all the way to 40 from there. It seems like a

Tayson: pretty massive jump in my opinion because the 40 degree bag, I'm probably not going to use any of the 30 degree temperatures obviously wouldn't 45 to 50 degree Comfort rating. Most likely and It's just massive jumps. So I like the 15 degrees spread. I think it gives really good use and I said this before, I'll say it again, a 15 degree bag in my mind is is like the perfect degree reading for a bag. You can typically stretch it well into

Tayson: the fourth season even and it's still super useful in the summer months as well. So, Good question. No, Matt. I thought that was pretty a pretty good question, to be honest. Luke dingham for my backpacking. Fishing setup is fly fishing gear lighter than any spin cast gear, my spin cast. A setup weight is 1.25 pounds so one pound and a quarter that's pretty good, that's pretty good. What would you say? Brigham you probably have done more of like a traditional fly

Tayson: set up and then I'll share what I have done.

Brigham: Yeah, most of my fishing is well. 99% of my fishing is fly fishing. So I definitely am not. You know, my fly fishing setup is not one and a quarter pounds but I will, I did a couple years ago out of Interest. I bought this little tiny In casting set and I don't know how much it weighs but I've seen

Tayson: in, I have one

Brigham: like not counting the case that it comes in. It's, you know, I'm sure it's a lot lighter in my my fly rod. But it, I don't know. It just my style. I prefer fly fishing. I would rather find a little stream to fish in and again, like, where I'm at, you know, Western us Rocky Mountains. I just prefer, fishing streams, and even if I find a little Pond or a lake, All managed with a fly rod, but it's definitely definitely not that light.

Tayson: Yeah, I I've never fully fly fished. I'd really like to get into more of the fly fishing side of things. Grew up, you know, doing a lot of trolling with my dad didn't love shore fishing, a ton. And then, you know, when we went to the Wind Rivers, I got set up with a tenkara Rod which is like a Japanese style of fly fishing, but it's Glorified hobo fishing. You just have a really long, really light pole, and there's no real

Tayson: or anything. It's cool. I caught a golden one. When we were up there, bring him call like 10, but whatever. I got up super early to fish without Brigham because he was sleeping in and I go down to this Lake and I fish and I fish and I literally catch one like right after that, they show up to camp and I'm like, I freaking got a golden trout. And they're like, oh yeah, Brigham was pulling him out of the stream,

Tayson: way, back there. Next to our other camp like crazy. I'm like kidding me.

Tayson: And then the better part of this whole story is Darren who basically wants to come on trips just to fish or do something like that. He finally catches the fish like halfway through. I don't know, day two or three. and catches one fish and then like it's taking it off the hook throws this pull back in and catches another fish and it pulls his pull into the water deep deep like we can see it. It was like now no one's going

Tayson: for that in this freezing Glacier of water. Tasty fish though. We did we did eat that fish. It was gonna eat that fish. He worked hard for it. Yeah, anyways my ten Cara set up with everything with like eight ounces. So It depends on what you're going for, Luke. You can get super light by going to the ten Cara type setup. You're like eight to ten. A lot of times when you're doing that, it's very fun setup. I've really enjoyed it.

Tayson: I would absolutely do it again. If the trip was 100% centered around just fishing, it's probably worth it to go with whatever poll you really wish for. You know, go lighter on something else and bring the tool that you really need for the job. So if I like, what's gonna go back into the wind reverse and I was just going for fishing per se. I would look at maybe the ten Kara and a spin cast, or something like that. Or or

Tayson: if I was good at fly fishing, just bring a fly fishing rod, like a full-size one, but good question. Luke, that's, that's kind of where we're at again. I don't know. We don't know what Brigham's weight is on his full setup, but it he carried it in his hand the whole time which was

Brigham: it's old. It's an old school, two section Rod, so it's five feet long and the case

Tayson: it was intense. It's in Colorado. Was pretty sweet though. You just can't reach out as far. Mike Chopper Boyd. Any plans for moisture wicking hiking shirts. I know you have the Cotton shirts already. very,

Brigham: Yes. And you'll you'll like them. Stay tuned.

Tayson: They're gonna be freaking awesome. We'll just put it that way. And yes. Um, we've been able to develop something that it's really cool. It's really unique. You're not going to see you really anything else out there like it and we're stoked for it. So, it's likely something that members will get first access to. So, sign up for the membership if you want to get it at a pre-order discount later in the year. Good question though. Yeah, we'd also we really don't

Tayson: sell those cotton t-shirts for hiking. Those are those are apparel swag type items just as a heads up. So Neil Benson. What is your favorite place to go? Backpacking, what is that? Let's suggestions Do you have for helping make backpacking fun for your kids? Great question. Bring. I bet I know what you're gonna say but let's, let's hear.

Brigham: Yeah, but I there are so many places that I love backpacking. But my My heart has been set since the age of five and a place in Idaho. Really, not sure. I want to the voltage, let's say, rugged,

Tayson: northern Idaho. Is that accurate?

Brigham: It's like South Central. Okay, I

Brigham: know somewhere but between ah, somewhere between

Tayson: between potato filled and potato filled is a mountain range, that's somewhere between

Brigham: Mount Borah and Stanley Idaho. There's a place that has lots of High Lakes and beautiful streams. That's definitely my favorite place to go backpacking.

Tayson: Well, I know you've taken your daughter into their right and some other places. So any tips on helping to make it fun for your kids?

Brigham: yeah, you know, that was that was probably the, the most meaningful and funnest backpacking trip I've ever had was taking my five year old girl, and that's it's so sentimental because this is like how I got into backpacking was, this was a place where my dad He grew up backpacking as a boy and up into adults. So he raised our family and when we were five years old, we were allowed to go on the backpacking trip. And so when I turned

Brigham: five, hype was already there because I missed out on a previous year in my memory, you know, like and all my dad's stories about catching so many fish and and the snow the snow fields, turning pink and blue from this, some kind of algae or you know, something that grows and then the snow frozen over High Mountain Lakes and and mountain goats and all these things and and like, you know, mysterious stories of like quicksand and this place and so, the

Brigham: hype was there for me and so I have tried to Not really push backpacking on my kids but just tell them about my experiences and just kind of just talk about it. Like I love it which is very easy and just kind of build up the same hype about this one place. I felt like it was easier to build hype about like this. This far off, place this this almost vacation and it worked great with with my five year old. And

Brigham: you know she's older than that now. But like she she was just always anytime I wanted to motivate her. I just say like, hey this will be good training for our backpacking trip and and it would light a fire, you know. And but I I guess for, you know, tips, I never kind of like pushed her, but I just Talked about all my experiences in a positive light and talked about how much I loved it and it just kind of she

Brigham: just kind of absorbed it and wanted to do it herself. And then when we when we stepped off on that hike, I I just let her go, it's so funny because she as soon as like, I kind of let her, let her off meaning. Like we we checked in at the check-in box. It's a Wilderness Area and she literally just started running which I knew that wasn't going to last. But it was so fun to just watch her, just start running

Brigham: down the trail and all I had her carry was a water bottle. Maybe that's a tip. Is like yes I

Brigham: carry everything. Just had her carry her own little cute, water bottle and and just made everything fun. Like every little stream Crossing, got her excited. About crossing the next log and pointing out fish in the Stream and just any little thing like that it she ate it up and she loved it. It was a it was a five-mile hike and you know, with a couple thousand feet of elevation gain and she did great. So it's it's awesome.

Tayson: I want to just point out on that last thing that you just kind of were saying there because I I really agree with that. Do everything you can with kids, to make it. Like non, I don't want to say not hard, right? But like So much easier like like the fact that you carried your kids stuff like that. Yes do that. Especially with young young kids, if they're older have them carry a portion maybe but like do what you can and

Tayson: what I, what I thought about when you, you know, with this is like the fact that Brigham ultralight backpacks The Ford Sim options. So whether it's this guy who's like, hey I want to, I want to go fishing, it's like cool, bring the fishing, the tool that you need, even if it is a two-pound fishing pole, instead of an eight ounce, fishing pole, you're afforded to do that by being ultralight with everything else, right? And just like with you, like

Tayson: you can pack two people's worth of gear because you're packing ultralight. So basically, I feel like hacking and living and being more ultralight, affords. You options you options. Yes. Keep

Tayson: some open, right? So I just want to point that out. But yeah, I would Echo that as far as favorite places to backpack, I don't know, I haven't been to my favorite place to backpack yet. I feel like, because I'm always looking at the next place and looking at how cool this range could be or this this. So I'll go with kind of a theme here. I would say but places like the Wind Rivers places like the the high you went

Tayson: as of Utah places. Like that area beyond the potato field, the Brigham goes, they call to me big time because I feel like it's it's so rugged, it's so remote, it's the Lakes, the fish the the scenery the mountain goats the it's something that feels like you're a million miles away and you just stepped back 100 years in time and or more and like I love that stuff. So any place to me that like has Peaks and stuff that are arranging,

Tayson: you know, upwards of 12,000 13,000 feet and it has those High High Lakes. You know, a snow field, type lakes and That's that's my favorite place to be on us like if I'm just picking one yes I love the desert. I love hiking always other areas but I really love getting into the High Country. Getting some really remote rugged places and just Seeing it. So as far as helping kids, that's I kind of touched on that. It's just make it as

Tayson: enjoyable as possible for them. Don't let them get cold. Don't let them go hungry, don't let them, you know, you're gonna get tired per se but don't let them get like so tired. So just really well planned execute it, right? And I really like that stuff to bring was saying about hyping it up. I do the same thing with my little boy. I mean, he's only four years old, so he's, he's Pretty minimal. What I can still do with him but

Tayson: like, I'll try to Hype it up. I'll talk about it. Hey, we're gonna do this, we're gonna do this, you know, for weeks and months ahead of time and just get them, just get him excited about it. And I think that's helpful but again I can't see with the ton of experience but I'm super excited to go out, you know, again this year and I have experience in some of these other areas too. Whether it be just, but all of them,

Tayson: you know, being outdoors related and all of them. I feel like just the hype, the hype aspect is really important and then just keeping them comfortable and happy having a good interactions and just don't push him. Don't push him too hard.

Brigham: Yeah they they sense your own emotions. So like I guess But, you know, my daughter. She knows me very well and so she she can sense and absorb like my passion and my my excitement about every little thing. And so I guess I kind of like make sure to broadcast that to her as we're going along, you know, and just like make everything. Cool or fun. Like point out, all these little things that really to them. It's it's a whole new

Brigham: world and so it's fascinating to them and it's not work.

Tayson: Yeah, one of the sneaky things that I'll do break them is, you know, my kid being four years old, he'll he'll want to watch, you know, say cartoons or whatever it is movies and so, you know, he'll watch those. But then when it's my turn, you know, I'll take something to watch that is more outdoor related and it's interesting to watch, you know, he'll watch, he'll watch sit there and watch with me sit right next to me, watch with me. And

Tayson: yeah, like he's attention span is going to be like a two-hour long movie with it, but he gets fascinated by the animals or, or just different things. And so I think Maybe it's a sneaky thing. I don't know. Maybe I'm manipulating it at a deep level, I don't know, but it is something that I enjoy doing is sharing that passion even in my little bits, whether it be even from a video, and I think of that, that will pay off in

Tayson: the long run. All right, we gotta keep moving here, man. A lot of questions, and we're not even through page one. So, Richard wheeler, has any of the OV team done, any bike packing, with ob gear, has OB looked into bike packing market for me. I'm gonna say that's just a, no, I don't know about for you, Brigham. Nope. We are not experienced bike Packers. I would say, don't plan on us being marketing or whatnot in the bike packing industry in

Tayson: the near future. I see a ton of overlap. I think that a lot of our parallel items will bleed over very, very well. Even like the Vintage City or different pieces. But I would say, none of us are experienced bike Packers and not sure when we'll become experienced bike. Packers seems to be a question. We see though we get a lot of people saying that we should be in that industry. That we should look at it. But we've got a lot

Tayson: of opportunity right in our main industry. So I don't know how quickly will expand this something like that or look at that. But Chip chip Corpus again. Thought of another question Obi has outstanding customer service. This is Chip, always has got it like stroke, our ego and tell us a good. We are so obvious outstanding, customer service and with online purchases, the ability to try in first, just not exist. Meaning if you can't go and try it on, hence, I would

Tayson: guess a larger than a guess a larger than a brick and mortar business would have for returns and exchanges. I'm not sure what I might be reading that wrong. I'm half dyslexic, just so you know what happens with the items that are returned on a side note. Could have fun from the OV tribe donations purchase gear. That could be resold. We can could not be resolved but could be donated, for example, the local outdoor Management program. Essentially asking if we're, what

Tayson: do we do with all the stuff that gets sent back to us? And the answer to that is One anything that we feel like can be repurposed reused, we we have someone who will repair those items and we will resell them on our clearance section. Anything that cannot really be repaired profitably. I will say where we can like, still make even a dollar on it or anything like that. Let's say like, a zippers busted out on a bag that it's just

Tayson: not worth the repair price. We have sought out, different people that are willing to donate sewing time. In exchange for the product and then they'll in turn, donate it. So essentially we've donated it to church groups that will then like, as a group go and have like a soapy essentially and they'll sell and fix the products that can be fixed. And then they'll donate that to refugees or they'll donate it to homeless shelters and things like that. And that's been a

Tayson: great method for us right now. I know that we're currently doing that as well. They're basically, we just kind of look for people who are willing to donate time to fix the products. And then you know, we look for people that are willing to do that and then donate them on because it's kind of like there's not really any money left in this product but we can't throw it away like that's just such a waste. So we would rather look for

Tayson: ways and possibilities to repair it and donate it. So, to your point chip, yes, that is exactly what we do. We look for ways to repair everything and donate things that are no longer sellable or reusable. So, John Clifford any chance, there will be a hoodless option for the Ventura active, hoodie coming soon. To answer that just really quick. I better correct this. He said Ventura, it's actually the Ventus Hoodie,

Brigham: maybe naming that himself like that would be what the hoodless version would be called. Not a bad suggestion, John, it's not bad his name and

Tayson: right now know maybe maybe though I would be really interested to see what people think of it and you know, maybe doing some kind of a version of a shirt, would be a cool option. Honestly, the cool thing about the Ventus Hoodie is it literally weighs less than a long sleep t-shirt. So you get a, long sleeve, t-shirt, weight or lighter, and something that's about as warm as a jacket. So it very well, could be a great fit to do some

Tayson: kind of a shirt version of it in the future. Good suggestion, John Second part of his question though, is it says, I've seen people say there's some squeaking in their shadowlight pack can taste in or anyone else address this. It's a great question, John, we are closely monitoring this. And an interesting thing about selling online is sometimes it's it can I don't think it's blown out of proportion but this might be an opportunity to to learn a little bit about this

Tayson: because it's very easy to comb through comments and see things and see. You know, a handful of people are saying all this squeaks. The squeaks the squeaks we went and pulled the data before this and we're seeing like one ish percent of people are making comments or and or have returned the product we're talking like I think it was like less than 10 people have returned to backpack or something. So very very small numbers have had issues with this we but

Tayson: it is enough that we are actively looking at it. We're trying to pinpoint it. The problem is when they're so few people experiencing the issue. It's been very, very hard for us to pinpoint what they're seeing what their experience because we did not experience any of this in testing and prototyping. We are looking at it and if we if we dig anything up, we'll definitely share it. But also just kind of want to share like definitely, don't be afraid of the

Tayson: pack because it's An extremely small percentage of people that have had the issue and I would, you know, we speculate a little bit about the way that they're carrying it load. Size, load weight. If there's any of these common denominators. The problem is, there's just not enough data for us yet to figure out a pattern between the ten or so people that have made these comments. So, Anything. I'm missing their Brigham. know I

Brigham: just reiterate we're you know like we said we've crunched the numbers we're talking about about one percent so far and however you know keep us informed like that's Kind of one of the advantages of how we do things is like, we want to know. So like I said, we've heard like taking said, we're definitely paying attention. We want to pay attention and we're going to take note of as much information as we can, because it will take a lot of information

Brigham: for us to actually address something. If it needs to be addressed, if

Tayson: you're listening to this and you have experienced a squeak, take a video load up your pack, do it. Whatever it

Tayson: is, that makes it squeak and take a video of you walking hold the phone or whatever over your shoulder. Try to pinpoint exactly where it's coming from anything like that, would be immensely helpful because we just haven't been able to do duplicate it ourselves. So, Appreciate that question. All right. Next question. Any plans so Jack zaigon, if I don't know if I say that right, zygon any plans to have women specific sizing and shapes for your clothes. Brigham.

Brigham: Yes. First one coming up will be next week in the Ventus. The Ventus Hoodie. We have women's specific sizing and fit that I think. Well, we've had many women already confirmed that they really, really like it. So I think that should project out to the whole female audience. But yeah, definitely the Ventus is going to be in women's sighting and fit. And then upcoming things as well, we'll be when specific. I'll sneak this in here

Tayson: for Tops were actively pursuing sizing and fit for women. Just so, you know, we did launch the, the Sawtooth Adventure pants in a women's cut. We we thought we would get a really good turnout of women, just because it seems like sometimes it's that, you know, the the noisy wheel gets the grease or everyone to say the squeaky wheel. And so we we went out on a limb. We did a whole development process on the women's pants and we've launched in

Tayson: a handful of sizes, women didn't necessarily show up for that yet. So just so you know, if you're a woman that's listening to this and you like an exact fit or cut of the pant or shorts shorts will be the same but maybe order it because we did cut back a little bit on the amount of sizing options. We're going to offer for women in the pant namely around the kind of Fringe sizes or links. We're going to go to one

Tayson: link on the women's pants so if you're like a short or a tall you might want to order sooner than later. There's your kind of fair warning on that. David tract. I'd love to wrap OVI on my water, bottles cooler and other gear. Any chance, he'll be making a line of smaller stickers. Keep doing what you're doing, PS. Let me know if you need an East Coast field tester, it's a great suggestion. David I will bring that up and see if

Tayson: we can't grab get a smaller sticker. I agree our stickers are kind of one size right now and we could we could have a couple different sizes for sure. I'm gonna skip this one from Chip because I believe other people are asking this about rain gear up all down. There was one though, the second part of your question here. Chip is about hammock with a built-in under quilt. I believe we've talked about this somewhere but no, we will not do a

Tayson: hammock with the built-in under quilt. The reason for that is the weight savings versus the risk analysis on. That just doesn't pay off for us if you ever damage your hammock you've essentially damaged your installation now, as well, installation is a lot more expensive than the hammock side of things, and So the risk of damaging that hammock, the risk of that to me and when we've ever looked at, I just does not seem worth it. There are some other companies out

Tayson: there that probably do this, that I believe, there's at least one that does this. So if that's something you really need, we might not be able to answer that, but again, it goes back to like a hammock is like, Between 1680 dollars. Let's say for a nice quality hammock, like one of our hammocks, whereas the insulation to go around the hammock is like 200 plus. So if you package those together, and you've got a 250 dollar piece that if you damage

Tayson: your hammock, Doesn't work the same. It's it may may never be the same and if you're anything like me, I've had situations where I've gotten a hammock with something in my pocket or a tool or I've set something in there. And one time I'll say, okay, stop multiple times one time, I did puncture hammock and have issues that and, and eventually the hammock failed. So, that's a good example. I've never had an installation piece fail, but I have had a hammock

Tayson: fail and by combining them together, there's just a high risk of the product going bad. So Moving down, we've got Kevin Frost, next type and diameter of cord included in the Delano Tarp. I don't recall seeing that mention on the website Brigham. Yeah. That

Brigham: should be two point five millimeter. Okay, I'm interested in

Tayson: fastpacking any chance of a Shadowlight type pack that is more of a trail running type shoulder harness setup. Maybe 25 to 30 liters or so. Plans right now. No. I think it's a good idea. Maybe I, I've kind of recently seen a little bit of the, The Craze or different things going on with fastpacking. I think it's very interesting and I think the biggest thing I'd be interested in there is just experimenting with some different shoulder harness setups. That's just

Tayson: a cool Innovation area in my mind to experiment with. So yeah, it's on. It's on the radar. I don't know when it'll be the top thing on the radar, but good question. Logan Davis favorite place. You have backpacked any places you want to visit and will you be uploading and will you upload a map of your Pine Valley trip? Hmm. Logan message us directly and maybe we can get you some kind of information on that Pine Valley trip. We've already talked

Tayson: about places, we like to backpack so maybe any places we want to visit Brigham about culture Logan here.

Brigham: Yeah, I'll throw one out there. That's kind of out of Out of our area Isle Royale National Park. In Lake Superior. I think it'll be really cool to hike that Island.

Tayson: For me. I think I would be very interested in getting up to Banff and doing some some trails around there. That's probably a high. High interest rate and then I'm interested. Hi interest. And then one that I really would like to do and also like to maybe bring some of the team members to as I live for a while. In Malaysia, I'd really like to go back to a place called KK Kota and Hike Mount Dakota. It's a just something that

Tayson: when I was there I was wanted to do and I never got to do it. So now let's specially that we travel back to Vietnam. It's not very far and it would be an easy one to tack on and would be ton of fun to do kind of more of an international hike. So might give something like that a shot as soon as we can travel freely again. So yeah, good question. Tom Muir reindeer in the future question mark. Brigham. You

Tayson: go for it? Yeah,

Brigham: sorry. No. I was just say we are Currently under we're developing something currently, it will. We're going to make sure it's thoroughly tested. We just want to make sure we're confident in it, you know, it's looking good so far. The design process on this

Tayson: is a longer one because we are custom building our

Brigham: fabric. So we're, you know, like like we do frequently we're pretty specific about what we want, and we can't, if it's not available, we try to just make it Make it develop it and so that's kind of what we're doing and, you know, like I said it's good progress so far. It's still still, so working progress, but yeah, making good progress.

Tayson: Well, do some thorough testing on it Brigham's, definitely created a pretty cool design idea behind the fabrics and and what we're making with it, you guys are gonna be really happy with it. But that's it is a ways off. And I mean, when I say ways because of development times production times, because it's such a custom fabric, we're talking like 12 months or something, so not don't expect it in 2021. Carlos. Solano as a trekking, pole chair. Something we may see

Tayson: in the future, Brigham. Trekking, pole chair.

Brigham: I'm this maybe Never Say Never, it's not really on my radar. Not not in the

Tayson: moderate future. Yeah, I think we're using our trekking polls for tents. And if we were to build a ultralight backpacking, chair, not in the near future but we have the connections to do that in the future. I feel like and we've got some ideas floating around the back of our head, but not something we're actively pursuing by any means, but Yeah, it's something that we use and anything we use. We're always thinking of things about it, so it's just kind

Tayson: of there. Matt Randall. Do you have a shoulder pouch recommendation for the Shadowlight or plans to make one? Brigham?

Brigham: Um, we're not really big fans of that. But again, we're, you know, we'll pay attention, we'll listen, and it's one of those things, I guess if there's a huge demand for it, we'll, we'll look into it. It's not anything that's under development or coming anytime. Soon, we could be. A couple years before we do something like that, I will say I did use

Tayson: an aqua clip on our last trip, which is actually first time for me ever using an aqua clip and I I didn't dislike it, I didn't love it, but I will absolutely try to get in and try to a few times and give it a throw test. And you know, maybe that's something that will recommend in the future and when I say recommend typically, for recommending it at something, we'd probably Partner with aqua clip on to to put on our website

Tayson: essentially so that it makes it easier when you're getting a shot like to throw on there or something like that. But Yeah, we're not we're not ones that typically like to put any weight on our shoulders, we'd rather you know, focus on the backpack and it transferring the weight to your hips. But we we made look further into it in the future. So, question and unfortunately, we don't really have a good recommendation other than I've liked the aqua clip in there,

Tayson: they're really cheap and affordable if that if your purpose is to put a water bottle somewhere on there, so Chip again. Let's try saying if you're, if you're on Facebook, you're gonna know chip. We all know chip in the office. So, Sizing of the new dragon will or the excuse. I'm just adding words here, I'm semi. Dyslexic, sizing of the new hoodie, which is referring to the Ventus. As it. As it I'll say compared to the size of the Dragon will

Tayson: or Loft tech jacket. I don't know. Do you have any words on that? I mean, I want to say it's gonna fit right in the line, but I don't know if that really answers any questions.

Brigham: I guess. Sizing, it's

Tayson: Gonna be, alright. It's size like the dragon wall

Brigham: in that. It's I guess it's the size and fit is similar to the dragon will in terms of You know, if somebody is a large, they get a large, you know, when I mean like if you're a double XL, get a double XL. Um that's the sizing. If he's referring to fit, maybe I can touch on that a little bit. It it's designed as an active wear piece. That is also intended to look good in many situations whether they're outdoor and

Brigham: active or office dinner Urban. So it looks very sharp across. The board. so, it is I don't know what else to say, aside from Athletic. But I don't want that to deter anybody and thinking that it's tight, it's not tight, it's Airy.

Tayson: It's not athletic in the sense of how we how we first try it athletic fit. It's nowhere near that we were we when we were like released when we were released, the Loft tech jacket, we release it in athletic cut and that was an extreme athletic cut. This is like a gentle athletic cut per se So I wouldn't be necessarily nervous about it being too athletic. I will say that, you know, that the dragon will probably meant to hug your body

Tayson: a little bit tighter and the Loft Tech's pregnant to be a little bit looser. So, will likely be kind of right in between the two? And

Brigham: yeah, that's a good way to put it.

Tayson: Um, I will say too that that so far everyone that's put it on. Has been pretty happy with it. We made some might we only had to make minor tweaks to make everyone happy with it. So I think I think everyone's gonna be pretty happy with the

Brigham: fifth order your size, for sure. Yeah,

Tayson: exactly. Okay, Jonathan, he asked more about the satellite covered that one. Sheila Corbett. White, as Obi, no longer offer, 30 degrees synthetic lofty under quilt. I was disappointed to have to order somewhere else. Yeah, it's a great question. Essentially this comes back to resources and and that that particular model was not highly demanded model. And so we do still offer everything in a down, the hyper dry down in the quilt section. Sometimes it might go out of stock for a little

Tayson: bit longer in June to seasonality. We don't order it a ton during the winter time frame. But you should be able to find that in down and that is available the synthetics specifically though. The demand just wasn't super high. And moqs and just resources kind of perturbed us from from continuing on that path. What I mean by that is is we aren't a company with infinite resources. We have infinite we don't have infinite amounts of Warehouse people, you know, HR we

Tayson: don't have infinite amount of capital and so really, when it comes down to it, we get a lot more people saying like, hey, could you keep Per se, the jackets more in stock or this size, you know, we're out of the, this specific jacket size or the specific jacket color. We're going to get that five times to every 10 times, probably to every one time we would get asked a question about like these 30 degrees synthetic, Loft, Tech undercoats. It's a

Tayson: good question. I that that's basically the short of it. It's not the sexiest answer. It's not a super like product Focus answer. I will say this though, depending on why you were buying the Loft Tech version of it. I think the you will find a great great performing down version of it. Hyper trade down is extremely. It just performs really, really well with moisture. And as long as you take care of your gear should be pretty good with that. You can

Tayson: all get our bug net, which has a protector on it if you're just really nervous about moisture. Yeah, mainly the demand just wasn't high enough and we had too many other areas that the demand was extremely high. And so we've, we've shifted that. And so we've dropped, essentially we've dropped all 30 degree loft Tech products, Be reordering 30 degree loft Tech products just as a heads up, so good question. I wish I had like a better answer for you if you're

Tayson: someone who's like die hard really wanted that specific product but the long and short of it is, it's it's not that exciting of an answer. So But for those of you guys that are really into that, we will still have it in a down 30 degree model. and then that's That's it. That's all the questions that we have here. Let me just recap really quick and make sure there's nothing I'm missing, but I think that's it, guys. I really that was

Tayson: fun. I enjoyed that. There was actually, I thought this is gonna be like a very quick 30 Minute Podcast. There was a lot of content that ended up covering, so I enjoy that. I don't know if you have any thoughts on, just this format? Brigham or think we should do it again?

Brigham: No, I I like that. I think it was good.

Tayson: Yeah, I think we'll look at doing this again or maybe doing it once every month or two or something like that. I think it's good podcast option to keep people up to date in the loop. I specifically, I know that a lot of times we can get really focus on the products side of things, but I really enjoyed the questions too that are more about Tax tactics of backpacking or ways we do things or things like that, keep that I just

Tayson: education side going. So keep keep all forms of questions coming in but I definitely enjoyed those so just last things to think about right now. Ventus studies coming out next week. Those of you that are members are going to get some extra perks and benefits of that. So you may want to look at joining the membership as soon as possible because if you wait, then and then you won't really get the benefits of joining for the Ventus Hoodie per se. So

Tayson: make sure that you if you want to save a little bit of money, you get a little bit faster shift time, so those types of things, make sure you're either join the level. Try membership or you're still going to get some benefit by just being on our email list. Make sure they're watching your emails next week, very closely. Make sure we're in your main inbox, not in some promotions folder or something like that or that small delay, could definitely cost you

Tayson: a couple months worth of ship time or things like that. We were able to secure a earlier ship time with our manufacturer, which we'll talk about in The Next Episode as well. But essentially you're looking like two to three months earlier on the ship time. If you act ASAP, once we release that. So watch your emails, we're not going to give you the date on here members. Watch your emails because you will get to know the date. But just make sure

Tayson: you guys watch an email box and you act quick on the mentality. If it's something that you're interested in, we're super excited to release it. It's a phenomenal piece and it really has filled a void that I didn't even realize was there. Until we were kind of really, you know, getting into what what the purpose of this product I guess. And starting that design process and ever since I saw it, I couldn't unsee it. So, we'll talk about that in the

Tayson: next podcast, when we are releasing the Ventus, active hoodie. So, stay tuned to the podcast. Stay tuned your emails, and we will catch you guys in the next episode. Hey everybody. This is Tayson again. And really quick. I wanted to invite you to join, probably the best thing that we've ever put out which is the Live Ultralight membership, buying and affording gear is arguably. The biggest reason that people don't get out and truly enjoy nature. You want to go but you

Tayson: don't trust your gear. It can't handle the expected, weather, or temperature ranges, or you simply don't have the right gear in the first place at all. That's exactly why we created the liberal Choice membership. It works a lot, like a simple savings account for your gear. You simply Auto load 10 dollars, with store credit into your account every month, and you get instant access to year-round discounts, you get free priority, shipping and prioritize shipping. By the way, early access to New

Tayson: Gear, the word, leasing or early access to cells that are going on, you're gonna get limited edition gear. You're going to get expert coaching, and access to the obtained inside our closed, Facebook group, which is also gated not, anyone can join this, right? And something very, very cool where you can now get our most vetted, our favorite gear from other brands that we're not putting on the website but members are going to get it at additional discounts and instant rebates. So,

Tayson: If you wanted that new cation, water filter that we've been talking about a ton lately, you can get it with your membership credits and you're also gonna be able to get it with a membership discount and an instant store credit rebate. That's just Auto added to your account after checkup. This membership has too many amazing things to cover. So what I want to recommend you do right now is stop everything. Pause this audio head over to Outer vitals.com forward slash membership

Tayson: to sign up and start building your credit. We're going to release some new products in there really soon at Big discounts. So go sign up today at Outdoor Vitals.com forward slash membership, and we will catch up inside the closed, Facebook group after that we can continue this conversation over there.