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Making it big?

Posted: Mon Dec 30, 2019 12:50 pm
by skidesmond
I don’t want to be a wet blanket for anyone wanting to make it big building skis or snowboards. But it’s an up hill battle. The market is super saturated. Even if you have a great product it’s only the tip of the iceberg. It takes REAL money! Real hard work.

I watched the show The Profit and he was called in to help Ramp Skis in Park City Utah to figure out their problems. The main owner had $6,000,000 of his own money into the business and didn’t own the building. Company started in 2010. They’re out of business now. Their best year they grossed $900,000k in sales. But still didn’t make a profit. Takes a long time to make back $6 mil at that rate. They never made a profit.

I know there are people that are making it. Kudos to you. Maybe share your story.

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Mon Dec 30, 2019 1:38 pm
by enieleni
Curious to hear what their problems were.

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Mon Dec 30, 2019 6:31 pm
by enieleni

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Tue Dec 31, 2019 4:17 am
by Dr. Delam
Just like Warren MIller said, "The best way to make a small fortune in the ski industry is to start out with a large one".

Exactly why I never dove into it. Plus, I enjoy skiing every day and owning a business would definitely get in the way.

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Wed Jan 01, 2020 11:17 am
by MontuckyMadman
I looked at ramp at sia in 2015. They were trash. Not well made at all. Mediocre geometry and strange design choices. Ugly graphics. They didn't seem to have a clear path to 'their' target client base.
They touted a bunch of 'green' tech that was all talk and no fact.
On3p is the only potentially successful group to come out of all this pretty much.
Shaggys still goin but I dont know how much they make.
I heard never summer guys own a very large grow op and diversified in cannabis buis and the board shop barely turns a profit even for all the oem they build. It's a virtually impossible market.
The impending recession should shake allot out leaving just the big guys once again.

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Wed Jan 01, 2020 5:42 pm
by vinman
Even making it small is hard. Every dollar I make goes back into the business. But on a positive note WRS will be fully in the black this spring after my shop upgrade/CNC purchase a couple seasons ago as long as everything goes as planned. It's an exciting turning point for WRS and in the future I should see some profit, but still nothing huge. It does pay for my skiing addiction and helps make it easier for the family to ski. It still will never be a full time gig for me and I'm not sure I want it to be, its stressful enough as it is when you have people paying you a money for a custom one of a kind product. Expectations are high as there is a lot of good competition out there.

I try to keep WRS to a warm months only business but it seems like I push that limit more and more each year. I still don't want to be building skis when i should be skiing. An upcoming heater upgrade for the shop will make getting into the shop in colder months easier. I do tend to limit this to days that the skiing would not be worth it.

This is still fun for me and my product continues to gather attention from print media and has made the cut a couple times during the Backcountry Magazine Gear Test. WRS continues to make progress towards profit as small as it might be.

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Thu Jan 02, 2020 7:28 pm
by skidesmond
I never see myself ever being more than a 1 man show. Trying to put skis in ski shops is expensive, they’ll want 30-50% off the top. It just doesn’t make sense when you start looking at the numbers.

I had skis in a shop a couple seasons ago. It was a good experience. I got a lot of free exposure and they looked great. I got a few custom orders out of it. But no sales from the shop. In the end I’m asking a ski shop customer to pay either $700 for my skis or $700 for a name brand they know and are familiar with. Plus that brand name will be in the bargain bin next season. It’s a very tough nut to crack. Honestly $700 for a custom ski is cheap... I need to work on that 😃.

I love making one off skis. I think if I made the same thing day in and day out I’d get bored and lose the creative drive.

I get tons of Shaggy vids in my FB feed. So they’re making good use of social media.

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Wed Jan 08, 2020 4:36 pm
by sammer
I think ON3P had a lot of help from the TGR community, and was one of the first independents to really to use that media and hype to it's full advantage.
There were a few others that started similarly, Fat-tpus come to mind, that are still going strong. Is PM Gear still around? They had a huge following on TGR at one time.

It's a hard market for sure. I never really bothered to try. When your material costs are climbing close to $200 and a guy can buy a pair of last years Rossi's for $300 on EVO, theres not much point.

Sam

Re: Making it big?

Posted: Wed Jan 08, 2020 7:28 pm
by MadRussian
sammer wrote: Wed Jan 08, 2020 4:36 pm

It's a hard market for sure. I never really bothered to try. When your material costs are climbing close to $200 and a guy can buy a pair of last years Rossi's for $300 on EVO, theres not much point.

Sam
custom skis most of us make cannot be compared to $300 bargain corner skis bargain shopper type of people will never understand

at first I thought "if you make it they will come" meaning if I make quality product. It will be interest at a reasonable price in reality it was not except few rare exception of people who understand. That's where I stop making any effort not to make it big . Forget about that. Not even make it small, not even very small.
Without doing full-blown well thought out marketing campaign(obviously without guarantee results) and I mean FULL BLOWING I don't think it's possible in any meaningful way to make it small

@Sam I have numerous conversations with $300 ski buyers they're not expecting to match that price they expecting price to be much much lower