Transworld Snowboarding...

Regional Business Round-up for March

With the soft economy and warmer temperatures making for a weird year of snowboarding in the region, it’s looking difficult for shop owners and managers to get a handle n the merchandise planning side of things. Business has generally been bad this year, so retailers are not in the best of positions to determine which merchandise or manufacturers are selling and which are not. They are hesitant to drop any lines based on the performance of this past year.

Many shops are sitting on the fence this season, in that the odd year makes it tough to decide what to drop or add. In East Windsor, Connecticut, Heinz Scheidle, owner of Heinz’s Ski & Snowboard Shop, relays a common comment by saying, “We’re not planning on adding or dropping anything, because nothing is selling well this year.” He adds, “We are happy with our merchandise mix.”

Over in Woodbridge, B-17 Snow, Skate, and Surf’s owner, Michael Blaskey, says, “We will be adding Elevation snowboards. We used to carry the Lamar line, which had great quality products and sold very well. Burt Lamar is now running elevation, so we expect that line to do equally as well.” Blaskey is also adding Jeenyus on the hardgoods front, saying, “It comes out of the same distribution company--Four State--as Forum, which sells very well, and I think the public will ask for Jeenyus due to the success of Forum.” Blaskey is dropping K2 snowboards--they had done well with high end models, but didn’t move on the low-end.

Up in Vermont, Killington’s Out of Bounds Snowboards owner Rick Torrey says he’s adding O’Neill’s softgoods. He says, “The merchandise looks nice and it will fit well in the store and with the overall mix.” He’s also looking to add another women/girls line, but hasn’t found what he’s looking for yet. As to dropping, Torrey is saying goodbye to Option and NFA. “Option didn’t have enough presence on the east coast and we didn’t get enough support from the manufacturer,” he laments. “NFA also didn’t have enough presence in the east, had poor sell-through, and we didn’t see our rep all year.” Ouch.

In Pittsburgh, manager Doug Stone at Ski North says, “We’re not adding any lines this year, but we did add Palmer hardgoods and Dakine softgoods last season and both did exceptionally well.” They are also dropping Swag softgoods due to poor sell-through, while severely reducing the stock of Switch step-in bindings (“the step-in market has died, particularly after success of past few years”) and Solomon (“graphics and colors of boards aren’t as good as the past and technical presentations of bindings are not good”).

Down in Delaware, The Ski Bum’s assistant manager Chris Laughlin says, “We’ll be adding more depth within existing lines to fill the void of lines we’re considering dropping, like Columbia softgoods, Ride bindings, and Burton snowboards. They are dropping Ride softgoods (not selling well, in that Ride is generally associated with hardgoods and people tend to want major brand names) and some Burton bindings (they’re basically going to carry the higher-end models)

Owner Scott Dickens at Glass & Powder Boardshop in Richmond, Virginia, says, “We just moved into a new store with additional square footage, so we need to add lines. We picked up Burton and Option this year and they are doing very well--we’ll continue to carry them next year. We’re also adding Capita hardgoods, a new brand that has lots of hype in the industry and where we have a strong relationship with the national sales manager.”

Glass & Powder is also adding Jeenyus, thanks to Four Star’s reputation and strong endorsement by pro riders like Kevin Jones and Tara Dakides. Dickens also praises O’Neill outerwear for the great price points, awesome looking merchandise, and a fantastic line for next year. Other additions include: 686 outerwear (“a huge seller currently, so looking to expand deeper into their line”) and Volcom outerwear (“great name, good looking merchandise, and good relationship with the sales rep”). They’ll be dropping Airwalk boards (not being made next year), but continuing to carry their boot line. Dickens also said they’ll stop carrying Santa Cruz, because they don’t get much call for them as a brand on the east coast.

Finally, over in West, by God, Virginia, owner Ed Daniels at Elk Mountain Outfitters, is dropping Patagonia because he’s found they’re rude to their distributors and don’t have very professional sales reps. Take that Yvon. “I’m definitely going to be adding some lines, but I’m not sure which ones yet.”

Daniels echoes the mood of many shops right now, as they wait to see how the economy, weather, and boarding industry as a whole finish the season. Then, it’s--’Wait ‘til next year!’