Felix: Today, I'm joined by Michael Hagen from Hagan Ski Mountaineering. Hagan Ski Mountaineering sells advanced backcountry skiing gear for accomplished skiers who want to accomplish more and Mike is the US distributor and is a six-figure business. Welcome to the show, Mike.


Michael: Hello. Good to meet you, Felix.


Felix: Yes. You told me that you saw an opportunity in the ski market. Tell me more about that. What was the opportunity that you saw?


Michael: Well, I was in the army, and I was stationed in Italy actually at the time and I went on a ski trip to Austria. I met my wife there and her family, and basically I was introduced to ski touring or Alpine ski touring then. I had done it in the army before, but a military version, not a recreational version. Her family introduced me to the sport and I loved it. And I thought this just doesn't exist or just is unknown in the United States and I saw an opportunity to bring the gear and introduce the sport to the United States.
I wouldn't say introduce. It was here, but it was small and it was much bigger in Europe and I just saw the potential for growth in the United States.


Felix: Got it. The company, the Austrian company has been around for a while. Tell us more about the history of it and how you got introduced to the brand.


Michael: Okay. Yeah, it's an Austrian company, it's been around since 1924. It's the oldest ski company in the world. It's actually tied with Fischer which also makes Alpine gear and Alpine Skiing Tour. They were both founded in 1924. It was founded by two brothers in a small village. They were wagon wheel makers and after the First World War, the economic situation wasn't too good and the sports cars were coming in and wagon wheel sales were going to be going down and they skied. They switched from making wagon wheels to making skis out of Ash wood.
Their name was Hager and they were from the little village called Antiesenhofen, so they combined the first few letters of Hager and the first two of Antiesenhofen and came up with the brand name of Hagan. They've been around since 1924. When I met my wife, it's a funny story. Her father is somewhat, well, typical Austrian, a little bit too tonic or a little bit straightforward and he would test at me. He said, "Let's go ski." And he wanted to test me and we went driving up to the mountains, parked at a trailhead. He got the gear out of the car.
We fortunately had the same size feet, so I used his old hand-me-down gear. He got the gear out of the car, put it on the ground, clipped into his gear and left. And I'm like, "How's this gear work? How do I get into these bindings?" Because I had never seen them before they were new at the time, very advanced binding. It took me a few minutes to figure things out and try to catch up with them. It was a little test and the skis that he happened to give me were Hagan skis.
Then later on, when I started getting into racing and I met a couple of guys on the Austrian national team that were on Hagan skis and one thing led to another when I moved to the United States and I wanted to get into ski mountaineering racing. I knew Hagan wasn't available in the United States. Instead of being simple and just buying the skis while living in Austria, I actually asked them if they were looking for a US distributor and they said, "Sure." So I became the US distributor.


Felix: First of all, a super cool story about the brand. I love hearing about businesses from almost a century ago, learning how to pivot back then even. That's super cool that that’s their background. You were interested in doing the sport in the US, you didn't see the gear that you liked when you were over in Europe and you reached out to Hagan and asked them, do you need a US distributor? I'd be surprised if that was the first person ever to approach them about this, or what was the situation? How were you able to pitch yourself in a way where you became a US distributor for them?


Michael: Yeah, it was a simple email. I just wrote to them and told them about my background in the military, skiing, and my wife being Austrian that I had learned about the brand. And I had been moved back to the United States and was trying to get into the sport and I realized there was a lack of quality and competitively priced gear in the United States and asked if I could be their distributor. They wrote me back and said, "Sure."


Felix: Now, what's the-


Michael: It was-


Felix: Yeah, go ahead.


Michael: It was just as simple as that, an email and they wrote back and said, "Yeah, you can do it." And actually, it was pretty interesting because it was entirely based off trust. To this date, we don't have a contract between me and them. They shipped me the first set of gear and without me paying an advance, it was just all based on trust.


Felix: Wow. They emailed you back saying, "Yes, you can do it." Tactically, what happens next? Once you got the okay from them again, this sounds like almost basically a handshake deal. What were the next steps to actually turn this into a business?


Michael: Well, I started really small and the whole market in the United States was quite small. I guess this has been a little over 10 years ago. It's been advancing, the market has been growing amazingly quickly lately. But at the time it was pretty small and it was simply a mere matter of calling up the very few retailers in the United States at that time, or some of them, I didn't reach out to everybody, but especially I started in Colorado. Visited a few of the ski shops that had it because it's very specialized gear.
Most ski shops don't carry it, they're starting to, but at the time there was probably... No, there were maybe six ski shops in Colorado, back then that had the gear. I just contacted them. Either via email or visiting and got a few relationships with a few retailers going.


Felix: Explain that a little bit more. I think most of the listeners out here or listening right now are probably more used to not being a distributor, but either buying and selling product, holding inventory themselves and selling it or creating inventory themselves and selling it. When you are a distributor for a foreign company, you are purchasing the inventory ahead of time. What is the, I guess, logistics of how you transact your business?


Michael: Yeah. At the time, starting off, I would work with the retailers and get orders and I'd try to get the orders in the summer. Actually late spring or early summer and get their orders and then try to make an estimate of how much more I might sell directly, which at the time wasn't much. Then just send that order to Austria and they would ship me the gear. At the time, it was just skis. They didn't have bindings or boots, which they do now. Yeah, I would get the gear, and small, so it would be shipped air freight instead of sea freight.
A little bit more expensive, and then I would break it down, sort it out and send it to the retailers.


Felix: Who assumes the risk in this deal? Does it change depending on, I guess the details of the deal, or in general who assumes the risk in this arrangement?


Michael: Yeah, that's me primarily. Austria assumes the risk if I don't pay, but I assume the risk if retailers don't pay me, if a retailer goes bankrupt, which I had in one case, and I got burned by one retailer. The risk is primarily on the distributor.


Felix: Okay. Then you had these agreements with the retailers. Was it hard to pitch them to get the price into their stores? What was that process like, to get it out into the market?


Michael: Yeah. It's relatively hard to pitch to new retailers with a brand that was unknown in the United States at the time. It is hard, because marketing is pretty key and brand awareness is for expensive gear that's in shops. Yeah, it's hard to get retailers to buy in because they're concerned about their sell-through and it's easier to sell brands that people know than a new brand that they're not so familiar with. Some boutique retailers like that, they like to be able to distinguish themselves from bigger retailers. But it’s a bit of a tough sell. I would say that's the biggest obstacle, the name and brand recognition.


Felix: Got it. Name and brand recognition certainly helps you get these agreements with the retailers, you mentioned in certain cases, the boutique shops want more, I won’t say obscure brands, but brands that don't mimic the inventory of the bigger brands, so that gives you a shot.


Michael: Right.


Felix: What else worked to give you a chance? Were there any retailers that said, "Hey, I want to work with you. I want to take a chance with you, I believe in you." Because of some reason. What was it that you learned about what worked in terms of getting into a retailer?


Michael: Yeah. We had something in common. Backcountry skiing or alpine ski touring for people that don't know, it's quite different from regular downhill lifts or ski area skiing, in that you climb up. You climb up with special binding, special boots that are more mobile, the heel is free, so you can get a walking stride and you have these climbing skins, they're called that help you climb up and then you take them off and ski back down. The downhill part is quite similar now to regular ski resort type downhill skiing. But the climbing is totally different.
It's a fitness sport, it's an aerobic sport. Initially, the people that started selling it, or people like me that love the sport and my first retail sales were largely to other people that I met at races, at ski mountaineering races and they were so into the sport that they started retail shops and I was so into it that I became a distributor. That's how largely I would start selling to a few friends that had started their own stores.


Felix: Got it. Basically everybody in the industry, at least when you started, were already huge fans of the sport themselves, and it sounds like they started businesses, just like you around their already existing passion for the sport.


Michael: Yeah.


Felix: Now, what's your role? Once a retailer wants to carry the products, do you play a role in helping them with the sell through? Do you play a role in helping to market? What's your role at that point to make sure that the retailer is happy so that they will purchase more inventory from you?


Michael: Yeah, and that's something actually that I need to be better at is the help with the sell through or help with the education on the products. Now, most retailers, like I say, are so into the sport, they pretty much know the gear left and right. But when there's a new ski, a new binding, explaining the features to them and explaining how to sell, how to market those features to customers, tell them what this product does, this ski or this binding or this boot, what its advantages are and how it will help a consumer meet their goals.
Educating the retailers is important and something I haven't done as well as I would like to, I need to do better. I've been doing a lot of that on the Shopify for direct consumers, trying to have very good explanations of the gear, but that's always something that can be done better. It's time consuming though, to be contacting and working directly with all the retailers.


Felix: And at this point, how many retailers do you have?


Michael: Not too many, in the dozens is all.


Felix: Got it. Now, you mentioned, of course the Shopify site. At what point did you start all sell directly to consumers? Was it at the same time as wok at the retailers or after?


Michael: Yeah, it was after. Originally, I didn't even have a website. I was bringing in the gear and I guess this was 10 or 12 years ago now. Bringing in the gear and contacting retailers and selling directly to them and then pretty much literally selling to friends and out of my trunk at ski races. We do the race and then have a beer afterwards and people say, "Hey, what kind of gear is that?" "It's a new brand I'm bringing in." And selling a set of skis, maybe in the parking lot after a race. Yeah. Originally, no website at all.
Then I got a website, a very rudimentary Apple iWeb website with no eCommerce function whatsoever and sales were growing slowly to direct sales. But literally people would email me and say, "Hey, I'd like to get a set of those skis." And I'd say, "Okay, send me a check." It was so cumbersome and really small. Then the big switch and when I started direct sales increasing was when I switched to Shopify, I think three or four years ago now. Direct sales to consumers have been steadily increasing ever since.


Felix: When you do have these existing retail relationships, and then you decide to sell directly to consumers, I'm assuming that's a delicate balancing act. Tell us more about that. How do you manage that? I'm not sure if you consider them competing interests, but obviously you're also now becoming a retailer yourself.


Michael: Yeah. It is a balance and I think it's a struggle or a balance at all or most brands. Any brand that is attempting some direct sales is going through, is how to have you direct sales without undermining your retailers. In my case, it's almost required because it's a niche sport and not in that many retailers. Not everybody can find a Hagan gear within 50 or a hundred miles of where they live. Many people almost have to go online to get it. And most of the retailers, Hagan is... We're specialized in backcountry skiing.
We're a small company, but we probably have the widest variety of gear of any brand in the world. We have 13 different skis. We have nine different bindings. We have three different poles. All kinds of different gear and not every shop carries it. There may be some skis or some binding that a customer doesn't have anywhere close to them, so the only way I'm going to be able to sell it is by going directly to the consumer. It's balancing that without undermining the pricing. I have to be really careful about having sales. We have a pricing agreement with retailers in when and how much they can discount it.
Even when I made a couple of black Fridays ago, I had a 24-hour sale. It was a little bit bigger discount than retailers were supposed to have at the time and I heard back from a retailer that said, "Hey, how come you're having a 15% off sale and we can only have a 10% off sale?" You make mistakes like that along the way and you learn from your mistakes and hopefully that the mistakes aren't too costly.


Felix: Right. It makes sense. Now, you mentioned that the traffic and the sales to your own store, your own online store is steadily rising. Where's that coming from? Where's the increase or this steady increase of traffic and sales coming from?


Michael: Well, hopefully it's partly because, well, Shopify is definitely helping with search visibility. There's two aspects to it. One, the sport is really growing, just taking off tremendously in the last five years, especially. It's just boomed in the United States and that was that potential that I saw. People tend to say that Europe was 15 or 20 years ahead of the United States and it certainly was. That was the case 10 years ago and now the United States is really growing. Part of my increased sales are simply because the sport has gotten so much bigger in the United States than it was.
I would say it's five to 10 times bigger than it was five years ago. It's really grown. Then the other increase in sales is, I think largely just through them getting on Shopify and having much more visibility, making it easier for people to review, learn about the products and easy to order. Having Shopify has really helped with that. On the other hand, what I'm fighting is because the market has really grown, the big companies that were traditional alpine downhill skis, three... No. About five years ago, they realized, this isn’t a little play thing market anymore. It's becoming substantial.
A lot of the big brands that people would be familiar with got into the market and because of their marketing, it actually made it much harder for me and retailers. I lost several retailers because they could go with a brand that had million-dollar marketing budgets. And everybody had heard of, because from their alpine skiing days, they'd seen 3000 sets of them on the chairlift. The market was growing, but the big brands were jumping into it just as fast as it's growing or even faster, so the pie got bigger, but it was getting sliced up pretty thin, and it made it really hard on some specialized brands like Hagan and a few others.
Made it pretty tough. I think we've survived and made it through that and are now continuing to grow.


Felix: Got it. You said a couple key things in there. First of all, you talked about the growth in the business, but then also the growth and attention from bigger brands and the struggles that came with that. I want to talk about that in a second, but let's first talk about the growth in the business. You mentioned the sport grew, the SEO, the search visibility was improved as you invested more into your online presence, your website, and then you also allow people to see reviews and leave reviews and learn more about the product. Let's talk more about the website itself.
You mentioned education was something that you found that is important for retailers and also education for you to your customers through your website. Tell us more about that. What do you focus on when it comes to educating your prospective customers?


Michael: Yeah. A lot of people are quite new to the sport. There's some that have been with it for a long time and know the gear, but I would say because it's growing so rapidly over half the people are first time buyers of any gear in the sport of ski mountaineering, and have a lot of questions. Having a good product description, I think really helps. I try to write in the product description of who the gear is designed for, what type of skier, how advanced they are, what their goals are. Then the bindings are complicated, so I have some videos on how the bindings operate.
I need to do more of that. The more videos... That's definitely the future is to have more videos explaining things. Explanatory and maintenance type of videos. Then I use the Shopify blog to talk about what type of gear you would use for different types of trips, hut trips or different types of skiing or racing. Using the blog is also education for customers. And we have 13 different types of skis so for a beginner, they're like, "Well, what type of ski should I get?" Blog posts saying these types of skis are for this type of skiing are really helpful.


Felix: Yeah. I think I've heard this before, too, where the goal really, of any website or any sales process is to remove any uncertainty from the purchase. You are creating a lot of content for the blog. You mentioned creating videos, educating them on what to get, how to use and how to care for it. Do you find that this is what has improved conversions for your website the most or were there other changes that you've made that have made an impact on the conversions and sales?


Michael: Let me think about that one for a bit. I don't really know how to answer that one, I guess. Yeah, I do think having the information and the descriptions is helpful. I think actually what helps probably almost more than anything, especially with... It's not like selling cars and everybody at least knows what a car is for. A lot of people that get into the sport have heard about it, have seen people doing it, but really don't know how it works. Having reviews, I think, customer reviews and testimonials is probably as a relatively small brand in a niche sport. I think the customer reviews and testimonials on...
I have some nice testimonials when people say they got good health. A lot of people just call or write the questions. When they say, "Hey, Mike Hagen can give you good...He's an expert. He spends time explaining things to you." I think that really helps comfort people and make them confident in making the purchase.


Felix: Makes sense. Now, when it comes to the educational content that you're creating, where do you get the guidance for that in terms of what kind of content to create? What kind of questions to answer?


Michael: Well, Hagan in Austria, they provide some information to me and actually I write the US catalog. I write the website, I translate the information from German into English for them, for the catalog. And of course, a lot of it is just my experience and expertise of using the gear myself. We're fortunate to live in Breckenridge in the Colorado mountains at 9,500 feet. And I ski, I use the gear 200 days a year. Literally, a lot of the time just from my back door, I literally walk into the garage, get the gear out, put it on my parking pad and start skiing, climbing the mountains.
A lot of it is just my own use of the gear and then knowing how to explain it to people and a lot of questions. People call and write with questions and from that, I try to understand where the gaps in people's knowledge are and how to adjust that.


Felix: That makes sense. You mentioned too that these customer reviews and testimonials have helped a lot in terms of improving sales and conversions. How have you been able to gather testimonials and reviews, what's your process to make sure that you have that review content on your website?


Michael: Yeah. I use an app called CM Commerce. It was originally Conversio and it's focused on reviews. Also, some follow up email, and the post-purchase email type things, but people make a purchase and I ask them for a review and that posts a review on the product page and then I can take some of the reviews and put them on the homepage. That's what I've been using and that's really been, I think, quite beneficial especially as a less known brand to have customer reviews like that.


Felix: Yeah. Sometimes people skip right down to the reviews first, at least rather than reading the description a lot of times, just to make sure that they're even looking at the right product for them based on other people that have been in their shoes. It's obviously a very powerful goal that they can put on your website. Are there ways that you've found to incentivize or encourage people to respond back to these post-purchase emails that leave reviews on the products?


Michael: Yeah, I actually just started doing it and it's a feature of the CM Commerce app. I have it set up where they automatically get an email, and because of skiing gear, I don't want to send them an email three days after they got it. They wouldn't have had a chance to use it yet. You lose a little bit of that immediacy, but you have to have them be able to actually get the... They have to mount the skis with bindings. They have to be able to go skiing. I wait 14 or 21 days, so they hopefully have actually used it and give a legitimate review. Then I follow up a month or...
I've been doing this more lately. It's a feature to confine those people that haven't given a review and follow up a month or two months later and ask again, and it's automated. I write a review or an email saying how important and how thoughtful reviews are and asking them with no incentive, no monitoring incentive, no discount or anything like that. And I have a pretty good... It’s a niche sport, people love the sport. They're more likely to provide a review of it than maybe I don't know, a consumer product. Right?


Felix: Right. This product, I’m just looking at the website now. It's a higher ticket purchase that you can make through your website, I think between 700, $800 is what I'm seeing. How long does it take for someone to typically make that purchase or do you? Like, from the time that they maybe join an email list or get on your website, how long does it take for them before they make the decision to buy?


Michael: I don't know exactly. I am a one-man shop at this point. At some point, although I'm not actually sure how much I want to grow or how much I want to keep it a one-man shop. I'm not expert at analytics and so forth. Once they get on the website, I think purchases are relatively quick in that people have been exposed to the sport. They know they want it, so they're only comparing it to brands rather than products. Once they get on the shop, I think their purchase intent is pretty high and it's just, hopefully I get them to purchase from me instead of somebody else.
They've already decided to get something and hopefully I give them the answers and provide them product that they want to get.


Felix: Yeah. It sounds like you're a one-man shop, so you probably interact a lot with the customers, qualitatively speaking. Are there certain things that you found that get them over the edge or are there certain questions that typically will block them from making a purchase that once you got an answer for them they're ready to buy?


Michael: Yeah. I think the biggest question or hurdle for a lot of people is that they just don't know what type of ski and type of binding to get, and this is talking to the new people which is a lot of people because the sport is growing. They're just uncertain. They've seen all kinds of different gear and the gear that tends to be marketed in the ski films, on the Warren Miller films in the highlight reels is the people jumping off a hundred foot cliffs. That's the sexy stuff and sex sells, and a lot of people have questions on, do they need that type of gear?
And actually, I think some of the retailers in the market is disserving people because 98% of people don't jump off a hundred foot cliffs, they do different types of skiing. They don't need that big, heavy gear. My job, because we don't sell that type of gear, we sell lighter, more fitness oriented gear. We get into that, but our focus and our heritage is on slightly narrower skis, Austrian style skiing for good skiers that know how to carve. Trying to convince people that our product, which is narrower and a little bit more specific is the right product for them.
A lot of people come to me and say, "Hey, I think I need a ski that's 120 millimeters wide. Why should I buy one that's 70?" They think that it's too hard to ski on it. I have to explain the advantages of a lighter ski that is easier to climb on. That takes some time and I can see the wheels turning in people's minds when I'm speaking to them in person or on the phone. There's a certain skepticism because all they see in the movies is this other type of gear and here I am trying to convince them that that's really not appropriate and the preconceived notions are hard to overcome.


Felix: Yeah. That's a good point about your customers are coming in with these incorrect beliefs on what they need based on what they've seen so far, especially if they are newer customers to the category or to the sport in your case. What do you do then in those situations where they're coming in and thinking that they need something else that you don't provide, because you don't believe in just selling that particular product to them. How do you get them to see it, I guess, the right way or the way that you think makes the most sense for them?


Michael: Right. I'm just really honest with people and I'll lose some customers because it's not what they want to hear. I don't sell people what they want to buy. If somebody has gone down the wrong track, instead of just saying, "Okay, here's that gear, go ahead and buy it." I'll try to have the conversation with them first and I don't convince some people. That's where I can distinguish myself, I think from retailers who have more time pressure, they've got to move product, so if people come in with preconceived idea of what they want to get, the retailer is fine to say, "Okay, give me your credit card."
That's not how I deal. I try to have the discussion with them and really examine what they want, what they're going to be using it for, talk about their skill levels, and then explain why their preconceived idea may not really be matching with what is best for them. And some people I can't convince, I see it. I can see it in their eyes, or I can hear it in their voice.


Felix: Yeah. Certainly better than having unhappy customers, especially when you don't need to, like you said, you don't have that urgency to sell through as much as a retailer that has significant overhead costs. You mentioned earlier about how the sport is growing. You mentioned this a couple of times. The sport is growing, but one of the big issues is that now you're getting the attention, the big giants, the big brands are raring their heads and looking at the industry, the niche that you're in. How do you find a niche inside this, as the competitors are moving in and to survive that the big brands that are moving in?


Michael: Yeah. I try to do it through a website, on the website with just discussion of the brand and the heritage, and in this fast moving social media and marketing driven world, I don't think tradition is a huge selling point for most people for a lot of people, but we have it and I still highlight it. I try to highlight expertise and authenticism and... You’re going to let me think. I lost my train of thought there. Then on the website, I don't try to pretend that I'm a big brand. I don't try to pretend I'm a huge brand with a marketing department and all that.
I use the first person pronoun on the website a lot. I say, "This is what I recommend." Or, "I think this is..." And I talk about my personal experience and let people know. I put my phone number and my email address on the website all over the place and say, "You can call on me and when you call, you're going to get me, you're not going to get a marketing person to some call center or something." The personal service and expertise is quite on twice sell or sale, but the highlight is different from the big brands.


Felix: Right. One side of the coin, you are a smaller brand, smaller company, one person, business, but on the other side coin, you use that to your advantage by showing that there's a personal touch to it, rather than a big corporate brand that likely has hundreds of people working for them and doesn't have as much of an intimate or personal touch to the business. Clearly a very seasonal business.


Michael: Yeah.


Felix: Tell us more about, right now, we're in the off peak season, I believe. What are you doing as your gear up towards or not gear up, but what do you typically spend your time doing during the off peak season to prepare for the peak sale season for you?


Michael: Yeah, it is very seasonal. My website traffic now is at about its lowest point and my sales are low, although surprisingly, I was having sales in May and June even, and I've had a few in July but it's finally gotten pretty slow. Yeah, it's 10 times busier in January than it is in July. And I guess hadn't said it, but this has been, it's not a hobby job, but it's a side job. I also coach endurance athletes, including ski mountaineering racers. Fortunately, I coach a lot of triathletes and that's busiest in the summer and quietest in the winter. They offset and that allows me to get that balance a little better.
In the summer, I'm preparing for the winter, I'm updating the website, getting the new gear put on the website. Experiment with new apps or new software. Then the season kicks off in September, October. My gear typically arrives in October and that's when I get busiest. Then through the winter, you're dealing with retailers or direct sales and then starting to sell for the following winter starts around January already. I have to develop price sheets and descriptions of the new gear and send that out to retailers, try to get the retailer orders.
January through April, I'm working with retailers and then I switch in May and June to starting to prepare the website and that the things for the fall.


Felix: Got it. You mentioned that you spend time on improving the website during this time, too and you mentioned so far too you use CM Commerce for the reviews. Are there any other apps that you recommend or that you use to help run and power the business?


Michael: Yeah. There's a few. I've used one. I purchased it a while ago called a Fan fully Automated Marketing, and it was very simple. Basically they take a product and create a real quick email and as a one-man shop that helped. I am now switching over more back to CM Commerce for the emails. They’ve introduced some new features where they basically to do the same thing. They'll pull a product up out of my product listing and I have to create a template first with my brand colors and all that, but they more or less automate an email and then I can edit it and then send it.
Of course, I don't send anything in July or August. I think that would be regarded as spam if I’m trying to send people emails about skis in July or August. I prepare those, or I will be preparing these now to send a later. Yeah, CM Commerce for email is helpful, and I'm moving to that. It was a pretty difficult switch because I had been using Mailchimp and still haven't completed the conversion, but I'm happy with that so far. I use an app called Make an Offer and it is what it is. There's a little pop up when they're on a product, it's a little time delayed and they can make their own offer on a product.
It might be a ski and they can offer, instead of $700, they can offer $500. I tend to use that for older gear or gear that isn't moving very well. And frankly I use it as much to get emails as I do to make sales. I get some crazy offers that I can't accept, but now I have their email and I can hopefully market to them later on. I use an app or a service called Outdoorly for pro sales in these type of high-end sporting gear. There's a lot of sales to pros, ski patrollers, guides, that type of thing. I use that to make the offers for them.
Then I use a couple of things. There's one called Honeycomb Upsell Funnels by Conversion Bear, and I use Bundle app by Revy and actually that's a pretty big deal and aspect that I just hadn’t cracked the nut on. In Europe, in retail shops, retailers tend to offer bundles, they'll bundle a ski and a binding and a boot at a significant discount. And that maintains the price level of an individual product because the discount is spread amongst two or three different products. That isn’t very common in the United States yet at retailers or online.
I've been trying to offer it through Bundles on my Shopify site to make the market more accessible. Lower the price point for especially people coming into the sport because it's pretty expensive gear. The bundles can lower that cost or barrier to entry based on cost. But I'm not totally satisfied with that yet. It's becoming a little bit cumbersome because I have 13 different skis and nine different binders. I could have 500 bundle combinations and it just gets a little cumbersome and I think probably reduces conversion as people get confused.
I'm looking into something, a build your own bundle type of thing. People just get a discount by picking a ski and a binding and a boot, but I haven't found a service for that, that I'm satisfied with yet.


Felix: Awesome. haganskimountaineering.com is the website. What are the goals that you have for this coming year? Do you have certain goals that you want to get the business to or any projects that you're focused on to continue to grow the business?


Michael: I think my goals are and I've only probably become profitable in the last two years. I would say for the previous eight... I would say I was losing money for the first three to five, and that's why I say I could have just bought a pair of skis and save the thousands of dollars and thousands of hours over the first five years. It was an investment of time to develop it, but the reason I got into doing it originally was to introduce the sport to more people, because it's just such a fantastic sport. It promotes a healthy lifestyle. It's exciting. People get fit. It's just a healthy, beneficial lifestyle.
That was why I got into doing it as a distributor originally and I just want to continue with that. I want to make the gear accessible. Especially the retailers tend to focus on the higher end gear and I want to try to grow the market for people that are coming in and cost may be a barrier, so we have some lower price point products and I'm trying to promote that to get more people to enjoy the sport. It is funny because there seems to be people who equate the price with the quality and for the most part, I don't really think that's really true.
But retailers seem to be really hesitant to offer the bundles or to offer the price point products, they focus on the higher end goods. I'm having to do it myself on the website. Try to promote the lower cost gear, so more people could get into the sport.


Felix: Awesome. Great story. Thank you so much for coming on Mike and sharing your experience.


Michael: Yeah, it's been a great pleasure speaking with you, Felix.