Cutting The DistanceEp. 134: Initial Ascent with Joe Elliston and Dennis Stokes
Jason sits down with Joe Elliston and Dennis Stokes of Initial Ascent to dive into the story behind their hunting pack company. They talk about what inspired them to start the brand, the hands-on prototyping process, and the rigorous testing their packs endured before ever hitting the market. The conversation highlights the innovation that sets their pack system apart, as well as where they're headed next in the world of high-performance backcountry gear.
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Welcome back to another episode of Cutting the Distance. Today, I'm joined by my buddies, Joe Elliston and Dennis Stokes of Initial Ascent Packs. They're out of Coldwell, Idaho. Just got some got some time with these guys. We were all at the Mile High show there in Denver. Got to got to talk to these guys and glad to have them on the on the podcast. Welcome to the show.
Guys had to be here man, Yeah, thanks Jason for having us on.
Yeah. Yeah, safe travels back home. Everything's went well. I know you guys were a little nervous that, you know, some of the employees were at the show and you guys were gonna have to go back and try to figure out how to take orders build the packs. Uh no, no, all joking aside, How did you guys manage without the without the crew?
You know what?
The old timers figured a few things out.
We did.
Yeah, it was you know, we had to dust off our hats a little bit o our fulfillment hats and it was good though.
I only had a couple questions.
The main thing that we could not figure out was the stupid labels.
Oh yeah, we had to go old school on the labels. Because our our main employee that usually fulfills a lot of the stuff, he's also our customer service guy, Cody. He decided he would take the laptop that we used to print the labels and all that with him to Colorado.
Oh well, then.
Leave the old guys to figure out how to hook up to the label printer with their computers. And we just finally bagged it and we ended up printing it, printing it out on paper, cut and cut it, taped it to the boxes. So we apologize if you guys got some ratty look at packages, you know, in that that period of time shortly there.
It's uh, it's so funny because you talk to a lot of guys you know that there's you know, some companies grow and they get too big and they don't have to do that anymore. But it's funny you talk to guys like my you know you guys or you know some of these other guys we talked to that are still involved in the business. They started and at one time we were doing all of this. But you always hear the stories where they have to go back a year or two three years later and they're like, I'm supposed to know all this, but man, it's uh I'm glad there's somebody that's like better at this than me.
Now, oh yeah, I mean because we had to build up packs. We hadn't built packs for a while and made a few phone calls to our frame manufacturer about this lot needs to be a little cleaner. The little hands don't put them through quite as fas as they used to.
Oh yeah, it's it's funny. I I designed the tube covers to be tighter because it looks better at the end. But then yeah, yeah, you go down there and help. The ladies are complaining about their hands hurting, and you go down there and put five covers on. You're like, yeah, I probably should have not made them that tight, but I don't have to do it. Uh yeah. And I noticed Dennis there to show, speaking of you know, guys that build and do this. On a more, I noticed he didn't have any eyebrows while we were in Mile Hi, can you explain that?
Yeah?
I was hoping that wouldn't come up, but yeah I had to.
So I was.
I was the guy.
Joe and I both operated out of our garages for a long long time, and so my garage got the job of basically being the fulfillment center and that's where the packs were built and all that. So when Cody came on, I taught young Cody, and he was eighteen years old when he started with us. I taught him everything he knows about building packs, and for a long time, you know, he got his confidence up and he started talking smack and saying that, you know, he wanted to challenge me to a pack building competition. So after a year and a half, we finally got this thing done, and I was.
Feeling good at the expo.
I was feeling pretty comp about my abilities that I could dust off my pack building apron and hat and you know, and get right back and whip that young buck. And so I made a bed that you know, Cody, if you lose, you're gonna have to cut a cold sack because he's got a headful hair. So you're gonna have to cut a cold sack and let it, let it ride for a little while, and you know, I'll just cut all my facial hair off, including my eyebrows. Never in a million years did I think that I would have lost that competition. I even practiced, man, I put in hours. I was here at five in the morning, multiple days in a row. I was here till ten at night, you know, just just knocking the rust off, and I felt pretty good. I was timing myself with time forget better every day. Well, when it came down to it that Friday, I just I didn't have my game together and I ran into a couple of those slots that Joe talked about, and the old guy just got behind and oh man, I ended up losing my eyebrows to that kid, and.
He lost some other things too.
Yeah, he still reminds me about it. So, uh, I got to come up with we're going to top Golf as a team tomorrow and we're gonna have some other competitions going on. You know that I that I used to swim a pretty decent golf club.
So that's funny.
Retribution is coming.
That's that's too funny. Yeah, I'm I mean, at one point, you know, you're always the guy that puts the originals together and like you should know and then yeah, those girls down there with old ladies down the bottom room would smoke me on every process that we have. Yeah too, I know, I know my only skill I have left is like does that sound right or wrong? Like that's all they called me down there for anymore. Like they don't need me to fix the arbor press, so they don't need me to fix this or determine that. It's like, Jason, you're not useful for anything but telling us if this sounds.
Right or you know.
But he's my reads writing, So it's always and it's like I show up every day and I've got to create a new position for myself because what I used to do is gone and somebody else is handling it much better than I ever did.
Yeah. That's awesome though, that you get to see that growth and you just kind of realize your place, like all right, I meant to sit here and do a little bit of marketing, a little bit of design, and the rest of this is taken off without me.
It's cool, man, it really is.
Yeah. So we're gonna jump into some icebreaker questions just to just to get the conversation going before we jump into the packs and the business and where things are going. If either of you could hunt one species in one place for the rest of your life, what would it be and where would it be?
For me, it'd be bear, I just I get giddy about bear hunting. Absolutely love it. You know, I think it's you know, I'd probably just stay right here in Idaho because there's so many of opportunities that haven't had a chance to explore yet. And we have a ton of bears here in all different color phase bears, which I love. So yeah, I think Jason, for me, it's, you know, after being cooped up all winter, having that opportunity to get out in the spring and do spot stock bear hunting.
I just I love it.
You throw a turkey on there is a mixture, you know, a combo. It's hard to beat that. Yeah, and that would probably be my choice right there.
So you're going and if you have to pick season, spring or fall, you're going to spring, black bear.
Spring, yep, spring bear, thank for me, September and the Elk Woods.
That's that's where I'm at.
I go back and forth a lot, but I yeah, it's just hard to be that and I suck as a caller. I'm first to tell you that. So Jason, you and I are going to be talking simon. You may even have to hire you, you know, to give me some private lessons on side. But yeah, that's that's where it's at for me.
Yeah, I I love you know, anything I can call to, right, So that's why, like even spring turkey, you know, it's love. People love to hate on out West, you know, especially by the hardcore Western hunter, like, oh, you're chasing the tricky. I'm like, yeah, but I get to interact with it. And that's why I think, Yeah, you can call bears, but you just don't get any you don't get any feedback, like they're either going to come in or they're not. And we've had success calling you know, some spring bears in, but yeah, to something yells at me or talks back or I can control a little bit. I just I love that. And so you know, probably, man, I love meal to your hunting, but it'd probably be that that September elk and as well, what wild game meal has topped all others for you if you can think about it, like, what's that one meal that that's been the best from any wild game?
Oh, access deer has been the top of my list for the last few years I've had I've had some opportunities to take a few of.
Those, and man, that meat is just it's just hard to beat.
Are you are you going like a roast or a steak or burger? Like what if you what's your specific cut on that thing?
Man? It doesn't matter with that aroun deer, it doesn't matter. But I mean, you know, I'm definitely going, you know, for that backstrap and cutting those steaks.
I I love that.
But you know, even the loin, you know, I'm taking it and just cooking it in my favorites, cooking it bear fat and just getting that good seer on the on the outside and then you know, a rare to medium rare.
Oh man, it's hard to beat.
We actually had a customer last week who's over here from Hawaii. He's doing some he's a helicopter pilot. He's over here doing some training. He stopped in and was visiting. He's like, you know what I think you shall whether he said, forty six axis deer with his bow over there. So he brought a bunch of access deer meat in. So tomorrow, after we get back from top Golf taking the guys down, then we're going to do a barbecue over here some some axis deer. So nice, Tomorrow's gonna be a great day.
I think I could be there one of my eight nine hours away. I think I could be there in.
Time, you know what, I think you could make it, Yeah for sure.
Yeah, And I don't know, I wish. So my favorite wild game to date, and it has more to do with the liver side, was that was that doll sheep because I hate all liver. You know, you always hear like, well, you've never had liver the way I make it, and you try it like it's still terrible. Well, you've never had liver the way I made it. And then I had some of that doll sheep liver and I'm like, ah, it's actually palatable and it's actually pretty good. And then I don't know if it's the cost of doll sheep or what it is, but like in your mind, I wish you could. It needs to be like a blind taste test, because that doll sheep has just been absolutely amazing all the way through, no matter whether it's the roast of steaks, just really really good. And then second for me, you know, I've had some really good antelope, had some really good moves, but like a specific cut those. We go back to Kansas and I've been killing some white tails out of the ag and the white tailed dough backstraps, like my kids. You get my kids hooked on that, and it's like you just start churning through it, like you know, package of backstrap after package of backstrap, and before you know it, you're out. But that that white tail white tail dough backstraps in agg country is pretty dang tough to beat. It is hard.
I grew up in Kansas, so we had we had a lot of deer. We didn't hunt a lot back there. We had a lot of friends that did, so we had a lot of white tail. But I think back to what you just said a minute ago. Though, for me, the antelope, I would put that at the top of the list. I absolutely love antelope.
If if it's taken care of right right, Like antelope has been the best, near the best, and then it's been near the bottom. If you can't get the hides off and get that thing.
Cool down really quick, that's a ticket.
Yeah. The disparity between the good and the bad is wide with antelope. But yeah, I agree, if if you can get it taken care of quick, it's good. My dad and uncles, before I got to travel out of state with them, they always talked about their like antelope processing factory. They would there was a bridge evidently in the area where they were hunting, and it had some shade, and my two uncles would be down there like skinning one. Next thing I knew, like somebody would drop another one over the bridge and like just take off without them, and they were stuck their skin in forever. But they said it was worth it to make sure, you know, you're right around with that thing in the back of your truck all day. It wasn't. It wasn't doing the given that animal to credit and the you know it deserves for table fare.
Yeah, so it's good man, It's yeah. We started hunting those probably seven eight years ago, I guess maybe even longer.
But you're right.
If you don't get cooled off in like an hour, it's it's just not But if you do, man, it is just phenomenal.
Yep, yep, I'm excited. I have a well, I have a ninety six percent chance to draw an anelope tag this year, which means I probably won't. Montana already told me with with eighty eight percent chance that I didn't draw elkin deer, so we'll see. But yeah, I should be able to draw my first antelope tag this year, and I've got points in whelming in Arizona. I always thought I'm just gonna kill a a couple of big ones, but the Montana, the unit should be good. So I'm excited to finally get my first chance to antelope hunt and awesome. Yes, yeah, So you guys starting to plan your year? Do you guys? Are you guys excited about any tags this year? You guys stay in local, you're traveling. What what's got you guys are the most stoke for this year?
Well, I you know, when when we first got into this business, we thought we owned a pac company. Man, you know what that means you just get to hunt all the time. That is not the case. My goal of the last few years has been to hunt one more day than I did the year before, and so I'm starting to build a little a few days out there. But yeah, as far as for me, you know.
I'm gonna I'm gonna go on a couple of bear haunts here this spring.
I'm excited about actually gonna take a couple of first time bear hunters out. That will be sometime mid May, and my son's gonna go with us, so we'll be out there for three or four days. But I'm pretty excited about about that. And then uh, I think we're I'm waiting. I did put in for for sheep here in idahop I'll do that periodically, but I'm not holding up high hopes on that, so we'll see where that goes and then do.
Just general stuff.
I am gonna do some white tail hunting again this year. I'm going to Missouri, and then I'm gonna try to do some white tail hunting here up north in Idaho as well. I'm kind of addicted to those creators now. I grew up around them and grew up hunting them and got.
Away from it for a long time. And I killed one a few.
Years ago and brought it home and it was young buck and fixed it for the family. And my wife told me, if I remember this correctly, she said something like, because she never really ate whitetail growing up, but I fixed this for and it was one of the backs drafts and fixed it for the family, and she just said, you know, I.
Don't care what you do. I don't care what you hunt.
You know, next year, but as long as you plan on bringing one of these home at least once a year.
I'm good with that. You need to do that.
So I thought, okay, yeah, I'll do that with the hat. I'm a big fan of whitetail and Aglantu. Yep, yeah, I think Jason.
For me, this is really my first year. So I retired about four weeks ago from a day job, and so it's finally going to free me up to actually be able to spend some time. I just the last five years, man, I just haven't been able to do a whole lot of hunt and if I got more three or four days out, that was a lot. So I'm gonna do a bear hunt middle of the month with a couple of folks here, and then I'm probably gonna go back out with my son, my oldest boy Parodi in late May for another bear hunt, which I can't you know, which I'm really looking forward to. And then this year I'm planning on you know, I'll be doing Mule Deer and Elk you know, in September and October. So so yeah, I'm hoping to be able to spend a lot more time out in the in the woods.
That's awesome. So we're gonna kind of get We're gonna jump into kind of the origin story. You know, Joe, you'd mentioned you grew up in can you know were you guys always hunters? Has it always been in your blood? Were you guys always at you know, like, where did you guys we were the humble beginnings? Where did those start? Yeah?
I mean for me, yeah, I grew up you know in Kansa. Like I said, my father, he was a I mean he was an avid hunter growing up. I mean he's a guy that literally, you know, I've got elephant tusk in my office at home from when he was in Africa. You know, he hunted all over from an early age, so I think, you know, he just kind of brought that mentality into our house from from the very very beginning. And I can remember back in cup Scouts.
You know, my.
Dad was the one that taught hunter safety, and you know, it wasn't you know, like hunter safety today a lot of us just classroom work with a little bit of fieldwork. We spent two days out in the field and they had all kinds of stations stuff me, so it was it was hands on. So it's been a part of my life as far back as I can remember. But it was mostly when I was growing up, we did a lot of waterfowl hunting in Kansas, and we did quail, but then we would go to South Dakota and go pheasant hunting. I really didn't do any big game hunting until until I got out here. So, yeah, it's always been a part of our life. We've always been taught to respect the animals, the importance of it, the conservation side of it. Huh. So, yeah, it's just kind of what we grew up with.
Yeah, I'm originally from Florida, and so we hunted whitetail back there, although heavy in numbers.
They were about the size of large dogs.
But grew up hunting, fishing, hunted whitetail, hunted hogs, hunted kons. I was trapping as well, and just kind of I grew up on a dirt road and I was just always running around trying to trying to figure things out, you know. So I grew up doing that, and and then when I went out to college, I kind of put pushed the pause button on that a little bit still ide hundred when I was in college. But then once I moved out to Idaho, my world completely turned upside down and I learned about elk and mule deer, all the things that we didn't have back there. It was just a complete one hundred and eighty degree change for me.
So I just became obsessed with it. Especially I stopped for.
A few years when when my twins were born and we were raising our twins and I was working quitt a bit with my consulting business. And then when my son was I think he was nine, No, he was seven, I believe he Uh, we would sit around and watch hunt shows and all that, and we got to watch Ted Nugent hunt. He really he really kind of took took kindly to Ted Nugent.
And just his excitement and everything's going on there.
And well, next thing, you know, Ted Nugent was coming to the Western Hunting Expo. So I said, you know what, let's I've never been to that, Let's let's go. And uh, my son and I went, and that that got me back into big game honting in I was buying packs like crazy and rifles and all kinds of stuff and so yeah, so since then, it's just kind.
Of been crazy for me.
Yeah, that's a good segue back into the next question. So, you know, Joe from Kansas, Dennis from Florida. You guys meet up in Idaho and make a pack, Like how long ago did that start? When did you guys meet? And then what kind of got got things going in that direction?
Yes, I mean we met. We actually met at church. We went to the same to it as a large church. I was a greeter there, and you know, I would we'd see each other on the weekends. We didn't know each other to win to talk other than I would say good morning, move on, and uh, you know, we just we just didn't interact much until we were at a flag football practice for our boys. So my youngest boy, Tie was playing flag football with Dnnis's son Trey. Now I think it was the first or second practice. I saw Dentnis there and uh, I just decided to go over and visit with it because I recognized him from from church, and that started a conversation which then all of a sudden about kids, you know, involved in sports. You know, you get kind of consumed with it. And every weekend we're together, and every you know, a couple of days a week we're together practice. And so that just led on to developing a friendship that moved into us, starting to do some honey together, and you know, we had some common interest there and we were in a men's group together at the same time. It started up Tom shortly thereafter, so Dennis and I just started spending a lot of time together. Our family started to gel together, and we started going down to the Western Expo together as families, and we probably did that for good. I don't know, Well, we've done it since probably two thousand and eight, somewhere around then.
We've been going.
I don't think we've missed a year since then, and that's where the friendship started. But that's also where I would say the passion for the outdoors became exposed, right. You know, I had a huge passion when I moved here for backpacking, and that's really what I dove into because coming from Kansas, with everything's flat, you don't see too many mountain peaks. So that's that was kind of my passion. But I also, you know, grew up, like I said, hunting but never done the big game. So we started bear hunting together in Turkey, hunting together a long time ago, taking our kids with us. That was always important to us, and uh, it just kind of developed from there.
Gotcha? So, so what inspired you to start that hunting pack company? Like, how did you get to that point? Was it just mountainside talks or hey we should look at this, or hey I got an idea? Like how what sparked that that direction?
Yeah? It was, I mean between Joe and myself, you know, we had we had about every pack that was out there. And we're short statued folks, and I've me personally, I've had a back injury since gosh the mid nineties, and so for me, I could it was really hard for me to find a pack that fit properly. And it was hard to find it was hard to find companies that would actually fit you if if you will. And so me carrying you know, more more than say forty or fifty pounds, it was.
It hurt.
And I really I just kept going through the packs trying to figure out something that would that would work for me, and uh, you know, Joe and I we you know, we would have these talks and everything. And one of the cool things that that I had used and he had used we had used these seats and I forget what company, Crazy crew, Yeah, we'd use these seats and I actually killed some animals out of those because they just really a rock solid backgress, you know.
And we had.
Talked about, you know, with our with our packs, maybe maybe it'd be cool to kind of come up with a seat, you know type thing that you know, with with a pack and try to try to put those things together that that'd be really cool. And you know, and at the same time, I'm thinking, yeah, I got to find a act that you know, it's going to work for me.
And so one thing led to another.
We started talking like, well.
Why don't we do this?
And so we went to.
The Western Line Expo like we had every year, and you know, we're just we're just kind of looking at things, we're talking about things, and we just decided, well, we're gonna try to do our own thing and and if if nothing else, it would be something that worked for us. Yep, because there were things about packs that we liked, we didn't.
Like, and and all of that.
And and again for me personally to have something that that wouldn't just crush my back, it needed to be something different, something special. So that's that's kind of how we how we got started. And then we we started working on it and this was back to the fifteen early twenty fifteen. We knew we had to have a frame. We spent three years just designing, testing, and trying to figure out the frame.
We felt that the rest of it.
You know, was going to be I mean, you don't reinvent the rest of it per se, but the frame was something had to be unique and something that was going to work.
And so we spent the.
Better part of three years working with three different engineering firms and trying to figure out that frame. And so we we finally got it. And next thing, you know, it was twenty eighteen in February and we were launching at the westron XBO.
Yeah. I remember you guys' first first time there and when you guys showed up, and yeah, it was you know, it's back then. I think everybody knows we were using Kafaro and you know, and it was like we seen you guys show up, and that's one thing. And these guys didn't ask me to say this. I've always had tired about you too, is even though you know I was using a different pack company. You guys were always you know, super super nice, you know, welcoming. We could sit and talk and it was just I always knew from the get go, whether you guys knew how to design a pack or not, I knew you guys were great guys, you know. Uh so, yeah, you guys, you guys showed up, there was something new, and you guys know the history of packs more me. But I think to that time, qu was the only other pack company out there with like a carbon sheet type of frame, right, So you guys were were maybe the first to bring a I don't want to say it, not that Q's wasn't custom design, but like the first ones, you know, outside of a giant company that was that brought a carbon fiber frame to the market. I think other people had components, but you guys could do it in the sheet, Correct me if I'm wrong there.
Yeah, I mean to your point. When we start, we didn't have a strong opinion that it had to be carbon fiber, But after we kind of went through the process, all things pointed like that was the best solution for what we were trying to accomplish.
But yeah, I think.
KUU was out there with one. I know back in the day. You know, some other manufacturers, you know, Mystery Ranch at one point to tried it way back when, and I think it did perform well. But I'm honestly Jason, as you know, I mean, you've been around carbon fiber, and I think about just the technology advancements that happened within that space. And you know, the point in time with which we were testing. Had we tried to do what we did three or four years earlier, the materials didn't exist right in the form and fashion that we ended up using. So a lot of things just aligned up, you know, for the right reason at the right time for us to be able to kind of develop a frame that really hadn't been created, you know, a frame that allowed you to carry just excessively heavy loads more comfortably.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, And you know, like you say, it's an evolution of the materials, and I've got a material science background, and you know, it's like all of these things, the acceleration over the last ten to fifteen years, and materials is is you know, it's I don't even know what number you put on, a thousand times more than the history behind it, right, it's just the acceleration of materials. And so you know, hitting it right there, and then like I say, I did finally get a chance I finally put one of your guys' packs on. I think it was twenty twenty three at Lamper's Western Hunt. My competitive side got the best of me, and me and Brad Hunt were trying to beat each other's time back and forth. And I remember telling Lampers, I said this, this Joe and Dennis guy. They're lying to me. There's not fifty pounds in this pack. They've only put thirty on here, so it makes their you know, pack look good. It's the old Ata trick. You know, you always all these sample bows you always shot a thousand grain arrow out of because it makes them quieter, makes them deader in the hand. I'm like, oh, this is the greatest trick of all time. They put twenty five pounds in this pack. Tell me to run up the mountain. I'm like, yeah, no, but I knew. I told Dirk from then. I'm like, man, whether we're using those or not, like regardless, like these things carry weight pretty good. And I didn't even have it fit right, you know. I remember, you know, I'm all torso, no no legs, big guy, And I remember I just like, heck with it. I'm gonna just start strapping straps and clicking straps and I'm just going for it. And I'm like, even that, you know, worked pretty good, and so you know the design it does hold weight really well, and I you know, I am excited to maybe get one set up a little more for my my long torso and seeing if you know, how well it can really do. And it's it's it's set up right, So initial Cent. So you guys, you got a product you ready to go. You did your field testing the name and logo, so initial Ascent. You put the two words together, it's the beginning and you're you're you're climbing, right. Is that? Is that what you guys were going for? What is there anything more behind that name or where where did that come from?
Yeah? I mean I think you know. So there was kind of an evolution with the logo, right. You know, Dennis and I had started, we had, you know, wrote out a couple of different designs. You know, we're not artists. Dennis is more autistic than I am by far. But then we ended up working with a lady that Dennis had a relationship with from She had done some design work for you on some other logo stuff, and we just sent her different ideas and just said, hey, build off of this like you would. And we did like the idea that I mean, initial ascent. We were pretty set on that for kind of similar reasons to what you talked about. But the actual what we ended up being our Mountain Dude, which is trademark, you know. So she she started sending us different samples back and we got a bunch of varieties on things, and I think one of them came back that we kind of goofed or you know, laugh about, is the Mountain Dude actually looked like the Burger king Man, I mean just giant. You know, We're like, that ain't gonna work. You know, we had some good chuckles around that. But what what came out of it though, was for both Dennis and I when we got the samples back that kind of had a pretty close resemblance to what you see today. It was kind of like, man, that is such a unique design. At first, you're kind of like, what is that? But we both overnight, you know, kind of slept on it, and we kept thinking about it throughout the night. It just kept popping up, popping up, and we had a similar response the next day and we're talking is like, man, I can't get that mountain dude, and that's what we probably just I can't get that mountain dude out of my mind. And we got similar feedback from other friends and family as well to where we were kind of like, you know what, it really it fits all of us, and we get people asking us all the time, who is the mountain dude, right, And we firmly believe it's all of us, you know, because we all aspire to be that guy right that you know is a true mountain man. I think at some point or another, we've all had that desire within our lives, you know, to be that person and to live that lifestyle. So we felt like, you know what, that's very fitting to who our customers are, and the logo fits well for what we're trying to accomplish.
Yeah, I always back to the mountain man. I always feel like I was born like two hundred years later. I don't know if I was tough enough to actually be a mountain man, but in my head it seems like I like doing that stuff more. But I I probably like modern medicine and all the amenities a little better. But it's like, man, I love trapping there were no regular you know, just do what you want. It was a wild West and uh yeah, no, no cool And uh so, so you guys are you're coming out with a pack, like what's your you know, you're looking at different fabrics, hardware. You know, I I get to shop hard where every once in a while, and there's all these different grades. It's like, you know, for three cents more per buckle, you can buy a better grade, you know. Like, so you guys, you guys are going through all of this. You know, one of the most difficult things I do you know any of our sowing goods or any of our our you know, our our stuff that requires tooling, you know, to build carbon fiber, you know, you have to try to find the sourcing. And then you're like, well is this going to be one thousand dollars a framer? It's gonna be two hundred dollars, you know, like you're trying to do all this, Like how did was were you guys? Were you learning as you went? Did you guys already have a good base where those engineering firms that helped you, Like how do you guys bring a product to market? You know, for it's easy to build one or two and maybe overspend. But when you've got to you know, hit margins and do all this in a way like how'd that process go? You know, finding so shops, finding you know, uh, a carbon fiber manufacturer with with the tooling and everything to do that.
Yeah, I mean back to what didnis It said, we kind of divide into conquered, right. We got to a point within the growth of the company where we had to step back and say, okay, because originally when we first started, we were both we were both shipping out of our houses. Dennis had half the inventory, I had half of it. And then it got to the points like, you know, we're gonna have to divide this up, and we had we had troubles with manufacturers that you know, where we would get them to a point and then they would, like our main manufacturer that we started with, basically fired us in the parking lot. And this was in December and we had the Expo coming up, right, so it's kind of like, oh my gosh moment, and so at that point that's when we said, Okay, Dennis, you're going to be consumer for Joe. I'm gonna do all back end business aspects. So I took over the manufacturing side of things, and at that point we did not have a supply chain model in place. We were not sourcing our own goods. Then we were running it all through our manufacturer. Grou just fired us in the parking lot. So over the course of probably sixty to ninety days, we ended up, you know, working and establishing relationships with over forty different supply shops that would supply us the goods right from Brookwood on down. I mean, John, I mean just there was just so many different places that we had to go figure out where do we even get these materials right? And then getting the credit application, I mean, all of those things, getting the customer number set up. So that took a good sixty to ninety days, and a lot of those folks it was you know, sometimes they didn't want to open you yep, right because who are you? You guys are nobody. So we worked through that and then I started really working hard on just trying to figure out the manufacturing side of it. You know. It was literally, as you know, Jason, there are no secret sauce. It's just like sometimes you just got to just head down and just go yep, and I can Remember I had a list over one hundred different manufacturers that specialized in you know, like a commercial SoC shop. Knew nothing about him other than I just done Google search, Google search, trying to get this information. And you get good at at learning the right questions to ask to see if your model will fit into theirs. But we ended up signing up or partnering with five different manufacturers during that time period. That got us through kind of you know a point where man, it was like, are we going to make it through this or not?
Right?
Fortunately, we had enough inventory and we were tiny that there really weren't a lot of disruptions with our manufacturing. But you know, over that year, the amount of it stuff that we learned about manufacturing, about supply chain, about sourcing goods, about forecasting. Yeah, I think it just made us so much better for long term, made us so much better. But it's painful, it is.
Yeah, I mean I knew nothing. I was just a dumb engineer, right. I designed bridges and I design roads, you know, fish passage culverts, and it's like, oh, you're going to start a business and build out calls. Well, it's easy when you're just building a little wood barreled calls because I got to just find wood and be able to turn on a lathe and stop a mouthpiece. Well then you're designing diaphragms. Well, now I've got to find somebody that can stamp out the frame, and I got to buy the latex, and I got to find somebody that can print my logo on the tape. Like and it seems like, just like you guys, the story almost mimics it everything we've did, the suppliers have because we are just a game call company, right and then in the mass manufacturing world where a nobody our moqs are you know the beginning, Yeah, you know, we're just barely trying to get to an MOQ where like you know, three M Duct is you know, the same company ordering, Like we don't even want to deal with your stuff, Like we're just gonna build duct tape for three M. You know, we're not gonna re And so, like everything we've did, there's been turnover, and every time I get bit by not having like a secondary manufacture already on and so it's like all right, let's pause, let's go just it's it's real frustrating. But now I think you guys could maybe say the same thing once you've been through it, Like, man, if I could just do this all over again, like I would have this dial like there would have been you know, we still successful, but like you could have did this in a in a way that avoided all of the heartache and the you know, going to beds at one o'clock in the morning because you're trying to, you know, solve all these problems and manufacturing issues. And no, no, that's that's cool. So actual testing, you know, we we go through and I don't know what the right terms are, and it's probably not the right engineering terms, but like normal use and then like where's this thing going to break? Right? And so I imagine for a pack company, you're like, well, you know, one hundred pounds might be normal for somebody. You know, one hundred and twenty pounds might be normal for somebody you know, or crazy buddy Baronio, he might decide to try to put more than that on it and hang stuff over the front of him and stay balanced out like so so on a pack like I feel and I don't know if this is gonna come out right, but like on a game call, it's not the end of the world, Right, if if a call fails, you just put another one in your mouth. So, like, I still do extreme testing. I want to know that that thing's durable. But like a pack, now, all of a sudden, you're like, all right, we probably got a you know, two x a normal load, or we got a three x normal load, but maybe not you know, jump up and down, you know, So like, how do you guys torture test these things? And did you guys have like a set number or were you guys just like that should be the max abusest single ever? Like what was that process like to make sure that your pack frame wasn't going to break in torsion or you know, obviously in compression carbon fiber is never gonna have an issue, but you know, the torsion things are people tightening down the wings too tight, Like what does that look like so that you two are confident enough to be like, all right, we're gonna sell this to to whoever and they're not gonna be able to break this thing.
Yeah, it's kind of for us, it was kind of a trial by fire. We had a bunch of folks out there that were using the pack that we we asked you that that got.
Out a bunch more than we did.
And you know, especially like folks like Dave and you know he's hauling thirty to forty elk off the Hill of Year, you know, for his in its guidance business.
And it was.
It was one of those deals where we would we would.
Have a breakage, or we would have a couple you know that would that would break or or fail in one particular spot, and then we go right to our engineer and say, hey, here's here's the picture, here's what it did. What can we do, And so then we would either add another layer of something there, or we would change the direction of the carbon fiber.
And so over time.
Of testing and use, they would they would kind of present themselves and having enough time on the mountain, with enough people doing different things, it would all just kind of work out.
And but the thing was.
Is we were since we were small, we were fair to nimble, and we were basically having these these frames.
Made to order.
So we would we would call up, you know, hey, we need another load of frames, and he would send us eighteen frames at a time, and so we could make changes through CAD or through the layout process. Because what we have now as far as the lay up process is completely different than what we started with. And it was like we knew what the cake needed to taste like, but we didn't know the recipe. And so we had to through our engineer and through our rigorous tests and we had to we had to figure that out. What we're going to try to do, and we just had a meeting this last week is we're actually creating some tests, some failure type tests where we can actually put some numbers to this and and be able to you know, have statistics and all that get get real scientific with it.
But but also.
When we make changes or when you know, if we want to try some other technologies, we'll have some numbers to back that up. Because we know the frame as it sits right now is dialed. It works very well. But you know, if you go and and we're always trying to raise the bar on what we're doing and introducing new technologies here and there, so we want to have some numbers and definitive numbers that we can use in testing. But you know, as far as like the the amount of weight that it can carry, man, we've we've really yet to find out what that is. I mean, you know, there's been guys that are that have carried over three hundred pounds with with our pack without failure, and that's not going to be most most guys out there, I mean most guys, you know, most guys I would say, probably aren't going to carry over one hundred and twenty pounds at any point.
So we feel like that if we.
Can take that that you know type of use where you're carrying two to three hundred pounds, that's going to be you know, great for the average use.
Ye And then I I mean you, I'm sure you guys look at this like I've always felt like most packs do fine with the weight like vertical weight. It's when the breakage is gonna come when I go to take my pack off and set on the ground, or I go to like roll my pack off of like a weird torsion, or it's gonna try to snap something. And that's where it's like, man, you just hope we either got to design for that and try to like take in the most extremes or just hope that people like take care of their stuff and can realize like, don't you know you guys have I'm gonna I'm gonna use all the wrong terms and you guys are gonna cringe. But like the way that you guys' pack attaches are through wings or fingers, right that come out from the stern the central vertical. You know, it's like if somebody was to tip the pack and only put it down on that wing, and you did have one hundred and twenty five hundred and thirty pounds, You're like, ah, is it? You know I probably designed it. You guys have probably looked at that, but that where I start I start to get worried. It is like if you if somebody's not paying attention, he goes it, throws it down or on a rock or something. But you guys obviously probably tested that. But that's one of those things that like always is a structural engineer, it's like, ah, like I can, I don't because then you're like, well, I don't want to make the frame itself ten pounds to account for that. You know, you need the user to have some input. But you know, how did you guys handle that? Like all of these I would call them extreme cases, right, and that you don't want to have to deal with that, but yeah, or or I mean, how what's a track record. I'm sure you know that the packs are solid, like you, guys just aren't having issues with them or.
So we I mean back to your point, I mean we had fourteen generations of design changes before we ever launched right now, that wasn't a perfect frame, but it was dang good, right, So since then we've made some change. I think we're on generation nineteen now, but as we learn, and I think this is one of the Jason, I know you you'll appreciate this because you've kind of know, you've grown your business, You've been at different phases. You know where we are now, and being a smaller company, you can respond so much quicker, right, there's not all the politics in Bold, and so every time something happened, we responded right away. To Dennis's point, it wasn't like it took us ninety days one hundred and twenty days to respond. We could respond immediately and change our manufacturing process almost on the spot. And I think that was the one thing that we did from day one and we still.
Do to this day.
If we have an issue, we're going to address it with the customer. Do we have a perfect track record, zero failures? No, We've had some failures, yep. But do we have a perfect record when something fails to replace it?
Absolutely?
Will, you know, because we do a lifetime unconditional warranty on the frame, and you know, some of the people that were some of the toughest on the frame were shedhunters because they put so much pressure on those upper limbs as well as the load lifters. And you know it made our pack better though, right, So every time we had a failure, we addressed it, We fixed it to where I mean we feel now. I mean we're just with Brian Cole last week talking to him about some stuff and he said they are driving on a hunt and all of a sudden his pack goes out the back of the truck. It's sixty miles an hour and it's rolling and tumbling and doing all this and there but frames fine, no issues, right, you know, It's just one of those things where now we feel like, yeah, you know, we're not going to say it's it's indestructible, but it's pretty dangos appropriate approaches.
Yeah, gotcha, that's that's awesome. Now do you on this pack where there you know, the innovations, were there any first any patent or did you guys just design the best pack you could, Like, how did that go through that process? You know, are there any patents? Are there any first?
Yeah, so we went through that whole process. We had lots of discussions with different legal advisors on it, you know, patent attorneys, et cetera, et cetera. Ultimately we felt like, you know what, there wasn't a need to go out and do that. Really, there's so much that's involved in the process that is unique, it would be very difficult for somebody to go copy it. Jennis made a good comment earlier when we started down this journey, it was literally like baking a cake without a recipe, and we know that secret sauce nobody else does. Nobody else is using some of the materials that we're using in the industry, and you know, we just opted you know, based on that feedback from from from Council that we didn't really need to go down that path with it.
Yeah, we've, I mean we've we've been on all sides. We you know, I own a couple of patents or I'm the designer own a couple of patents and you've had people violate them, and then you realize once again, we're only in the game call world, and for us to go and force it's going to cost a whole lot more money than we may even make off of it. So let's just out market them. You know, we've protected ourselves with some other patents and it's worked well. But yeah, it's not like we're Ford Motor Company designing something that all cars in the future, you know, are you know what I mean like a market or a segment of business that's way bigger than than what we're dealing with. And we kind of made the same decision moving forward. If I don't design something that that's gonna you know, be be groundbreaking, then we're not even going to mess with it. It's too expensive, it's too expensive to defend. And yeah, yeah it just build the best pack you can, market it, be a good person, get the right people using it, and like should take care of itself. Yep, yep. So where I mean the initial cent, you guys have got the three K, the five K, the eight K is correct, the three, five and eight and then you guys have a day pack two different frames like things are things are? You know from my seat you know outside looking in, you know, just paying attention to socials, which isn't always the best indicator, but like things are cranking themes, things seem to be going better, you know, new products, new accessories. Where does the business go, Where does the growth go? Like, what what's your guys's focus? You guys just driving deep on packs? You know, like a lot of other pack companies, Are you guys going to expand into different categories? Like where's the future of initial scent and how you guys looking at that?
Yeah, I mean we will always be a primary pack manufacturer, right that, that is our primary, but there's a lot adjacencies that we feel like, hey, we can go bring in innovation into that space. You know, our goal is never to be you know, quote a me too company. You know, we always want to bring innovation. That's what that's what excites us. I mean from day one, you know, innovation around the frame is what got us excited to bring something new to market that betters the hunting community. So you'll see us continue to expand. I mean I shared with you earlier, Jason, you know some of the newer products that we're working on, right, you know that that fit within the portfolio of a backpack manufacturer. But hey, do we see ourselves going on developing you know, sleeping bags and tepees and tents. No, that that probably doesn't fit. There's a lot of opportunity. It's you know, it's a huge market, you know, the backpack space and kind of those adjacent categories. In the same breath, we we want to make sure what we're producing is of the highest quality and standards, right. You know, at one point I worked for a company di Woult that you know, just about everybody knows. I could have had de Wault underwear at one point and I would have hit my number every year just on that because it was such a big, powerful brand. We don't want to lose sight to what we stand for and what we're trying to, you know, build and produce every single year. As far as innovated products.
That's awesome. Yeah, it's it is. It's stuff you kind of get stuck in the rat race of you know, how do you sell more? How do you sell more calls? How do I grow this? And with that some of the quick nimbleness, the ability to design the best regardless of price, regardless of margins can come in and uh yeah, I like that. You know that that model and and uh being able to be quick to make changes and and you know, innovate and improvise and uh so it sounds like you guys are staying pretty vertical in the pact, at least for the foreseeable future.
We are, but I think you know, from a distribution we've always been D two C up until about a year and a half ago. And you know, we've changed our model right to where now we're working with a couple of companies like go hunt and black o US. But then we got into the retail space for shields, I mean, and we feel like, you know, that's a whole channel of opportunity for us. I think it makes us better too as a brand, right, It makes us think about more further down the path, right, because when you design a product, now you know you have to pay Okay, how are we gonna do packaging?
Right?
How are we gonna you know, you got a U, B C codes, You gotta all these things that you don't have to do on a on A on a D two C you know. Business model that just makes us better. And so we're super excited about those opportunities to work with those partners.
Yeah, and Shields is as great as good at a partner as we can get. You know, not that the others are bad, but Shields has been awesome to work with and and not to not to use this as an opportunity, but one thing being a D two C company, if we can't meet up with you guys at Western Hunter out a trade show like testing these things out, so Shields will be a that is a great option right now for people that may want to may not want to travel to a show, or may not have the ability. There's going to be some select Shields where people can actually go, you know, put one on, try one on, and how they fit that that that's that's good. So, uh, you know, we talked about new product We've talked about the you know, the business and growth, like what's the road ahead? Like where do you guys see initial assent in five or ten years? You know, some of that does have to do with that product line, but like where are you guys going, what do you hope to see out of this? What's that future look like? If you could plan it?
Yeah, I mean I'll go I'm curious. We can kind of both speak to them, but you know, for me, I think it's evolved honestly, Jason. You know, when you first get into the the business or start a business up that's consumer driven, product driven. Yeah, I think there's this dream as to home, man, is this going to work?
Right?
Are we actually going to be successful with it?
And you know, with with everything that was going on, including COVID, yeah, there was a lot of years there where we were like, I don't know, I don't know if it's going to work.
Long term or not. And you know, we've always grown a year over year, but here over the last two and a half years, it's been hyper hyper growth right to where now it's no longer a question as to hey, is this business going to make it? Now it's like what do we want to make of the business?
Right?
Which is a different, different conversation, And you know, I think that continues to evolve for us. But what we do feel confident is is we're going to continue to bring the best product to the market and we feel like there is a ton of opportunity of growth. You know, if you think about it, how big the backpack market is. Right, we are just a spec on the backside of an elephant right now. You know, as far as the size of company, So we feel like there's a ton of growth opportunities as we continue to bring on more products as well, continue to expand our relationship, you know, into more retail spaces with shields this things. We feel like it's going to get pretty pretty big.
Hurry. Yeah. I just I just love how the competition within the pack space and the technology of change. I can remember, you know, when I learned a backpack hunt. I was a poor college kid that was like, all right, I can do a Cabella's Alaskan Extreme with a five thousand cupakinch bag on it. And then you hunt for a couple of years and you realize like, this isn't the best pack. So then you go to a data designs like terror Frame, right, and that's that was a real good pack, but external and more of a hiker pack, not necessarily hunting pack, but it worked great. And then you know your roll and the and and so I just love that technologies moved to a point you got you know, companies like yourself, guys that are passionate and got great product out there. And I just like to see. I'm just I'm a you know, an engineering nerd. I'm a materials nerd, and so to like see see the change, you know, from where I started, even in my own hunting you know, my own hunting adventures to where where I'm at, and I'm excited to be able to get to hopefully strap big old bulls down on that pack or a big you know, pack out and entire boned out deer or whatever it may be, and be able to kind of relate to that story of you know, really similar to my own story, you know, maybe maybe a few years ahead, because we did start back in two thousand and nine, and we caught our big break in twenty sixteen, and then I was fortunate to ride like the beginning of that COVID bubble which shot every company through the through the moon and then created a lot of issues on the backside with how do you keep up with those numbers? But uh no, I'm I'm excited to get to know you guys better, excited to get to work with you guys. And uh that's not why I had you on here. I wanted you guys to talk about your story, you know, talk about your product. Why you guys you know, are passionate about it, and you know what hunters can get out of that, and like I said, I would be lying to say that I've I've went up on the mountain and you know, packed my camp and an elk out yet, but the little bit I have got to run it. Been very impressed, you know, me and Dirk what I think this is where these guys probably fibbed to us again where they said they had one hundred and fifty pounds on our back at the show, but I'm thinking it was seventy five. But I know, you know, Dirk was able to stand straight up, and I'm excited to get out and test these things we got spring Bear, you know, shoot right around the corner. I think I'm twenty two, twenty three days away from from hopefully giving a big old BlackBerry right out of the.
Mountains in one thank Yeah, that's awesome.
Yeah, anything else, you know, how do how do our listeners find you? How do they find out more about Initial Ascent, what you guys got going on the adventures? Everybody wear an Initial Ascent all of that.
Yeah, so they can find us course at our website initial ascent dot com, all the social platforms we're on. Our YouTube channel is pretty special because anything.
You want to know about our gear.
How to use it, just tips and tricks is on that YouTube channel initial Cent. So yeah, it's we're pretty easy to get a hold of.
Gotcha. Gotcha. Well, really appreciate having you guys on. Look forward to getting to know you guys better as we work together moving forward. And uh, I can't thank you guys enough. If you're interested in a you know, a pack, you know, looking into something, definitely go check these guys out. Thanks a lot for joining Joe and Dennis, and uh yeah, I can't wait to start. Like I say, share some pictures hopefully with you guys or some video with some some critters in them.
Were excited.
Thank you, thank you. M m.
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