visiting Kirkhams
I'm typing this at 2:00am in NYC. Off to bed soon.
I thought I'd relate the fun we had visiting Kirkhams in SLC yesterday. We left the Outdoor Retailer show about an hour early and set out to find and visit this retailer in the SLC area. They're not only a customer for our candle lanterns (although they don't buy directly from us, rather through a distributor), but they're also one of the customers for our metal-working talents. We have made thousands of T-shaped fittings for them over the years, including many in the last few months since I've taken over. I knew the fittings were used in a tent sold by Kirkhams, but I wanted to see it for myself.
The tent line is called Springbar. There are about 14 varieties, almost all of which have a major structural element consisting of an aluminum tube passing over the top of the tent. The joints at the ends of the bar each use one of our fittings. We only make 2 sizes, but they use them for 14 different tents. Pretty clever!
You can see the fitting in the top center part of the picture below. The aluminum tube has been crimped in place on the fitting.
It was also fun to visit their candle lantern area. We bought several items on the "product development" budget for later examination. They were selling knockoff candles made for our lanterns. Although slightly cheaper, they seemed to be more uniform in look and feel than the ones we sell. There's definitely some room for quality improvement in our candle line.
We also bought a Cocoon XL, a neoprene protective cover for the Candlelier. This was a real treasure to us because we haven't sold them in a few years and we don't have many examples. We'd like to reintroduce some sort of protective bag for the big lantern so it was a delight to find this.
Finally, I will recommend against Ono's Hawaiian Food in SLC. Although the food was indeed ono (it tasted good), it wasn't particularly Hawaiian. I was hoping for laulaus, lomi salmon, kalua pig, etc. Good barbeque, but none of the other delights.
I thought I'd relate the fun we had visiting Kirkhams in SLC yesterday. We left the Outdoor Retailer show about an hour early and set out to find and visit this retailer in the SLC area. They're not only a customer for our candle lanterns (although they don't buy directly from us, rather through a distributor), but they're also one of the customers for our metal-working talents. We have made thousands of T-shaped fittings for them over the years, including many in the last few months since I've taken over. I knew the fittings were used in a tent sold by Kirkhams, but I wanted to see it for myself.
The tent line is called Springbar. There are about 14 varieties, almost all of which have a major structural element consisting of an aluminum tube passing over the top of the tent. The joints at the ends of the bar each use one of our fittings. We only make 2 sizes, but they use them for 14 different tents. Pretty clever!
You can see the fitting in the top center part of the picture below. The aluminum tube has been crimped in place on the fitting.
It was also fun to visit their candle lantern area. We bought several items on the "product development" budget for later examination. They were selling knockoff candles made for our lanterns. Although slightly cheaper, they seemed to be more uniform in look and feel than the ones we sell. There's definitely some room for quality improvement in our candle line.
We also bought a Cocoon XL, a neoprene protective cover for the Candlelier. This was a real treasure to us because we haven't sold them in a few years and we don't have many examples. We'd like to reintroduce some sort of protective bag for the big lantern so it was a delight to find this.
Finally, I will recommend against Ono's Hawaiian Food in SLC. Although the food was indeed ono (it tasted good), it wasn't particularly Hawaiian. I was hoping for laulaus, lomi salmon, kalua pig, etc. Good barbeque, but none of the other delights.
posted by Keith @ 10:45 PM
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