Pure class!

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I’ve been a geek for a good 10 years now (although I love both tech things and women equally!), and I’m passionate for the outdoors. What I’ve managed to do is put together a list of recommended stuff that combines both of these in one place. So here it is, enjoy..

1: Oakley Thump Pro MP3 Sunglasses

Why I like it They’re lightweight, hold 1gb of storage, and look pretty cool when I’m snowboarding. Very easy to take the buds out your ears and use them as a pair of decent shades too.

2: Quicksilver U-Ramp I-PodJacket

Why I like it Buttons down the left hand side are responsive and enables me to control my integrated ipod. Easy to manipulate when moving fast. The Jacket is also a decent outer shell too.

3: Keen Burnside Laptop Pack

Why I like it Has a little pouch to fit my macbook pro into it. Side entry zip is genius for getting into a packed bag with all my RoR programming books. High quality material too.

4: PowerMonkey Explorer

Why I like it A slim clam-shell of solar panels for recharging my gadgets while out and about. Handles my ipod, iphone, and PSP no probs. Takes a couple of hours to charge, but nothing like being able to juice up my stuff while at the top of remote mountain.

5: Space Invaders jacket

Why I like it I had to order this from Denmark and not sure if you can still get it. Even so - it has loads of little pixelated alien dudes from Space Invaders on it. What more can I say!

Ok - that’s what I’ve got for now. Let me know if you agree with it in the comments - but personally these are THE best outdoor tech gear items by far..

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We’ve started rolling out some new site updates recently and the first elements are the new landing pages for our brands, starting with Berghaus, Mountain Equipment, and Keen.

First thing you’ll notice is an actual brand header outlining the brand’s message in more detail and some text explaining a bit about them, with relevant links to new products in their range or explanations of the technology they’re using (click the image below to see it full size):

Each product range the brand stocks is outlined in a cleaner fashion, and we are now showing the bestseller list from that brand on the left hand side. Overall - nothing major but a sign of what we’re doing right now - small, incremental changes, based on what we’ve learnt from the last few months of user stats and feedback.

Now believe me when I say this is the 15th variant we came up with before putting it live… all fun and games.

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So the inevitable happened, the kid came along and as a result all our best laid plans of heading walking crashed and burned. The last couple of months, however, have seen a bit of a rennaisance due to one tidy piece of kit, the Macpac Vamoose. The Vamoose has had us strolling the beaches of the Isle of Wight, the South Downs and the fields of Kent in places where you would not be able to get a buggy and has had led to some seriously happy parents.

A couple of things have really impressed me about it’s design, firstly the hip belt. As you can imagine with Sprog and all his attachments in tow, he weighs a ton, so comfort in carrying something so heavy was the top order of the day. The hip belt feels like I have been cuddled by a bear, e.g. soft and strong and so it take a lot of the weight. The shoulder and back system are to Macpacs usual high quality - all in all it is a very comfortable ride.

It also has a fair few features that also get the thumbs up. Firstly a zip off day pack which is awesome for carrying all his bits and bobs. You can then simply take off the backpack if you need to go and chenge his nappy anywhere or if you want your partner to spread the load. Secondly, the sun shade and rain cover are fantastic and keep the worst of the weather from your child. We had a trek through snow whilst in Kent and all the while he was gurgling away happy as larry on my back. Finally there is so much space in the bottom of the pack along with the zip off day sack that we end up just taking the Vamoose when we head out.

Things you may not be as happy about are that it is quite heavy due to all the attachments and there are definitely cheaper ones out there. From our perspective however we love it and are looking forward to some happy tramping over the next year or two. One final word as with any kiddy carrier though is to introduce your kids nice and early. The later you leave it, the less happy they are getting in to one we have found in our experience with friends kids!

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The other week James, Phil (that’s me), Colin, and Rich hot-tailed it over to the ISPO show in Munich to get a real feel for the size of the outdoor industry and meet a lot of new brands that we wanted to sign up to the site and shop. James will probably do a follow up post to this soon, but from my perspective, the main thing that struck me was the sheer size of the thing. The exhibition centre itself was about 15x that of the NEC in Birmingham and it took us the whole day to go through 3 of the 21 halls!

There was a huge number of brands present all showcasing their entire range and I’m amazed by how many products there actually are out there and what a small % of them we actually stock right now. I think if we had unlimited cash we would have bought up everything there including the really cute kid’s walking boots!

We’ve signed some top brands for that event that will go live later this year and started to pre-order the gear. Even my favourite ones are now ready to go live… of which I think Merrell went live on monday…

Key Highlights for me:

• A taxi driver taking us down some dodgy country back roads in the middle of nowhere late one night
• Living the high life in the 1* hotel Jame had booked us all into - and we had to share a room with bunk beds!
• James drinking a good 8 steins of 2 pint beers and feeling a bit worse for wear on the morning of our flight
• Signing our new brands and having some great team strategy meetings after having missed our initial flight.

I’ve put some photos below from the event and you can see the full set here on Flickr

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Sorry it’s been a while since any of us posted on here - we’ve had the most manic couple of months known to man. Our traffic and sales projections for all of 2008 were beaten a week ago and we’ve been rapidly scaling things up to cope with all the extra orders. It’s been an amazing ride so far and this year looks set to be one hell of a steep, yet fun curve.

Over the weekend we got a sudden spike in traffic and then heard that Webtogs has been featured in a full page spread in the Telegraph - hurray! I can’t find a link to the online version yet (maybe they haven’t put it live yet) so here’s the scanned in article (click on it to see a larger version)

Our Zero hassle, eco-friendly, easy-to-use site messages came across really well and we’re chuffed to bits. Who would have thought that a small campfire chat last year would result in so much so soon…Onward!

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