New skis in 2006, Atomic/Dynastar/K2

Wogio: With respect to Atomics: regarding weight, it only really applies to the B:5 which are honking heavy (increased my bicep circumference by 2 inches).

The M:11 and M:10's don't utilize the beta 5 lobe construction, hence they're built more like normal skis.

It's also true that the Neox binding is more than 1 lb lighter per pair.

Net result: you're cruising!

no changes in legend line other than the mounting point of the 8800.

I also heard the legend pro will be a couple hundred less. Perhaps it's no longer being made in the race room?

I believe the Luv series just has cosmetic changes, why mess with a good thing.

The M9 should be the same as the M10 and the M11 will be the same as the B5...now since the Metron changes the tip and tail for each length, what length are these demensions for?

I've heard rumors that Atomic prices are going up for next season. I also heard that they are going to try to block internet sales. I don't know how.

Atomic 918,

Maybe they plan on trying to keep them away from the online only retailers? How is it in their best interest to keep their skis off of the internet though, I don't understand that...

-Craig

The (Internet) age old disintermediation challenge. It never works, but one can try...

Craig: As a manufacturer's national sales manager, I can assure you that internet sales can severly damage any brand which depends upon dealer distribution and support.

No dealer want's to inventory product that consumers can buy for discount prices on the internet. What's the motivation?

In some cases, people go to dealer showrooms to check-out gear (including boots), absorb ample time from the dealer, and then buy the whole shebang on ebay. To add insult to injury, they sometimes return to the dealer with their ebay purchases to have their bindings mounted and boots fitted. It happens!

Unless a brand is configured for on-line mechandising, internet sales can be a death knell. Companies trying to build distribution and brand profile do their best to limit on-line sales with dealer contracts.

This is especially true for products which depend upon specialty shops for promotion and system sales (boots, bindings, skis, etc.).

Captain,

I guess you have a good point, but I feel like all of this is just interference with the market economy doing its job. I personally refuse to buy outdoors gear (whether it be for skiing, nordic, biking, hiking, etc.) at MSRP unless it's something I absolutely need at that time.

With the inevitable sales that always happen, and the deals that can be had on the internet, I'd rather save my money unless something is absolutely necessary. Having the internet also makes things a lot easier for those of us who don't necessarily live in a place with access to a lot of shops. My local shop only sells Fischer, Rossignol, and Dynastar, and I refuse to shop there after they sucessfully tried to sell me the wrong size boots (they are pretty much a cycling shop which brings in a little bit of ski equipment to make it through the cold central New York winter). 50 miles away, I can get Volkl, Head, Salomon, and Rossignol. That's pretty much it unless I head all the way up to the Syracuse metro area (about 75 miles). If I am going to over pay for skis at a ski shop over 50 miles away that can't give me support as a local customer, why would I not just want to buy over the internet in the first place?

Also, I know what you are saying about people going back to a dealer with the gear they got off eBay, but shouldn't that dealer do everything in their power to make sure that a person doesn't walk off and take their business else where? Don't get me wrong, I want to support the local business as much as possible also, but when a shop doesn't go that extra mile to win me over, it just isn't worth it.

I am also curious, have any other ski manufacturer's tried to run interference like this before?

-Craig

Craig: Your point is valid.

Our company does its utmost to limit or quash internet sales. It's a non-stop struggle (we lose dealers if our stuff shows up on auction sites). I also like to "buy local" whenever I can.

However, modern realities also abide. I searched virtually every ski store in Washington and Oregon for Atomic Metron B:5's, and came up empty. I finally bought them - guess where? - ebay!

Sometimes, either through lack of access, lack of service or lack of decent pricing, local dealers can't provide the goods.

But, I'll still go local if I can. I'm willing to pay a bit more and buy locally, especially if I know I receive after-sales support and an upgrade path.

Craig; I don't have a clue. It seems to me that it is going to put retailers in a worse position than they already are. And I have no idea how they would close all the loop holes.

All the responses are valid. Everyone wants the best gear at the lowest price. So, if every thing you want is available on line, then what are retailers supposed to do? They can't compete.

Also, if this is true, I give Atomic cudos for addressing the problem. But, unless the other manufacturers follow the leader, its seems to me that Atomic is going to put itself in a difficult position. People are brand loyal as long as everything is at par. Start tilting the scales and people will start jumping ship. Fools walk, money talks!

If you ask me, the whole economy is screwed up. But, I was just reporting what I heard!!!!

Damn - - wish I would have gotten those Metron 11s from Backcountry!!!!

I believe the 05/06 8000 has a new topsheet (different colours?) could be wrong though (might have been a Euro thing).

I did that this year, well, I bought skis and bindings on eBay based on a demo and personal knowledge and had them mounted at a store that sold the same brand. As a consumer, what motivation do I have to pay $799 (Canadian) for skis and $330 for bindings when I can get the same for $500 and $225 on eBay for an identical product? I actually did feel bad doing it because I like to support local stores, but I'm not going to do it out of my pocket for 45% more. I bought my boots local for custom fitting, I wouldn't feel good buying over ebay and then having a shop work on them. Same for apparel. Unfortunately for brick and mortar, the internet is a cheaper way of selling quantities and deep discounting, it's market efficiency. As you said, the manufacturers should be attempting to discourage it but I'm not sure that is possible.

?Prevent internet sales of anything under the sun? These people must be living in the past. The much more powerful entertainment industries can barely manage to exert some control over internet sales. And a ski company thinks it can "prevent" such sales. People like this should get out of business altogether. Internet sales are here to stay. The companies that learn to deal with that fact the most creatively are ultimately going to do best. Witness the manufacturers rep who bought there ultimately because--duh--there was more selection than his beloved local dealer could provide.

This is copied directly out of the FAQ's on Volkl's site:

"Can I order directly from this site?
We are the authorized distributor for Völkl products in the United States and sell only to authorized retailers. We currently do not authorize ANY retailers to sell our ski equipment on line."

The next question in the FAQ regards returns for warranty. I wonder if Volkl wouldn't honor the warranty if you bought off the 'net and then tried to return through an authorized brick and mortar retailer. Might be one way to enforce it. Just thinking out loud.


Glenn
"I know you can fight, it's our wits that make us men."

Keeping music and videos off the web is next to impossible. Skis are different. You can't buy a pair, copy them, and sell them to someone else, while keeping your own.

IMO, atomic can limit internet sales very easily. From what I've heard in most of the shops I've been to, a lot of them WANT to sell atomic, but are not authorized by atomic. This means that if Atomic says "Any skis we find on ebay that are tracked back to you, you loose your dealer authorization." Simple, you sell a pair of skis out the door as a dealer, and show proof of sale. Then if that pair on get on ebay , they are second hand, nothing you can do about that. Once equipment leaves the shop, stopping it from getting on ebay is impossible.... but who would buy a ski for 600 dollars, and try to sell if for cheaper? Actually, it woudl probably drive the cost of internet sales for Atomic up a bit.

I think a threat like that would shut down most of the shops not based solely on online sales, and the ones build with online sales, well I'm sure Atomic knows who they are.

Just my opinion

Internet sales work well for some market segments, but aren't necessarily compatible with evey business model. Just because some items sell well on the internet, it doesn't mean that every retail business is suited to this medium.

The most successful companies in my business - high-end audio and home theater - strictly avoid internet sales because it kills retail distribution. How many consumers spend $100,000 on a multi-channel A/V system purchased on-line?

To equate "on-line" with modern is simplistic. Remember the dot.com bubble burst? Suddenly NASDAQ shares tumbled through the floor and brick-and-morter shares became sexy again.

On-line is great for a lot of things. But, it doesn't serve all products and segments. If on-line sales damage the brand, mfgr's can easily shut them down by denying product.

Long-term, the market decides what distribution model is most efficient. So long as people need to see and feel something before they buy, or require pre/after sales service, in-person sales will still have a place.

Internet model for ski sales

How about this business model. X-Ski company decides to invest heavily in internet sales. They contract with local shops in major metropolitan areas or destination resorts to provide demo rental/advice/binding adjustments/service. Purchaser chooses skis/bindings and purchases on-line. Skis/bindings are shipped from warehouse directly to purchaser. Purchaser brings to local shop for binding adjustment. Lack of middle-man mark-up and inventory issues results in lower price and much greater availability of merchandise. Purchaser gets product without hassle at lower price. Shop makes money off from service not sales and has no inventory woes. IBM thought PCs couldn't be sold by direct mail or over the internet. Michael Dell became a billionaire proving how wrong they were. The "Amazonization" of ski sales? Perhaps. But did you ever try to buy an uncommon title in a bookstore in Small-Town USA? How many people on this forum complain that they can't find the model they want in the length that they want? Once a manufacturer finds that they can move a lot more merchandise this way, the whole paradigm will change. Remember how many ski areas originally banned snow boarders? Now you can count them on one hand. As I said originally, some people live in the past.

If that model were widely adopted it would no doubt be far more efficient than retailers around a large geographical area (North America) each holding small amounts of inventory which loses value very quickly. Over several years, manufacturers would have very good sales data from which to judge production numbers from and avoid price slashing at the end of the season.

I think that skis and ski/binding systems are actually a great product for Internet distribution. What do you really have to do to set up a ski other than what you do to maintain it? Nothing. What do you have to do to set up a ski/binding system that can't be documented easily in a brief user's guide? Nothing. I set up my Fischer RX8 RailFlex in about 10 minutes on my family room floor. What is it about skis that requires real service from a dealer?

Boots, obviously, are a different deal, as are "flat" skis that need to be mounted (although I would argue that the skill and equipment necessary for mounting is relatively limited and covered by the typical $25-$35 mounting charge).

Next, someone will tell me I shouldn't order poles on-line, either... :

I'd like to support local shops more but the price isn't even close. I went into a shop yesterday to find a Lange buckle for my niece. They let me dig through their junk box and gave it to me free. I looked at their skis and nothing was under $450, most of what interested me was over $600. I haven't paid over $300 for any of my skis online.

Free replacement buckles are nice, but not worth $300 extra.

A good shop might be a repair, mounting, waxing, advice, and online brokerage service, sort of like the ebay stores.

Agreed

Unfortunately, your probably right about this. I've just bought 2 sets of Atomics with Device bindings from 2 different UK retailers via their websites but one of them removed the Atomic-supplied set-up instruction and "insisted" that I take them to one of their shops to get the job done. Suppliers/manufacturers seem to be doing all that they can to prevent the public getting access to instruction books or allowing them to do their own maintenance (this is the reason that I'll never buy another Marzocchi fork for any of the 5 mountain bikes in my family - but that's another story).

This whole bussiness of online sales Vs brick and morter stores arugment is going to be around for a long time. The ski Industry has a dilema on it's hands. One support The shops that have been thier customer base for years as well as increase thier sales and profits. The Small ski retailer hasa lot of competion out there. the big Box retailers and now internet sales. Both these things hurt the small guy. if you are a retailer in a small resort town you have a small base of customers. You have a big fight on your hands for every sale. Your main weapon is service. My personal opinion is that there needs to bea new bussiness model for the ski shop. A modle that reflects the New consumer and how that consumer is spending thier money. Ebough makes some every good points. Amazon has changed the way we buy books and related products. The big retailers like Barns and Noble have responded by now offering on line sales and making thier stores more attractive and having an in store service center that you can use to order those hard to find titles. The store is now a place to hang out have coffee and enjoy an afternoon I buy a lot of art magazines and books from the store but still use the net as well. If i were to go into the ski retail bussiness I would do pretty much what Surefoot has done. Lets not get into the good and the bad of Surefoot. Thats a whole thread into it's self. But you can not argue with the fact that for the last few years they have been The fastest growing bussiness in the ski industry. Boot fitting are the one thing that you can not get over the net. Sure you can buy boots however howmany people can just put on boots right from the box? i would guess maybe 1 in 20? My store would focuse on bootsand fitting. In fact I would go as far as having an orthopedic dr as a consultant and for training the staff. Skis and binding would be just an added feature to the shop. They would be sold at a discounted price. I would have a large inventory of demo skis. Service would be the name of the game. The new reality is on line sales are here to stay and the local shop needs to takea good hard look at how they do bussiness and how they can move forward into the future.

Wow. Interesting discussion.

On a personal experience level, I agree with Captain Strato. Some markets, ski gear being one of them, are not particularly well served by internet sales. Internet sales are 'forcing the hand' of the smaller ski specialty shops at an alarming rate, and the reality is that many of them will be out of business within 5 years. Who's going to mount/tune/warranty your skis then? Gart Sports? That's a nauseating option.

However, on a practical level, I agree that ski internet sales are here to stay, and the smart shop owner needs to adapt his business plan, and fast.

What's really at issue here is "legitimate" internet vs. Ebay. Most ski manufacturers can accept their authorized dealers selling online (Volkl does to, regardless of what their website says.) This usually means that the skis will sell at their manufacturer-set MAP prices and the dealer has experience handling returns and warranty, so the odds of a happy customer are probably the same as if said customer walked into the retail store.

However, the same cannot be said of most ebay transactions. Obviously, many ebay sales go well, or else we wouldn't be talking about it. That said, I know the percentage of happy customers is not as high as it is for a traditional purchase, and this is a cause for concern with the manufacturers, often because the consumers ask them to solve the problems.

Example:

Ebay customer: "Uh, hello. I bought some x skis with y "system" bindings from Ebay. I took them to my local dealer to get mounted and they mentioned that I should have received the x system binding. I contacted the Ebay seller and they said the y binding would work just fine, don't worry about it. That may be true, but I'd really like my skis to be exactly the way they are pictured on your website, so can I just swap the bindings with you?"

Manufacturer: "Well, um, geez, system bindings are not sold as separates, so I can't really help you. You should really contact the seller who sold you the wrong binding and ask for the right one..."

Result: local store doesn't get sale, customer gets confused and potentially unhappy, and manufacturer appears unhelpful is solving a problem they did nothing to create. Happens more often than people think, and none of it is good.

Regarding warranty, most manufacturer's reps tell the shops that any merchandise purchased through Ebay is not covered by any warranty. Right or wrong, this is seldom enforceable unless the consumer readily admits the source of the skis during the return process.

Regarding Atomic, the same company that sold directly to Overstock.com is now going to clamp down on their "rogue" dealers who may want to sell legitimately on the internet?

Sure, they are :

If they did that, I'm pretty sure I'd no longer be an Atomic dealer...

troutman, why do you think that ski sales are not particularly well-served by Internet sales? I think that just the opposite is true (and think Utah49 has it right). Let's face it, honestly, how many specialty retailers, even in a place like Boulder, have staff that can give you as much and as accurately as EpicSki.com (as a hypothetical )? Combine EpicSki.com with a solid on-line retailer (like BackCountry.com, for example?) with solid inventory and good prices, and I think that it competes well with the top of the ski retail marketplace.

Does this mean that the specialty retailer has to go the way of the spotted owl? Of course not! It just means that ski retailers have to adapt their business model to current reality. The lessons of the past 15 years on the Internet make it clear that artificially trying to manage the Internet channel just does not work for commodity sales (within which I argue ski and binding sales fall). The retails impacted by the Internet have learned how to thrive within the new environment--or they have not survived.

How? Well, how about posting Amazon reviews in their bookstores? How about using EpicSki.com affiliation as a means of generating business? I think that the ski industry is a bit behind in this regard (as well as some others), and those retailers that take this on will be quite successful.

Focus profit on those areas requiring expertise and service. Make everything else simply pay for itself. And stop trying to move product that isn't of the highest quality (and you know what I mean!).

I should have been more specific in my original post. I think authorized dealers selling AND servicing ski product online is tolerable. I don't think it is great - there are still the obvious issues of lack of demo-ability, mounting, and return service - but done properly I'm on board with it.

It is Ebay that have a specific disdain for, and I know I am in the minority amongst the other bears on this topic. The odds of an Ebay buyer purchasing product that is a less-than-perfect choice is far greater on Ebay than via any other method. It is true that a knowledgeable consumer, such as many on this forum, can find bargains, but keep in mind that we are 2,000 out of 10 million.

I think your idea about online sales aided by epicski are creative and progressive, perhaps too much so for the current state of ski retail. Most people don't like change, and ski shop owners are at the top of that list. If any ski manufacturer were to totally embrace the internet, like your example, they would lose 50% of their specialty business out of spite - without knowing if they could make up those numbers via the internet alone- and this is why they aren't going in that direction, at least yet.

I agree, as I stated in the original post, that ski specialty shop must be seriously reviewing/adapting their current business model. If they don't, they will be out of business. That being said, even if every shop in the land changed their plan today, not all of them will survive with the tune/mounting/bootfitting expertise story.

There's a point within this debate that I am surprised nobody has mentioned yet. Most here seem to think online/Ebay sales are great because the competition brings prices down. OK, let's assume that this idea "wins" and 5 years from now it's considered "normal" by most of the 10M US skiers to buy your skis online...

Why would the manufacturers need the shops at all?

The manufacturers could skip it altogether and sell online themselves. What does this do to prices? Gives the manufacturer more control, which probably means a higher average price to the consumer.

This idea already been discussed within the industry. Soon, it will actually be put into use by a leading snowboard maker.

Is that what we all want?

What's funny about this?

http://www.overstock.com/cgi-bin/d2....=Atomic+ski s

There are only 2 models left now, there were 6 a few weeks ago.

So either a) Atomic sold to Overstock.com, or 2) your fancy "tracking system" ain't worth squat, or more probably 3) Atomic doesn't care what their dealers do to get rid of unsellable product.

pistonbully, I've heard Japan. Am I close?

Cry me a river, dude. Are the skis Atomics or not?

What other "facts" are relevant?