Guidefitter Spotlight Episode 15: Brent Pike, Founder of PYKE Gear

Transcript

Bryan Koontz (00:03), Hey everyone, the following is a conversation with Brent Pike. Brent is the founder and owner of an upland bird company called Pyke Gear. Makes some very innovative pants, hunting pants, mostly designed around bird hunting, but also used for honestly just everyday around town wear as well as some big game stuff. His company also makes some really cool upland game vests with some load bearing belts. So if you're an upland hunter, especially, and you're looking for some, a new brand that's doing some innovative things and materials and breathable pants and so on, check out this conversation with Brent. He's an entrepreneur who just loves hunting, loves the dogs aspect of upland. And I think he's got a really cool company that's the beginning of something that's going to grow from here, certainly outside of bird hunting as well. So. Take a listen to Brent, learn from his vision as an entrepreneur and a little bit more about his company Pyke Gear that's now available on Guidefitter. And with that, welcome to the Guidefitter Spotlight.

Bryan Koontz (00:00), where do you live again? You live in Michigan.

Brent Pike (00:01), Michigan, Grand Haven, which is just outside of Grand Rapids. So we're right on the basically right across the lake from Milwaukee.

Bryan Koontz (00:09), yeah. Milwaukee. That's right. That's right. I remember when you came out here to, to Bozeman and we hung out and broke, broke some bread. I think I mentioned, I lived in Milwaukee for a while when I was, yeah, I went to, I went to college and then I took a little break from my engineering school and I went to work for Harley Davidson. Probably the coolest job I've ever had, you know, working for Harley Davidson in Milwaukee. Yeah. Yeah.

Brent Pike (00:19), That's right, yeah. That would be a pretty cool place to work, yeah.

Bryan Koontz (00:32), And I'm guessing maybe grew up in a hunting family, but maybe I'm wrong.

Brent Pike (00:37), Well, a little bit. My dad did a little bit of rabbit hunting and a little bit of bird hunting. He was a very, very casual hunter, you know, compared to what myself and like my son are, you know, I mean, he enjoyed going out with – to him it was a very social thing, more so than actually, you know, really wanting to get out and get after it and stuff like that. So, but, you know, exposed to it as a kid, but not, you know, in any real hardcore fashion and like that, just local stuff, you know. We could hunt grouse and stuff, chow down our back door and ducks down in the Muskegon River marsh and things like that, but nothing really hardcore.

Bryan Koontz (01:14), Right, right, I gotcha. Now how did you get more into it?

Brent Pike (01:18), Well, in college I worked at a ski shop and did that, actually worked in the ski business for, I guess, three, four years after I graduated college as well. And I left that, got a job in the pharmaceutical industry and actually one of my first client events was a put and take pheasant hunt and I'd never done that before. I was like, wow, I'd never seen a pointing dog work and just saw that and I was just like, wow, this is really cool. I want to try more of this. And, you know, kind of got hooked by, you know, doing some of that stuff and just, just fell in love with it.

Bryan Koontz (01:56), It is addictive. I, I had a yellow lab for her. She lived almost 15. And when she, when she was a pup, you know, I spent—first, I don't know, six, nine months, just hardcore obedience training. And this was back in Pennsylvania, way back there. And a friend had a—you called it—a putting spot or whatever bird farm. And so I went over to him and I was like, I don't know if this dog is going to like, birds or not. So we hooked a chucker to a string and just kind of like, and we wanted to see if my dog Pearl, you know, that was her name...

Brent Pike (02:20), Yep.

Bryan Koontz (02:25), We're like, let's see if she's birdie and she showed some signs and he's like, I think that's a good sign. Let's go up to the field. And so I remember we went up, he went out and stashed a Cockbird pheasant – just one. And I knew where it was; could see like it was by a fence row where there's a tree branch hanging. So I kind of knew roughly where it was. And I remember I was just like, first time I gave the command, "hunt them up." And I'd never, I'd never given that command. And you know, she was, she was great at all the other obedience stuff. And I said, "hunt them up." And she just went into this zigzag pattern.

Brent Pike (02:49), Yep.

Bryan Koontz (02:55), in the field and I kind of strolled along behind her and I knew she was coming up to where that pheasant was placed. She stopped, got birdie, tail went up, you know, and she went on a straight up full-on point. And my friend's walking with me, Keith, and he's like, "My God, you got a pointing lab." And I'm like, I almost cried. It was such a thing of beauty, you know, just to see this dog point. It turns out she was like a 50-50 point. Sometimes she would just circle and I'd give the command and she'd like put a foot in to flush, you know, but…

Brent Pike (03:06), Really?

Bryan Koontz (03:25), the 50% of the time she would point. But anyway, I can understand the addiction is my point to this little story. Yeah.

Brent Pike (03:28), It's an effect. It for sure. I think that's where a lot of people really get into bird hunting – it's the dogs. I mean, we're seeing some pretty good growth in hunting. And a lot of it has to do with people buying, you know, a German shorthair or a Vizsla or something like that, and then realizing, "This is a working dog and, you know, they look cool." And then they start doing a hunt test and they go to a put and take or something like that. Like, wow, this is really cool. And it's fun to watch a dog do what it's…

Bryan Koontz (04:07), 100%. Hi, totally. Yeah. I've gone on several kind of bigger operation upland hunts. There's a really beautiful lodge up in Kimball, South Dakota called Dakota Prairie Lodge. Tony runs that place and their guides run— I mean, they run like four or five dogs at a time. Sometimes I get distracted from the hunt because I'm watching the guide and I'm watching him manage the dogs and I'm just seeing everything going on. Like, wow, it's something to see when you see that at that scale. So yeah, I totally get it.

Brent Pike (04:39), Yeah, I'm an amateur dog handler at best, you know, but watching some of those guys that are professionally handled—I went down to a quail plantation in Georgia last year. A friend of mine invited me. It's a family operation. It's all wild birds. They've been running it for a hundred years down there and watching these guys handle these dogs is like, wow, these guys—it's an art and it really is. It's like watching a maestro at a symphony or something like that. I mean, it's amazing watching these dogs…

Bryan Koontz (05:11), Totally. Nah, totally. Especially when those guides are making sure the hunters are doing the right thing and not doing anything stupid and staying in line—especially if you're working a field with all the folks in line and everything. They're making sure the hunters are good. When the guns crack, a couple of birds are dropping in various places and the dogs are running. I mean, there's a lot going on. That guy's got a whole bunch of stuff—not just the dogs, but the humans. He's responsible for the humans as well. Right. And like, no one's flagging anyone with a shotgun. Right. Yeah, exactly. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Stop flagging that guy with a shotgun. "Where's the dog, the birds over here, you know?" So no, it's super cool. I love that. So, how did you come to the point where you decided that, you know, a lot of the gear that you're using just wasn't good enough? I love the…

Brent Pike (05:44), Right, that's a scary thing. Right.

Bryan Koontz (06:05), You know, the about on your website talks about “it's classic,” right? Which is like, this is a – you don’t have to wear the same stuff our grandparents wore when we go out. You know, so many of the other apparel brands in the industry over the years have realized that. And this is an area that you've identified as ripe for innovation, but how—walk me through that. I love the entrepreneur story of that. When was that flash, like, boom, that light bulb moment where we can do something better?

Brent Pike (06:35), You know, it started pretty early in my hunting career. As I mentioned earlier, working in a ski business, we were using Gore-Tex, Merino wool, polypropylene and all these various fibers to stay warm in miserable conditions, stay dry and windproof, et cetera. And when I first started really getting into hunting—Filson was the brand everybody had to have, you know, they were making pretty good money. So I went out and dropped probably 1500 bucks and bought, you know, a couple pairs of pants, a jacket, a strap vest, shirts, you name it. I bought all the stuff. And I remember it was an early October day. It was probably 40 degrees. The sun had just kind of cracked and there was a good frost on the ground in the morning. So it was cold in the morning, started and, you know, it must have been a great day. Got the spills and, you know, tin cloth is a shelter cloth jacket. I'm like, you know, and…

Bryan Koontz (07:39), Yep.

Brent Pike (07:55), Some of the fishing shirts were this—the Sims, the lightweight nylon fishing shirts that worked pretty well. I mean, they were definitely a step up from the hunting gear. They weren't durable, though. That was the problem with them: they were quick-drying and wicking and all that good stuff. But there were still no good pants out there. So I always tried hunting pants with, you know, chaps over them that would breathe a little better. But chaps just aren't great. They're not comfortable, they're heavy and they get really hot as well. I just was, after 12, 13 years into hunting, like, “This is terrible.” And I started sketching up some ideas. I had a design artist buddy that helped me draw up some designs and I knew that nylon and similar materials work better for quick drying and for not absorbing water like waxed cotton does. But finding actual materials that would perform in really tough environments is difficult. I'm certainly not taking away from elk hunters and backcountry elk hunters, but those guys are not really crashing through brush like bird hunters do. I mean, an average bird hunt for me is, you know, most days I'm walking between 10 and 12 miles—and some days pushing 15—and a lot of times I'm walking trails and easy terrain, but sometimes, you know, with dogs on point, there's a big, blackberry-thick patch you got to go through. Or I was just out in Oklahoma and they had a lot of plum thickets out there. And, you know, you're not wearing your Sitka or your First Light or your Kuiu stuff.

Bryan Koontz (09:15), Right, sure. Now to get shredded. Yeah. Yeah.

Brent Pike (09:42), That stuff, without proper materials, is going to get shredded. Exactly. You know, it probably works fine if you're trucker hunting. But for pheasants, rough grouse, quail and things like that, it's just not really an option for the places I hunt. And so I started digging around and trying to find what manufacturers were making good waterproof, breathable, lightweight, durable fabrics. And I found a few different places that made the fabrics and had my mother-in-law, who was a pretty talented seamstress, start sewing some stuff together for me and just testing things out to see, “Is this something that's even doable?” I didn’t really know anything about it. I had no background in the clothing industry whatsoever other than working at a ski shop. That hardly makes me somebody who's designed to make that stuff. It's like being a car salesman.

Bryan Koontz (10:33), Right.

Brent Pike (10:38), Like a Formula One mechanic. It's not the same, but one thing I'm good at is finding people that are good at their jobs and seeking those people out and seeking advice from them. And I did a lot of market research on Facebook forums and different hunting forums—asking people what they wanted and what they were looking for. And I found there were a lot of guys looking for stuff like I was looking for. They weren't satisfied with the stuff out there either.

Bryan Koontz (10:41), Sure, sure.

Brent Pike (11:05), You know, I mean, was it good quality? Yeah, it was really good quality. There's nothing wrong with the Filson wax cotton pants—they're a good quality item—but it's just like wearing your dad's old wool outfit. It might be good for sitting in the whitetail woods, but if you're going to hike up a mountain and it's 30 degrees with wet, sloppy snow, that wool is going to keep you wet. It doesn't dry out fast. It just doesn’t do the job. And that's what a lot of guys are thinking, like, “Boy, there’s got to be something better out there.” And there is. The tough thing is, with brands like Sitka, Kuiu, and First, I can tell you—it’s expensive. I mean, we're not using cheap material. We have a lot more money invested in material than everybody else does out there. And we use the best of the best materials.

Bryan Koontz (11:48), Yeah.

Brent Pike (11:59), And then the price kind of falls based on what it costs to make. We've got to make a little bit of money on the items as well. That was the big key: finding the stuff that works. I mean, making cool, comfortable stuff is easy. Making it cool, comfortable, and functional—that's another story.

Bryan Koontz (12:18), Yeah, 100%. And I think it's kind of better that you weren't in the apparel industry and didn't know anything about clothing because there are those classic entrepreneur stories—if the founders of Airbnb had come from the hotel industry, they never would have started Airbnb because they would have told themselves from the beginning, “There’s no way people are going to allow strangers to stay in their homes when they're not there.” Right? I think when you come into an industry where you don't have a ton of experience, you just naturally ask, “Why? Why does clothing have to be that way? Why are materials that way? Why can't it be better?” And you're naive enough to lean into that over-optimism that you need as an entrepreneur to know that it’s got to be better. Otherwise, it's a no from day one. So I think that that was probably a strength, not a weakness, that you weren't embroiled in the clothing industry.

Brent Pike (12:43), Right.

Bryan Koontz (12:48), A ton of experience aside, you just naturally ask, “Why does clothing have to be that way? Why are materials that way? Why can't it be better?” And you're naive enough to lean into that over-optimism that you need as an entrepreneur to know that it’s got to be better. Otherwise, it's a no from day one. So I think that that was probably a strength, not a weakness, that you weren't already entrenched in the clothing industry.

Brent Pike (13:01), Yup. Yeah, you know, I never thought of it that way, but you're a hundred percent right. Because I mean, had I known any better, I might have said, “Well, you know, there's a reason why they don't do it.” And I didn’t know any better. I've always been one of those fixers. One of my bosses when I worked in the medical industry said, “Brent, the best problem I ever got from a boss is, you're the best problem solver I've ever worked with in my entire life. I throw something at you and you just naturally figure it out.”

Bryan Koontz (13:20), Totally. Hahaha.

Brent Pike (13:36), You know, how can we fix this? How can we make it right? And that's what I try to do in the upland world—how do I make it right? And we're constantly tweaking our stuff and taking feedback from consumers, changing the fit on things, changing pocket angles, changing pocket designs and game bag sizes, you name it. I mean, we listen to our customers. I know what I want, and I'm not going to deviate from that, but…

Bryan Koontz (13:44), Awesome.

Brent Pike (14:01), I'm going to listen to what my customers want. If there's little things I can do to make things better for them, I'm absolutely going to do it.

Bryan Koontz (14:08), Yeah, no, that's really cool. It's inspiring for other people who are enthusiasts in various aspects of the outdoors. We're all gearheads to some degree, and we all have opinions. And so if you see something you don't like and you think it could be better, just go for it. You don't have to have a PhD in whatever field. If you've got some innovative ideas and you like to work hard and figure it out, that's really cool. And it's inspiring what you've done. So what was your… You had this idea—you're like, “It's got to be better.” You start playing around with some prototypes. What was the first product that you focused on? I know you have—we're going to get into your product line in a minute—but like, what was the first one?

Brent Pike (14:48), Yeah, the first—I came up with two things to start out with: a pant and a shirt. They were really good, and they're called the Kiowa pant and the Kiowa shirt. They were awesome for that early season lightweight hunting. They weren’t exactly what I wanted because I hadn’t found the other materials I was looking for yet for the next level of gear. But it really gave people an insight that, wow, lightweight, quick-drying, durable stuff exists and it worked really well for what it was designed for. It was really designed as a prairie hunting pant—for early season sharp tail, early season pheasant light cover, early season rough grouse light cover—and people just commented, “Man, this stuff is awesome.” And to me, it was nice stuff, really good stuff, but it just wasn’t quite there. And then that’s when we came to the next iteration, where we introduced some water-repellent laminates and really got things to the next level. I thought, wow, this is really where the future is in this stuff.

Bryan Koontz (16:02), And it's called the what? The Kiowa? Where did that name come from?

Brent Pike (16:04), The Kiowa, yeah. Don't ask me to make up a story—so we name all our stuff after areas. The Kiowa National Grassland is a place we hunt out in Kansas and Oklahoma. It's kind of a wild area, and we try to name things after what they're designed for. Like our Tongass Pant is named after the Tongass National Forest, which is a large rainforest.

Bryan Koontz (16:21), That's cool.

Brent Pike (16:29), So it's fitting that our wet weather gear is named after the Tongass National Forest.

Bryan Koontz (16:38), Right, right. Very cool. So you got the pant and the shirt, went through another iteration, and then how did you expand from there?

Brent Pike (16:45), So from there I knew I wanted to have a waterproof—well, not a full waterproof—pant. I think everybody that hunts a lot knows there really isn’t such a thing as a true waterproof breathable pant. I mean, there is for about five minutes, but as soon as you punch a hole through it, it's no longer waterproof. You know, what a lot of people—your customers probably know this even if mine don’t—waterproof breathable is not really designed for what I'm using it for. It’s designed for literally sitting in a duck blind. It's not designed for walking through things where your body produces sweat vapor—which is, you know, a very small droplet of water—while a droplet of rainwater is, let's say, 10,000 times bigger.

Bryan Koontz (17:21), Sitting here.

Brent Pike (17:42), …than the holes in your waterproof breathable laminate. So in theory, it's supposed to breathe through and keep the water out. And that's how it works. But what can happen is that the pressure from walking through things pushes water through it. Our stuff does a pretty good job of keeping that water out. At the end of the day, if you're walking for 15 miles on a wet, rainy day…

Bryan Koontz (18:14), Yeah.

Brent Pike (18:37), Yeah, yeah. It dries so much faster. That's really where the biggest difference is for me—the quick drying of these fabrics sets them apart from cotton and canvas, which are great absorbent fibers. They absorb water. And why do we use a cotton towel when we get out of the shower? It sucks the water right off you. You take a shower in the morning and go back home at 5 o'clock at night, and that towel is still damp. If you use a microfiber towel, you get home and it’s probably dry.

Bryan Koontz (19:01), Yeah.

Brent Pike (19:04), You know, it just isn’t designed to hold that water. I mean, yes, it absorbs some water, but it’s not designed to expand like cotton does, so it dries out extremely fast and you’re much more comfortable in it. It doesn’t weigh as much. I mean, you get a pair of waxed cotton pants that might start out at, say, 28 ounces—get a little wet and next thing you know, you’ve got three pounds of pants on you.

Bryan Koontz (19:29), Yeah, right, yeah, right, right.

Brent Pike (19:29), You know, I mean…

Bryan Koontz (19:41), Right, when you stop walking and sit down to take a break, 20 minutes later you're freezing because all that water vapor has frozen. Yeah, totally. I totally get it. Very interesting. Now, when did you get into—how did you expand from there into the vests and harnesses?

Brent Pike (19:45), Freezing cold, yeah. Yep, yep. The GameVest—so the GameVest was in development even before we launched the shirt and the pants. It was in development, but we wanted to test it. I mean, there's only so much you can do with the GameVest. For anyone watching this who’s interested in upland, there are, I don't know, half a dozen different companies making upland GameVests, and we're all very similar. We all use anywhere from 500 to 1,000 denier Cordura. We all have weight distribution, game belts, pockets—in short, everybody's using the MOLLE system. Now they're all very similar. We were the first to come out with the MOLLE system on our game belts. Nobody else had done that before us. We thought, “This is a great way to make our vest very modular.” And the other guys, honestly, were probably developing about the same time we launched ours. It's not like they stole our idea by any stretch of imagination—they probably were thinking the same thing.

Bryan Koontz (20:54), Sure. Yeah.

Brent Pike (20:57), There are better ways out there. I mean, it’s just that there are better ways to make this stuff—and we weren’t the only ones thinking about it. So that was kind of our GameVest—the second thing. And again, coming from the skiing/backpacking industry, I knew that having a belt that sits on your waist when you're hunting out West is key. When you hunt in the grouse woods in Michigan, most of our hunts are 45 minutes to an hour long, so you can get away with carrying just the essentials.

Bryan Koontz (21:06), I gotcha.

Brent Pike (21:24), A very minimal vest—you need a little bottle of water for your dog, enough to hold probably a dozen or so shotgun shells and a GPS unit. That's literally all you need. Now when you're out West, you want to carry a half-gallon, a gallon of water, maybe a little first aid kit for your dog, because a lot of times you're two, three hours from your car and need a lot more stuff. Carrying all that on your shoulders just beats you up. I mean, you're just like…

Bryan Koontz (21:45), Yeah, right.

Brent Pike (21:51), My gosh, I'm so tired from that shoulder fatigue. By building a really sturdy game belt—a weight-bearing belt—we eliminate all that. It might be a bit overkill for grouse hunting, but guys use it; I use it. Once you have your game bag set up, you don’t want to be switching between your grouse bag, your pheasant bag, and all the others. You buy one and it works for everything.

Bryan Koontz (22:16), Yeah, right.

Brent Pike (22:21), But yeah, that was the big thing we did. I still think our belt is the best one out there. I don’t think anybody else making this stuff has worked in the backpacking industry and understands what a true weight distribution belt means. When you're backcountry hunting, you're going to pack a hundred pounds in your pack. You don't want that weight on your shoulder—it’ll kill you.

Bryan Koontz (22:28), Hmm. No, no, no, no. Yeah.

Brent Pike (23:22), Yeah. And, you know, when you're out West, you're probably carrying a box of shells in your pocket—that's at least two pounds. I usually carry about a half-gallon of water on a three-hour walk—that's four pounds, plus a little medical kit, a snack, a GPS—and then you add in a couple of sharp tails that weigh, say, a pound and a half or two pounds each. Next thing you know, you're carrying 20 pounds. And if you have that weight on your hips, you don't even notice it until you take it off—you're like, “Holy cow, I got a lot of weight on me,” but with a proper belt, you really don’t notice it at all.

Bryan Koontz (24:02), Totally. Yeah. So what's the future of Pyke Gear? How do you see the business growing? What themes do you want to stick with? For example, there's a founder here who owns a company called RAZCO Gear. They make Kydex holsters and some really cool stuff—not too far from the office here in Bozeman. And when you talk to them, they don't want to be just a holster company. His whole goal is…

Brent Pike (24:42), Really?

Bryan Koontz (25:04), Are you the upland company? Are you the technical performance fabric company? Where do you see the business going? And what’s the product roadmap behind it?

Brent Pike (25:11), Yeah, you know, I mean…

Bryan Koontz (25:32), Ha, nice.

Brent Pike (25:42), You know, they wear our stuff—it’s so comfortable. One thing we did differently was we built our patterns from the ground up. We didn’t just buy some cheap patterns from China or the US; we built our patterns from scratch. We had actual guys out in the field, wearing it, using it, trying stuff on and saying, “Wow, this stuff fits really well.” And that's why our stuff fits so well. That’s why we see ourselves expanding into our next phase—we’ve got a pair of fishing pants and a fishing shirt coming out in the spring. We want to continue expanding the upland line. I want to get into duck hunting, maybe even backpacking. I know backpacking is a different crowd than hunters—many backpackers aren’t hunter-friendly—but there are plenty of hunter-friendly guys and gals who would love high-quality, lightweight, durable gear that does it all.

Bryan Koontz (26:33), Yeah.

Brent Pike (26:40), There are going to be some difficulties with some of that stuff. There are plenty of hunter-friendly people who would love super high-quality, lightweight, durable gear. You and I both know that companies like North Face, Marmot, and Patagonia become lifestyle brands—they’re not doing what they once did. And I don’t ever want to lose those roots. I want to make sure we're always servicing our base customer first and foremost. We may expand into other areas as time allows, but I want our hunters and fishermen to always have super high-quality gear. They’re not going to say, “Oh, Pyke's sold out,” while we're selling more polo shirts than hunting pants. And if that happens, that’s fine—but I guarantee we’re not going to stray from our core.

Bryan Koontz (27:31), Sure.

Brent Pike (27:35), …cow-towing to the polo shirt. People like us—the bird hunting folks, the fly fishing folks, the duck hunting guys and gals—know what we want.

Bryan Koontz (27:45), Yeah, yeah. There's a ton of that going on. I was just talking to a guy here in Bozeman. He's definitely an insider; he leads the hunt division for a major apparel company. We're having a good conversation about what's happening in apparel—and I think it's happening in other outdoor sectors too. There's so much pressure for growth, especially considering the boom during COVID, when companies were growing 30, 40, even 50 percent year over year. And many of these companies have private equity owners or parent companies that push for even more growth. So how do you find that growth? You have to go into the lifestyle areas—polo shirts or whatever—where it's not just technical gear for the pursuit. It's like, “Can I wear the same pants when I go quail hunting and then later go shopping with my wife or out to dinner?”

Brent Pike (28:31), Yep.

Bryan Koontz (28:45), Later that night, or you need a whole other set. I think there’s going to be a lot more of that happening in the industry—brands that started as strictly hunting apparel brands will go lifestyle and then into fishing, and vice versa. It’s natural. So brand really matters. Brand loyalty really matters—the quality of the product really matters.

Brent Pike (29:08), Yeah.

Bryan Koontz (29:15), And so I think finding your initial entry point into the industry, like you did, is really important. Then you build that loyal base and expand from there. Someone who loves hunting birds with Pyke Gear is going to love filling up at the gas station in Pyke Gear—they just love that fit.

Brent Pike (29:26), Yeah, that's. Absolutely, that's what we want to do—make it so that the guys and gals who buy our fishing pants, for instance, can wear them to church. I mean, they look that nice and the performance is top-notch. One of my good buddies even wears our pants to church; he says, “These are the most comfortable pants I wear.”

Bryan Koontz (29:57), That's my kind of church.

Brent Pike (30:01), Yeah, he's a blueberry farmer. He literally wears pipe pants 365 days a year—bow hunting, you name it. That's all he wears because they're the most comfortable pants he owns. And that next level is bringing cool, comfortable, durable gear that isn’t as expensive to make. I mean, fishing pants are less expensive to make than hunting pants because we’re not using the same fabrics. For upland hunting in particular, you look at the big game stuff—if you're spot and stalking and sitting on a knob blind, you could use lifestyle pants too, but for hardcore bird hunting you need really durable gear that lasts a long time. I mean, that's the sustainability of our product—it just lasts forever. I had a pair of pants come in the other day where the zipper broke, even though the pants still looked great. I wear these things all the time and love them, but hey, if a zipper snaps, that's why we don't put eight million zippers on our pants.

Bryan Koontz (30:47), Yeah.

Brent Pike (30:59), The pants still look great. I wear them all the time, and even though a guy broke the zipper on his after five years of use, it just goes to show that we don’t overdo it with zippers—because if one breaks, that’s it.

Bryan Koontz (31:10), Sure.

Brent Pike (31:24), For sure, for sure. We've got a really cool new shirt that I'm super excited about. It's called the Kiowa Snapshirt. Our original Kiowa shirt was just a quarter-zip pullover—really lightweight. But there are a lot of guys who want advanced fabrics but with a traditional look. I think this shirt will meet that need. It's really lightweight—made of nylon and spandex, so it stretches and wicks moisture. It's a great early to mid-season shirt. You can throw a base layer on it and wear it down to 40 degrees. I'm really excited about it. We've had it in the works for two years; we had some manufacturing issues with some partners, but we found a better manufacturer who can keep up with our growth and did a bang-up job with these shirts. We're looking forward to launching it. I also mentioned we've got a pair of fishing pants and a fishing shirt coming out later this year. We're updating colors in our game vest, updating both our Tongass and our Dakota pants—in terms of both fit and style—so people can look forward to that. Like I said, we're always innovating and listening to our customers. If we see that our Dakota pants were sewn a little tight by the manufacturer, we'll fix that immediately—we change things midstream if something’s not working. I don't wait for 500 complaints. If I see a pattern, we change it fast and move on.

Bryan Koontz (32:51), Loosen them up, I love it.

Brent Pike (33:16), Hahaha! No, I don't have any investors and… Yeah, I—

Bryan Koontz (33:48), Yeah, I know that. I de-scaled our coffee maker yesterday here in the office, so I know all about that. Well, that's awesome, man. I'm looking forward to trying out some of your stuff. I haven’t gotten my hands on any yet, but now I definitely want a pair of those pants—I mean, you talked them up. I'm always looking for comfy pants.

Brent Pike (34:04), There you go, right on. You'll love them. And we're getting a lot of guys—sheep hunters, elk hunters—who bought them for bird hunting and started wearing them for that too. I think there’s going to be a natural progression for us into the big game world with guys wearing this stuff. And we might do a few tweaks here and there; some of those guys want cargo pockets, which might not be ideal for bird hunting, but if we can add a cargo pocket here or there to give a little versatility…

Bryan Koontz (34:35), Sure.

Brent Pike (34:47), There are some easy ways to bring that into the big game world and get guys using this stuff for multiple purposes because it's durable, fits well, and people love it.

Bryan Koontz (34:59), Why not add cargo pockets on the bird gear? Just one more thing to snag on. Is that the deal? Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right.

Brent Pike (35:03), Exactly. It's a great point. And we often get asked, “Why don’t you have vents in your pants?” I'm like, “Two reasons: one, if you're using the right fabric, you don’t need vents; and two, vents are just asking for trouble.” Even if you're hunting out West in sagebrush, if you have a vent open and it hooks on the brush, you'll rip out the mesh or mess up the zipper. You can end up ripping the whole area. And if you use the right fabric, your gear will breathe just fine.

Bryan Koontz (35:16), Yeah.

Brent Pike (35:31), Regardless, I'm sorry, but if it's 75 or 80 degrees, it's going to be hot. Just deal with it.

Bryan Koontz (35:35), Yeah, right, yeah, yeah. Maybe try hunting shorts in the sage and see how that goes for you.

Brent Pike (35:39), Right. Yes, exactly. I’ve hunted in 80-degree weather plenty of times out in Montana in early September. Am I warm? Yeah, I'm warm. But I'm not dying like I would have if I were wearing some waxed, heavy stuff—I can tell you that much.

Bryan Koontz (35:56), Yeah. Well, I'm looking forward to you coming back out to Montana. Next time you come, instead of just having lunch, we should get our dogs together and do it in bird season. Here at the office, pretty much everyone—except me, since I'm thinking about getting a new dog since my dog Pearl, who almost made it to 15, passed about two years ago—has a lab. Everyone's got a lab here, but anyway, they're good bird dogs. A lot of waterfowl hunters here too.

Brent Pike (36:17), It's time. For sure.

Bryan Koontz (36:26), It would be great to hunt with you—come out, bring your dogs and spend some time. You can work remotely from the office if you want, but I'd love to just spend some time with you out in the field. That would be a lot of fun.

Brent Pike (36:30), Love to.

Bryan Koontz (36:43), Right, yeah. That's right. Totally. That'd be awesome. Well, Brent, it's been great talking to you. I'm always excited to talk to entrepreneurs who see a better way and then just go for it—so many people have ideas but never find the energy or the way to act on them. And you did, and you've got some great products. I really appreciate the time talking to you, and I really appreciate you jumping on the Guidefitter platform. For anyone listening…

Brent Pike (37:29), That sounds awesome, Brian. I appreciate being able to join you guys. I’ve been a Guidefitter customer for probably four or five years, and I finally got ahold of Mark this past fall asking, “What would it take to work with you?” I'm glad we met up. I enjoyed breaking bread with you at lunch at MAP and look forward to working together in the future. It’d be a great partnership.

Bryan Koontz (37:48), Yeah, sounds good, man. Brent Pike—check him out on Guidefitter.

Brent Pike (37:58), Thank you, Brian.