|
There are no translations available.  2002 We got a logo. I had a brief discussion with Chris Turpin at a Molson Snow Jam contest in Vancouver that summer, asking about what name he liked best, "Forcast" or "Forefront." He said "Forefront" and so it was named. I needed a name because that was my first contest I had to provide the announcer a sponsor list. I think then, we used the correct spelling but later that fall, decided on the alternative spelling and it was done. I started working with a friend of mine on conceptualizing a garage factory, at the same time with another friend on designing a website. I was hitting up a third friend on legal advice of how to protect the name, layout a solid plan for investment and that's when the partnership between Joe Stumpf and myself was born. Joe was a businessman coming from a burnt out corporate environment and I specialized in skiing, carpentry and art - a perfect match. Team: Matt Sterbenz Factory: My apt parking lot, Jay Grube's garage Finance: My sponsorship savings Office: NA Employees: Matt, Joe, James the designer and Jason the garage snowboard builder Products: Preliminary Blueprint series, stickers and letterhead. Setbacks: Too many to list Strides ahead: Partnership  2003 We finalized our business plan and started to venture out into making skis in a real factory. Given our lack of experience and direction, we headed into a slightly larger garage environment located in East Los Angeles. We learned there about engineering and how important that would be. We started off with a dozen prs. of cores and some remnant raw materials we scored from a snowboard materials distributor based out of Seattle, which soon after closed up shop. Of the 12 pairs, we got 2 pairs of ski-able skis. Quality only their creators could look at with a smile. We ate a lot of In N Out burger, practically knew every Home Depot employee and burned through some start up cash quickly. We debuted our product at Parkasaurus, a film/photo shoot at June Mtn, California. I arrived late to the shoot due to complications at the factory. Joe and I were stoked to be there with our skis. Everyone laughed and a few applauded our efforts. We also made our first company presence at Camp of Champions, Whistler BC, that summer and shortly after, signed up Steele Spence to our rider/owner family. Team: Matt Sterbenz, Luke Van Valin, Steele Spence and Griffin Cummings Factory: Munson mfg based in E. LA, then moved to 5 Axis in Huntington Beach in the fall. Finance: Secured our first private investor, who we still work with to this day. Office: Truckee, coffee shops in LA, hotel rooms Employees: Matt, Joe, James, Jason and Bob, our new engineer who we also still work with to this day. Products: MSP (160, 170, 180), accessories. Setbacks: Joe fried his computer with a lay-up table of magnets Strides ahead: We made a legit pair of skis and delivered to some shops.  2004 We were in business. Had expanded our retailer network through daily cold calls. We started to get the hang of manufacturing skis and learned a lot of un-orthodox techniques to get the job done. A big part of our intention with Steele was to get busy building a park ski - to compliment the MSP's all mountain performance and Steele's XGames contest schedule. At this time, many mid-west and east coast dealers were interested but not in how wide our skis were (92mm). They routinely commented on them being powder skis. We would scratch our heads and push on till we got a good set of dealers that knew what was up. We introduced the line at SIA in Las Vegas that year. It was our first show and still to this day, one of our cooler booths. We had a good "Bad Boy" image in the ski hall. Few exhibitors would even come into the booth, Jason from Line was cool to us though. He saw the passion we had. Steele's ski was a success right out of the blocks and we began to talk international distribution and entering into some bindings. Team: Matt, Luke, Steele, Griffin, Oakley White Allen, Eric Hjorleifson and Sammy Carlson Factory: 5 Axis in Huntington Beach, California Finance: Self funded with the developments of some export loans Office: A condo Joe rented in Tahoe Donner, Truckee, California and a small room attached to a garage in San Clemente we built bunk-beds in. Employees: Matt, Joe and Bob. We started appointing sales reps as well across the country. Products: MSP (w/ the 187 length), STL, VCT early stages, accessories. Setbacks: Japan distribution was compromising our factory quality (in a good way), we needed to take our quality up to start selling into new markets Strides ahead: Magazines started to declare our position and focusing on our products unique performance.  2005 The turning point. We had grown out of our LA factory, had designs for some new skis and brought on some new riders. By now, Niklas Karlström from Sweden and Quebec legend Vincent Dorion came aboard as rider/owners. We had gained an even clearer perspective on how we were to compete with the boom in freeride skiing and set our sails straight towards bigger factories. This year production had come out of Option Snowboards factory in Vancouver, a short term supplier of ours until we could get in with Elan, located in Slovenia. We had also come off our first year introducing bindings to the market and so our supply chain began to shift from North America to Europe. We took some team trips to both Mega Park (Norway) in the spring and Powder Mountain in the early season. We started to work on the forever ongoing project called the EHP and the family of owners were as active in filming and designing than ever. We spent almost everything we had to redesign molds for the new factory and new models. We introduced the line at ISPO, in Munich, a tradeshow 10X the size of SIA in Vegas. We had a heavy sales schedule with retailers growing coast to coast in both N. America as well now in Europe, Scandinavia and Japan. We moved the offices to Salt Lake City and finally got our own warehouse. Staff was slim but ideas were huge and growth was abundant - in both units and team rider coverage. Team (as then advertised): Matt, Steele, Eric, Vincent Dorion and Niklas Karlström. Other pros were: Wiley Miller, Charles Bedard, Erich Kunz, Christian Sirianni and many others. Factory: Option in Vancouver, Elan in Slovenia, a binding factory in Italy Finance: Export loan died with factory switch, gained some more private and started to recycle profits back into operating costs. Office: Salt Lake City Employees: Matt, Joe, Bob, intern Jeremy which later became full time Customer Service, friends and family Products: MSP, STL, TNK, VCT, Deadbolt bindings and started up poles and further advancing our accessories collection. Setbacks: Cost of moving production out of US and creating new molds. Strides: Expanding rider/owners.  2006 Arriving to a state of control. We sourced all our ski production out of Europe at this time. Due to finish capabilities, we went with a temporary supplier in Tunisia with the wider skis while growing units with our narrower skis at Elan. The product reputation started to rise and our warranties became within our target, nearly zero. We remained poised on expanding alternative products like bindings, poles and accessories. We started to fly over seas a lot to build on foreign relationships between both our suppliers and customers. The bindings and poles started to spread out over various models as our seat in the market continued to grow. We launched the TNK and EHP and survived a very successful sell-in season. We got recognized by SIA's retailer census as a brand with traction and growing quickly. Our team continued to expand and Eric Hjorleifson was up for Powder Magazines' "Line of the year." We took on more media initiatives and started to share the story world wide. Camp of Champions was a birthplace of the brand but in 06 our team began to assemble as coaches and our consumer testing pool was becoming highly valued. We entertained our foreign clients back in the states all the while growing even more global distribution in Australia, New Zealand and Korea. Team (as then advertised): Matt, Steele, Vincent, Niklas, Eric, Wiley, Erich, JD Zicat, Mike Hornbeck, Tom Wallisch and Even Sigstad. Many rising stars developed internationally with our growing distribution as well. Factory: Sarco in Tunisia and Elan, bindings in Italy and poles in Austria Finance: Thanks to some fiscal history, we started generating conventional lending within US based Banks. Office: SLC with a new and improved skate ramp for the warehouse (work out facility) Employees: Matt, Joe, Bob, Jeremy, Steele Spence starting contributing to design, lots of Interns Products: MSP, STL, VCT, TNK, EHP, Crossfade poles, Deadbolt bindings, accessories Setbacks: Shipping late due to new-foreign supply chain, race to get in shops for holidays. Strides ahead: Major international expansion due to new level of quality.  2007 A fresh look. We've grown out of our classic logo style and wanted to "Scream" Rider Owned as loud as we could. Mainly because at this point, many other companies have started for all the wrong reasons. We had a company built around the values our team needed and in a state of the industry when no one wanted to listen. I guess some the same is true today but most the other ski brands out there are now fully respecting this new wave of skiing and we wanted our identity as a leader. We started to diversify our team of athletes. We brought on young gun Matt Hayward, poised to champion any superpipe in his way. We engaged in CR Johnsons' comeback with a fresh new take on sponsorship and life in general. We got aggressive in our advertising and started to see our elite team of riders on covers of magazines world wide. 4FRNT was not only a name in the US, but everywhere at this point. We had respect amongst our peers, loyal dealers with customers and suppliers that didn't require watching videos to interpret what we were saying. Our ski line up started to diversify with NON-rider centric models like the GROM jr ski. We launched into alternative accessories and expanded both our binding and pole offerings. Unfortunately, mother nature didn't have our back this year. Lots of complaints in Europe and North America's eastern regions, concerned about lack of snow, or cold weather at all. Al Gore got a medal for some Global Warming scare tactic and so we fought hard to get our units into the stores. Thankfully come fall of 07, we saw record smashing early snow falls and all our hard work started to pay off. Team (as considered Global): Matt, Steele, Eric, Niklas, Vincent, Even, Wiley, Erik Naess, Matt Hayward and CR Johnson. Factory: Elan and Sarco for skis, Bindings and Poles remained in Italy and Austria Finance: A bit of the same with more favorable terms from suppliers to shoulder the short snow year Office: SLC with a brief pack-n-ship facility out of Raleigh, North Carolina for our overseas container Employees: Matt, Joe, Jeremy, Matt Monahan steps up for the warehouse and brings a crew of Midwestern'ers to help out as Interns. Products: MSP, STL, VCT, EHP, TNK, GROM, Deadbolt and Padlock Bindings, Crossfade, Signature and Grom poles, accessories Setbacks: Lack of snow Strides ahead: Diversified image with non-signature direction.  2008 Up, Up and Away! Winter came upon us in a gracious way. We launched skyward with a profile of our company in Snowbirds Aerial tram for Freeskier Magazine. We set out to establish a proto-typing facility in WA state under the supervision of Bob and Steve. We gained control over the development of new, cutting edge skis all the while embraced the routine of being an Independent Ski Company veteran. We learned from the world what they wanted, and we gave it to them. We succeeded in all categories to grow sales, moved even more units into foreign lands and landed top tier supply. We abandoned our Italian binding design for something sweeter with the Austrians. Elan came up with the cash to revamp their finishing line so all the skis now set sail from Slovenia. We now offer a men's and women's all mountain ski under our "Identity Series," which has been warmly accepted. We received news from Powder Magazine that Eric Hjorleifson won "Full Throttle" and Joe witnessed Matt Hayward take the World Cup overall championship in Italy, aside Bode Miller. We complimented our teams design innovation with round tables for the first time during a Team Week, hosted by Camp of Champions in Whistler. We expanded even further into bringing on Finnish park skier phenom Kalle Leinonen and North American Open Superpipe champ Keltie Hansen. We also had our first year female big mountain sensation, Jen Ashton, win her 3rd World Extreme Title on the new EHP and up coming star Torgrim Vole from Norway won the Røldal Extremes on the VCT's. Steele Spence graduates Design school and moves in-house to join our ever growing staff in SLC. CR Johnson's signature model is set for its debut this fall and that ongoing project we learned about in 05 about the EHP, yeah...it's still ongoing... Team (as represented Global): Matt, Steele, Eric, Niklas, Vincent, Wiley, Even, Matt Hayward, Torgrim Vole and Kalle Leinonen. Factory: Elan, Tyrolia, Austria for poles Finance: Banks Office: SLC Employees: Matt, Joe, Jeremy, Steele, Matt Monahan and interns. Products: MSP, STL, VCT, EHP, TNK, GROM, Madonna, Pique, Deadbolt and Padlock, Crossfade, Signature and Grom poles, accessories expanded into gloves Setbacks: Running low on administrative horsepower Strides ahead: Our unified team of managers, employees and riders working as 1. Even greater product expansion, new binding supplier. 2009 To be continued... |