Verve finds niche in climbing apparel
Saturday, July 22, 2006 11:56 PM PDT
By Associated Press
Printable version
E-mail this articleBOULDER, Colo. -- Back when Christian Griffith started his rock-climbing apparel company in 1988, yoga was still considered fairly eccentric and New Age. Now it's used widely by people who just want to feel like new.
In the past few years, yoga has even rejuvenated Verve, Griffith's Boulder-based business. Once a pioneering venture as one of the few climbing-specific apparel companies in the world, Verve is now just as well known for its appeal to the yoga market.
Griffith, who grew up in Boulder, earned degrees in philosophy and psychology from the University of Colorado and was one of the top climbers in the nation in his prime, says at least 60 percent of Verve's sales now are made by the yoga community.
It's a recent shift, and one that came not a moment too soon for Verve, which fell on hard times during the economic downturn earlier this decade.
Large retailers like REI and Eastern Mountain Sports and their abilities to offer greater economies of scale make life difficult for small companies like Verve. Other small climbing-oriented companies that have popped up around the globe have diminished demand for Verve clothing, and a shift in the market toward more style and less function has also affected Verve's sales.
But with the explosion of yoga in the United States, Verve struck a chord with a new crowd.
"Yoga is a young market and so there's a lot of new people coming into that activity," Griffith says. That also means "a lot of new people that are considering purchasing things like clothing."
"Climbing is much more established. I'm sure if you were to look at the growth curve, climbing I think as an activity either plateaued or hit a more modest growth curve probably about four or five years ago. Yoga, on the other hand, I think is still probably in the process of escalating.
"It certainly has allowed us to sustain a scale that, if we were exclusively climbing, we wouldn't have been able to maintain."
Griffith, who began climbing under the tutelage of local climbers, including Pat Ament, at the age of 12, founded Verve to supplement his income as a professional climber and as a way to get his own ideas into production.
He was a U.S. Climbing Team member from 1988-90. He was the 1991 Canadian national champion and 1994 U.S. champ. He spent five years as a route setter for national championships and world cups in the United States and has designed about 20 climbing gyms worldwide.
Verve's reputation in the climbing community was built on the back of Griffith's reputation, but later was reinforced by the clothing's durability and emphasis on function while still keeping aesthetics in mind.
At first, Verve's offerings were limited to a couple of pairs of climbing pants. Now the line includes chalk bags, shirts, jeans, jackets and other items, much of which is worn by local Verve-sponsored climbers like Johnny Goicoechea, Mallory Cox and Shannon Forsman.
"His clothing line was one of the early examples of a style that's become really accepted," says Jeff Achey, the former editor of Climbing magazine. "Christian pioneered a lot of those basic concepts."
Durable, loose-fitting and nonrestrictive, Verve clothing not surprisingly attracted yoga practitioners, who traditionally wore tighter fitting dancewear, which could become uncomfortable.
"People who move and don't like to be encumbered wear his stuff," says Dan Michael, an instructor at the Yoga Workshop in Boulder.
Appealing to two very Boulder pastimes like yoga and rock climbing has certainly helped Verve thrive. But a third Boulder-esque aspect of Verve has also gained attention: It's the epitome of "locally made." More than 90 percent of Verve clothing is sewn by a crew of six or seven "grannies" in their homes in Boulder, and all of the clothes are made on American soil.
"For a long time, I think I kind of relied on my own reputation in the climbing industry to kind of carry the brand forward," says Griffith, who still climbs five days a week. "We weren't going out enough and telling why the brand was significant.
"And now we're doing that. We're saying, 'Yeah, we are locally made.' We don't just go to China and find a cheaper factory," even in tough economic times, Griffith says.
Griffith ran Verve out of his garage for more than 10 years, until the city of Boulder made him stop. Today, company headquarters is an inconspicuous old auto body shop, where dogs often outnumber the three employees.
And even Griffith's long-term vision for the company is modest. Despite increasing revenues -- he expects sales to approach $750,000 this year after years of decline -- Griffith has no plans to expand or sell.
"Everything has its moment, has its time, and everything should be measured to a degree by their spontaneity and their temporalness," he says. "There are things that are great about this business. It's a great way to stay connected with so many people. I'm sure that I would really miss that if I ever let go of that."
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