Alpkit's mountain tents have been around for over a month now, but can you trust a non-tent brand to build a top-end tent? We asked them some questions.
Alpkits new range of geodesic mountain tents looks pretty good, not insanely innovative, but solid and well specced and at a decent price. The trouble is, that they just don't seem as competitive in value as the brand's other stuff. And can you trust a non-tent brand to design a specialist mountain tent? We posed the Alpkitties a few tent questions.
Alpkit's three-strong range of geodesic mountain tents have been on sale for just over a month now. They look good and seem well specced, but we know that some potential buyers are dubious about buying from a brand without prior tent-building experience. Plus the new tents don't seem quite as competitively priced as other items in the Alpkit range.
We, like you, had some questions and the guys from Alpkit agreed to answer them - some interesting stuff including why the UK tent market is 'pretty screwed up'.
OM - Some people will think it's a risk ordering a high value tent from a company without a long background in tent design - is it something they should be concerned about. I guess the 'safe' option is a Quasar.
AK Just because Alpkit doesn't have a heritage of tent production, doesn't mean we don't know about tents. Within the company we have spent hundreds of nights under canvas, in a whole range of conditions and altitudes. Previous to Alpkit we have worked for other companies and have been involved with and designed tents that have been raved about on OM Forums as well as withstanding the elements pitched well above 7000m. We are pretty confident that we will very quickly build up a reputation for making exceptionally well designed tents.
OM - We've seen comments that the tents are a little heavy, is that really the case or are people just being unrealistic about what a mountain tent should weigh? Why have you not built a lighter mountain tent range, what would be the pay-off of using lighter components and fabrics etc. What do the weight terms actually mean?
AK I guess this is all subjective, there are lighter tents out there and they have been specifically designed for those users who are well aware of the compromises their making. To make something lighter you either have to make it from a super exotic fabric which can be every expensive. Or make from less material (usually thinner) which is normally much less durable. We have concentrated on making tents not only durable and suitable for the environments there are going to be used in but also liveable, lots of mesh pockets for storage, reenforced zip covers. In our research we found users of mountain tents place strength and durability above weight. Maybe in years to come we can do a stripped down version and aim to shed a few grammes.
OM - The tents are described as 'mountain tents', what does that mean in terms of suitability?
AK Something you could pitch on the side of a mountain pretty much any where in the world in pretty much any weather and expect it stay up.
OM - Also seen comments that the range is relatively expensive compared to other brands' tents of a similar type and, to be fair, they don't seem to have the price advantages of your sleeping bags or mats, particularly when online discounting is taken into account - what's going on there?
AK It was probably about 9 months ago, when we were faced with the decisions to comprise the design and materials in order to fit into the UK tent market. We don't feel our tents are any different to any other of our products, they are priced competitively and fairly. The underlying fact is the UK tent market is pretty screwed up with many retailers applying hugh discounts to tents of all brands. Despite these discounts we know our tents hold their ground against the competition and in many cases raise the bar. Anyone that has seen them in the flesh and the recognised the design that has gone into them doesn't think they are over priced.
OM - Where are the tents made and why?
AK China. There are perhaps a handful of factories worldwide that could make these tents to the level of specification we required. We have known the factory we use for nearly 10 years and have worked with them on quite a few other projects. Their level of knowledge on tent manufacture would be hard to better and their care and attention to detail matched our own exacting standards. We are currently looking at offering a repair and modification service in the UK as we start down the road of our own UK manufacturing.
OM - What happened to the lightweight tent we previewed a while back? Will that be on sale soon? How about a tent pitched - sorry - somewhere between the lightweight and mountain series? A sort of reasonable weight, reasonable strength all-rounder.
AK The truth is it didn't work quite how we wanted it too. Perhaps we were a little too conscious and focussed on the weight, whatever we weren't happy with it and we weren't willing to compromise our design philosophy just to get it on sale. We changed our goal posts a little and the product guys are waiting for the FedEx guy to arrive with some new samples. We hope to have a full range of lightweight backpacking tents ready for summer 2012.
OM - Why did you decided to run the 'try before you buy' scheme on the tents?
AK There where a number of comments saying that the big problem with our tents was that you couldn't see them in the flesh. Someone would be committing several hundred pounds to something they had never seen, let alone slept in. Several of us have "Demo'd" bikes under similar schemes and felt if a customer was seriously considering a new tent from us the least we could do would be to let them sleep in first. The internet is still a new retail space and we are learning and borrowing ideas from other markets to try and give our customers the best service we can. So far no one has sent a tent back.
