Anniversary: We Celebrated 15 Years of Spark!
It has been a wild ride and we are so grateful for the splitboard community and all the support you’ve given us over the years. Thank you. We’re happy to be doing what we’re doing - helping people get out in the backcountry to snowboard, have fun, relieve some stress, and breathe some fresh, cold air. We have a skilled team, new tech, and capacity for growth. The future is bright!
What’s new: Arc ST, Surge ST, Ibex ST
We made some great updates to the Arc and Surge for this coming season: we’ve introduced brand new asymmetric highbacks, baseplate refinements that improve durability as well as simplify the manufacturing process, and are incorporating our new ST tech. With these new changes in binding evolution, we are updating the names to Arc ST and Surge ST which will carry through to our Pro line. They also have some hot new graphics.
ST stands for smooth touring and will be seen in our touring brackets, whammy bars, and Ibex crampons using a manufacturing technique called overmolding. This process allows us to inject plastic over our metal parts for the best combination of strength and smooth rotation. It's something we've been working on perfecting for the last couple of years and we are really excited to incorporate it into our product line.
Capacity: We bought another building, we bought machines, things are happening!
In order to meet demand, or to at least bridge the gap, we are working hard to scale up as fast as we can. In a stroke of luck, we were able to purchase the building across the street from us. This is a huge step forward, as we were out of physical space for machines as well as people. The new addition to our Spark campus adds 7,500 sq/ft (700 sq/m) of office and warehouse space. We’ve been working hard to do renovations and get our sales & shipping team settled in over there along with the finished goods warehouse.
The move frees up space in our manufacturing facility for two brand new CNC machines that will be up and running soon. Additionally, we’ll be able to house more raw materials, which we’ve committed to ordering early to minimize lead time issues and supply chain misadventures.
Updated Sizing: Moving to a unisex binding line
Continuing the theme of Simplicity we have decided to meld our two sizing charts together into one unisex line. We will no longer have Men’s specific or Women’s specific bindings. We will just have bindings size XS, S, M, and L available in all the same colorways throughout the line.
Why the change? We’ve decided that our bindings are better sized and discussed in terms of boot length and bulk rather than Men’s and Women’s. For example, our Women’s M/L baseplate was the same as a Men’s S baseplate. We had some women who were sized out of a Women’s M/L and needed a Men’s M and likewise some men and even kids with smaller feet who would have fit better in a Women’s XS/S. Also, we wanted to offer each colorway to feet of all sizes.
We’ve been really proud of the Women’s growth we have seen over the years, and want to continue that trajectory. However, we feel it’s less important that we call it Women’s gear than just having the sizing and correct dimensions available for smaller feet and boots.
What’s Sunsetting: Pin Bindings, Crossbar Clips, Dynafit Adapters
We have been working hard to streamline our manufacturing and focus on the products that people really want. With this in mind, we have decided to sunset our entire pin binding line. It’s sad for us to say goodbye to our iconic Blaze but we continue to find that splitboarders prefer the pinless Tesla System over a pricepoint pin binding, so that is where we want to focus our efforts. Along with the Blaze, we’ll be sunsetting our LT Brackets, Stainless Steel Pins, Dual Height Climbing Wires, and Mr. Chomps crampons. Along with the Blaze, we’ll be sunsetting our LT Brackets, Stainless Steel Pins, Dual Height Climbing Wires, and Mr. Chomps crampons.
We will also be discontinuing our Crossbar Clips and Dynafit Adapters. The Fixie Clips have proven really popular and we appreciate their simplicity and function over the Crossbars. As for the Dynafit Adapters, hardbooting has evolved to the point that there are enough splitboard specific toe piece options out there and we don’t see the need to supply a toe adapter any longer.
