Rogue Elite

We have been selling a few brands of tactical clothing that from the pictures you see on  our website, may look like they are the same thing.   The reality is much of what you saw from Woolrich Elite over the years was marketed and designed by the people behind Eotac.   While we let our customers debate over which products they prefer, the item we are selling now that we absolutely have an opinion about and aren’t afraid to say it is the new Eotac Field Jacket.   This field jacket is designed for modern gear and is based off of the Algerian jacket that was issued in the 1950s.  The fit and design of the pockets is superior to any simliar jacket and according to our customers this is the better jacket.   The only complaint we have gotten on the jacket is that it doesn’t hang low over the belt line so you will have to take that into consideration when thinking about CCW options.

The jacket may look heavier than it really is.   I would suggest that you wear this in the Fall or Spring and use it as a surface layer and just add on base layer clothing is the temperatures get colder.   We are discounting the Lizard patter jackets and the lizard patter Field Vest which also has similiar pocket designs.   We have had virtually zero complaints about the fit of this jacket as long as the user reads our sizing guide and measure themselves properly.  You will easily be able to carry fully loaded double stack magazines as well as flashlights and knives comfortable and not have to worry about printing.  You will be able to carry small autos or j-frame guns in the outer pockets but I am not really a fan of carrying guns in coats, jackets or vests.

We have been waiting for the Eotac womens pants for almost a  year.   We expected them to arrive in June of 2009, but there were production delays which we suspect we’re due to re-design changes.   Later we were expecting them in the Fall of 2009, but once again, there were shipping delays.   We’ve been holding backorders for the Style 702 pants and just got around to fullfilling the orders in April of 2010 and we were crossing out fingers that the design would be well accepted.   When the tactical pants first arrived, we shipped a lot of them out to associates as beta testers to see what there opinions were before we started stocking the product.   We have carried other brands of womens pants in the past, but we dropped them because statistically speaking, the return and complaints about them were about 85% complaints about fit and sizing.    You may think that is a really bad stat, and it certainly is, but desigining womens tactical pants are much harder than designing mens.
Eotac has the connectios in the manufacturing industry to bring in the right people that know tactical, and know how to make products for women.   As of today, we have not had one single return where women could not wear these pants, we have had a few that had to return the pants for differernt sizes.    The production for the Style 701 womens tactical pants is still ramping up so there may be some shortages in certain sizes and colors, but we defanitely have a winner here when it comes to the product line.   Overall, the demand for the Eotac tactical pants has far exceeded the production capabilites at this time, so please keep in mind that this is something you need to jump on now before there is a 6-9 month gap in our inventory.   We recently sponsored a Ladies shoot at the Langhorne Rod and Gun Club and the top 3 scorers each received a pair of Style 702 womens pants.   The responses we got were great and we’re waiting for them to get more range time in and tell  us how they held up.

Rogue Elite will be running promos for the new apparel line called Elite Operator Tactical or which is more commonly named, Eotac.   We have seen the tactical apparel market explode in the last few years, but we have also seen some casualties.   There have been several small concealed carry clothing companies come out with pants or vests that have already gone out of business.   The art of designing tactical or concealed carry clothing is not an easy one.   The real problem that we see in many of the products that are showing up is consistancy and quality.   5.11 tactical has held a huge chunk of the market, but as many of our customers know, the original manufacturers made a higher quality clothing line and things have deteriorated.   Some of the 5.11 clothing I own is nice,  but on more than one occasion, the sizing was inconsistant.   I have seen some of the newer casual clothing and it does look nice, but I’m still wondering if I’d have the same issues if I wore their shirts.

Woolrich has been making tactical clothing for almost 5years now, but seems to have taken a real hit since so many dealers have dropped the line.   We have been told that many of the people that were originally behind the Woolrich Elite Series clothing split off from the company and are working with Eotac.    We wondered about that when Eotac first showed up on the market because so much of their clothing mirrored 5.11 Tactical and Woolrich Elite Series clothing.    This coming Fall there will be some real cutting edge products coming from Eotac, namely the Direct Action line.   The new A-Tacs camo is really nice and we will first get a glimpse of this at the Atlantic City Expo in June.

We’ve been selling Woolrich Elite clothing since the beginning and have seen the changes in the tactical pants market over the last 5 years.   One thing we have noticed is the tactical pants sales change like the seasons do.   Our customer base knows that certain types of clothing just can’t be worth in hot climates, but for working in other environments, lightweight material just won’t hold up to the heavy use, and won’t shrink as much.    We get a lot of people calling or emailing us about whether or not the clothing shrinks, and they answer to that is not as bad as some of the other apparel companies that have been on the market for almost 10yrs.   We still don’t understand why some of these companies haven’t cleaned up their quality control.

Woolrich Elite lightweight pants are very well made and if you haven’t known this, Woolrich has been  manufacturing clothing for over 150yrs.   You may have issues with the fit or design, but we have to tell you that their tactical clothing is as well made as their civillian line of clothing.   The style 44441 pants are made of a 100% cotton ripstop material that is a big selling in the Spring and Summer months.   We’ve been running a clearance on some of their lightweight pants in Style 44447 just to clear out some inventory so check out our website Clearance section for some great deals on Woolrich Elite Series Tactical clothing.

For those of us living in the part of the Country where we get all 4 Seasons of weather, our concealment options usually will change atleast 2 times a year.    There are enormous numbers of ways you can conceal a weapon, but for those of us that carry full size weapons, the warmer the weather the fewer the options.   I carry a full size Beretta 92F while at work and one of my favorite ways of carrying this firearm is in a Fobus paddle holster.   For only about $20, I’ve gotten more than my moneys worth and have never broken the holster.   I’d have to say that if I was rolling around in the dirt I would defanitely prefer to have a Serpa holster.

The Woolrich Elite lightweight vest is made of a 100% cotton ripstop material that is identical the the Woorlich Elite lightweight pants and shorts.   These make carrying gear and concealment tolerable in hot weather.   These Woolrich Elite Vests are very popular with the IDPA crowd and being cut generously on the sides give great concealement, especially for those carrying full size autos.   We’ve had a few goofy complaints from customers that have stated that these vests are not good for concealing firearm if you put them in the pockets, and we would agree, these are basically made of the same type of material that your T-shirt is made out of and your gun will most likely print if you put it in the front pockets.   The concealed carry vest is meant to be a concealment garment and not a firearm retention device.   There are other concealment vests out t here that cost 3x’s as much money and can be used to hold firearms, but those are not lightweight.

I have another trip up in the sticks where we have to do some land clearing.   The State is asking us to clear out a mountain range for fire prevention.   Working in emergency management we get everything from clearing car accidents and hostage situations.    One thing we also never know from day to day is what type of clothing we’ll be needing.   Most of us started out wearing 5.11 Tactical clothing because they pretty much held the market for years and there wasn’t much else out there.   A few years ago Woolrich Elite Series clothing arrived on the market although Woolrich has been in the clothing industry for over 150 years.  Woolrich Elite cargo shorts style 4905 are made of a cotton canvas material which makes them very hard to tear.   Unlike many of the lightweight style shorts out there, these have side cargo pockets which are great for storing lighters, bug repllent, hand wipes ect.   Due to the fact that wearing pants in certain hot weather means unnecesary sweating and water loss, you really have to think about how much clothing is necessary.    I’ve had shorts on in hot weather and felt comfortable until I came home with poison ivy.

The lightweight 100% cotton ripstop pants are very comfortable, but in 90F+ weather I’m always going to go with shorts even if they are made of heavy material.   Protecting your legs from bug bites is also something to consider when wearing shorts and clearing out woodlands because you never know what is going to be swarming around you when you start sweating up a storm.   There are some bug repellents that can be worn on a belt, but with the work I will be doing, I prever to bring a spray bottle with me and store it on the cargo pockets.   Since I am also always carrying flashlights, radios, guns and other items, not having enough pockets means putting more on the belt line.    I find wearing too much on the belt being a real pain when having to do a lot of lifting so just about everything except my Glock 26 is stored in my Woolrich Elite Pants.

If you are looking to carry mace or pepper spray, I would absolutely have to urge you to do some research on the Kimber Guardian Angels also known as the Life Act.    At first you might get sticker shock, and I think you may want to consider buying 2 of them and test firing 1 of them before you really get comfortable carrying one.   I’ve earned my merit badges in seeing evil in the world I know walking around with the smallest pepper spray bottle to fend off a potential rapist, robber, or worse isn’t going to give you much of an edge.   There are many reasons to consider carrying a less lethal defensive measure.   You can blast someone with something like this without much of a worry about legal ramifications.   I’ve seen pepper spray used against 0bnoxious drunks which in my opinion were justified.

Why is the Kimber Guardian Angel a good choose over bottled pepper sprays?   I’m not sure if there is anything else as innovative as the Kimber Guardian, but if there is feel free to fill me in on it.   Bottled defensive measures have 2 flaws for the most part.   Number one is that you are going to have to figure out which end is the one to point it when in a hostile situation and the other is the shelf life of the product.   The Kimber is easy to point and you will know in micro seconds which end to point at  your attacker.   There is a safety mechanism that prevents accidental discharge which is something that does occur with the flip tabs that bottle sprays have.   The Kimber Guardian Angel will fit comfortable in most 5.11 Tactical, Woolrich Elite Series or Eotac front pockets.  The Kimber also has a shelf life of over 2yrs and if you are buying bottle mace every year, the Kimber costs you only $20 a year for 2yrs to help  you not get that $40 sticker shock.

The title may sound like we’re going to talk about the expense of various tactical pants, but this post is actually going to be about retrieving your wallet from your tactical pants.   When I first got into wearing tactical pants, I started out wearing the 5.11 stuff most people are introduced to.   I tended to feel like my wallet didn’t fit right in the rear pockets becaused they floated around too much.   The  next line of tactical pants I wore were the Woolrich Elite 4429 style and although they are very well made and the quality is there, I really thought the velcro ID pocket was a pain to use for a wallet.   I carry a few credit cards, but I have a lot of business cards and other type of ID that I carry and my wallet is probable thicker than 3/4 of operators.   After I found out about Eotac pants, and the fact that the original designers of the Woolrich Elite series clothing are the present designers of the Eotac apparel, I gave them a try.

The Eotac Style 202 pants are basically an improved pocket design over the Woolrich Elite 4429 pants.  The Eotac 203 are similiar to Woolrich Elite 4441 and the Eotac 201 are similiar to the Woolrich Elite 4447 styles.    Each may look the same at first look, but try stuffing the pockets with various items and  you’ll quickly notice the design differences.   The ID pocket on the Eotac pants have a pull tab that make it easy to open the pocket and I have absolutely zero problems using my gear with this design.   The side cargo pockets are bellowed and although not as wide as BDU pants, you will be able to use these for mag dumps much easier.

Woolrich Elite pants are made of either 100% cotton ripstop or 8.5oz cotton canvas.   I’ve seen 5.11 makes pants that are supposedly made of the same material and weight, but there is a felt difference.   The standard weight pants are styles 4904 and 4429, these pants are the most commonly used Woolrich Elite Pants followed by the 2 styles that are made of the ripstop material.  The 4904 pants are being listed on clearance for $25 and are a deal.

There is a huge difference in what kind of pants are tolerable in warm enviromnets.   Once you start hitting the 80 F weather those cotton canvas pants will really get heavy.    The styles 4441 and 4447 are your hot weather pants, and if those are too hot to wear, try the shorts.   Everyone has varying degrees of tolearance in the type of apparel they can wear.   We’d consider the 4441 pants to be the most worn unless you’re taking a carbine or tactical class or you’re toting and M16 or Ar15 all day, and then we’d recommend the style 4447 Lightweight Operator pants.

Woolrich Elite pants are one of the highest quality pants on the market.    They don’t shrink like some of the 5.11 pants do and you can feel the difference in the weight even though 5.11 pants usually say they are the same weight.    We have an over stock of the Woolrich Elite Pants which are the same pocket desings as the Style 4429 pants are except they have a lower ankle pocket  on each leg.

The 4904 Cargo pants were originally designed for operators that migth be in the seated position and find it easier to pull a wallet or accessory from an ankle pocket rather than reach into hand pockets.  Try sitting in a car and pull your keys out of your pocket, then try them from your ankle if you had a pocket down there.   We have mostly 4904 OD Green pants at a blowout deal for $25.00 a pair, we do have a few Khaki and Black pants left but not many.