All posts tagged Tactical Apparel

If you’re looking for tactical footwear that gives you support

If you’re looking for tactical footwear that gives you the support to haul heavy gear around, ask your UPS delivery guy.   Those guys are hauling weight around and they can’t slow down.   When you have to get away from wearing boots that weight 5lbs or more, support and safety are important, but you really feel it at the end of the day.   If you put that kind of weight on a UPS delivery guys feet, his butt is going to be dragging half way through the day and he’s not going to get the job done.   There is a lot to be said for take a pound or two off of a firearms weight in the battlefield because the guys that haul them all day long are the ones that will tell you they can feel the difference.

One of our biggest selling boot from Original Swat footwear is actually not really a boot.   Its the 1230 Air M.T. low, this boot is a shortened version of the extremely popular 1232 Air 9″ which is probable is number one of the Original Swat boots.   The first thing people notice about the footwear is that the boots are very light.   Nobody is going to complain that the boots aren’t bulle proof, but they gotta hold up and not wear you down.   Next time you’re out and about, look at who is wearing the Original Swat footwear, you may see you’re local UPS guy wearing them.

Top

Buying trash and wearing it

I don’t think I’m going to run out of info on discussing these tactical clothing issues because I hear it all day long.  I just got off the phone with a customer that was bitching about the Eotac clothing being discontinued, and the “now what am I going to do?” is starting to set in.   I noticed a ton of gun shops in my area have stopped carrying clothing because I get it.. selling clothing is a royal pain for a gun shop because nobody wants to deal with the sizing issues and exchange rates that you have to expect whenever  you sell something like that.  Nobody buys an LWRC M6A2 and returns it because it doesn’t fit right, but we have sold hundreds of dollars of clothing and had it all come back for exchanges, it goes with the business.

At a recent show in Atlantic City, we walked around various tactical booths and checked out the stuff that was there.   One guy that use to sell the stuff for some of the big names said he hated wearing the tactical pants from one company because they felt like they were made of cardboard.    I didn’t disagree with him because that really is about where the tactical clothing market is at.   There is a lot of uniform style clothing but when you get down to comfort and durability, it’s almost down to about 3 or 4 clothing companies and then after that you have to decide if you want tactical or casual, and then it’s an even small market.  I wonder if anyone in the tactical apparel market knows that ?

Top

Rumors and more rumors as to what is going on

The tactical market is absolutely flooded with tactical pants and tactical clothing.   I just did some research online for concealed carry vests and found a few smaller companies making vests, but I also noticed they are making pants.   I’ve heard enough bitching and moaning from our customers about the fact that they didn’t want to pay $50 for a pair of pants, and now I’m seeing a cluster of small companies making $80 + pants.   As a dealer, I have serious doubts about the profitability of clothing priced that high even if you create a cult following.   The reality is this, if you don’t have easy access to a manufacturing facility in China, India, or Indonesia, you really are going to have a hard time making money.

Now that cotton prices have shot up so  much due to the inability to grow it fast enough, prices have gone up for even the big companies.   With Eotac tactical pants swimming in rumorville,   the easiest transition for customers is to Woolrich Elite apparel although Tru-Spec seems to have gotten a good nod from people we have been dealing with.   One of the good things about selling tactical footwear is that Original Swat boots owns their own boot factory and they don’t have the scheduling issues that many clothing companies have.   If they are sold out of something, they order it and produce it at their own scheduling time line.   One thing that seemed to really due in Eotac was they never produced the right products at the right time and it was almost like the company never got its best stuff on the market.

Top

Knee pads and other protective gear

We’ve been selling various tactical pants for the last 5yrs and one thing that I still find kind of odd is the whole knee pad insert.   When i first started using the knee pad inserts it was with the Woolrich Elite 4447 pants and the knee pads didn’t line up to where my knees were.   I later tried them on the Woolrich Elite 4429 pants and they worked on them, but you really only could get use out of them if you kneel on both knees at the same time.   That position may work at Church, but on the firing line, when I think of kneeling, it’s on one knee.   The knee pad inserts do hold up for a pretty line time, and for only $3 you can replace them for both sides.

If you are looking for serious protective gear for your knees and elbows, I seriously recommend using the Blackhawk Neoprene elbow pads and knee pads.   People have their preferences on what they want to wear, but there is a pretty big difference between using the ones you get on your tactical pants and what you get separately.   I was severely disappointed when the Eotac Direct Action line basically flopped because it hit the market and barely a month later the South Carolina location shutdown and all of the products were basically being cleared out at cost.

Top

$29.99 pants on sale until they’re gone

It’s time to clear out some space and make room to transition our store into a kick ass Police, Security and Law Enforcement supply place.    We just got in a huge  inventory of Original Swat tactical boots and the diverse product line of footwear is impressive.  We’ve done a few conventions for their products and we know what people want to see.   Recently we had several groups from local Swat teams show up and we sent out a bunch of stuff for testing and evaluations. Product feedback is important and we are listening.
We got a lot of requests from people to start carrying the Tru-Spec 24/7 line of clothing.   The women’s pants have a pretty good repuation, but this whole un hemmed thing for women’s tactical pants is someone annoying, but I know why they are doing it.  With our broad display of tactical pants we’re adjusting to the demand of our customer base.   The Eotac product line was a great sell, but now it seems to be a thing of the past and it’s time to move on.  Stock up on the last of the lightweight pants for $29.99.

Top

After Action report at Atlantic City

We got a lot of feed back from people we ran into at the Police and Security Expo in Atlantic City, New Jersey.   There was a lot more foot traffic this year than previous years which was somewhat shocking considering the bad economy.   One of the best things about selling the Original Swat footwear was the price points.   From what many of the customers have told us, they spend sometimes 3xs as much money on boots for 3 times as much weight.

The Original Swat 1232 have a air cushion in the sole and that were by far the biggest seller.   The other thing people like about that style is that it has a side-zip and that it was light.   Original Swat boots has a 1 year guarantee on their footwear and this is a great thing for a dealer to deal with.  If there is a factory flaw and the boots come apart. You will just need to send in your receipt and Original Swat will replace the boots.

Top

New wave of CCW shirts from Woolrich Elite

Today I was going through the list of all of the new products that we had to list on our website and sometimes we debate on whether or not we are going to carry something when it gets to my desk.   There have been a lot of useless gun accessories, but they sold and made money, but I found them to be annoying.   Some of the gun parts were a liability to carry because the quality control was so bad that our return percentage and complaints were so high that it wasn’t worth the time to carry them.

When it comes to selling clothing, there are some big named companies that we limit the products from them because quality control is so bad.  That is not the case with the Woolrich Elite Series product line.  They’ve had a few dud products, but I would mostly blame that on the economy and marketing.   The new wave of Woolrich Elite CCW shirts are going to be in my wardrobe.  I’ve about had enough of the solid color CCW shirts that have been made in the past and it’s great to get shirts that look  like they came from a department store and not a tactical shop.

Top

Update on Eotac

It’s now been several weeks since Eotac closed it’s doors in South Carolina and we acquired the last of the tactical pants inventory that they had left.    We still have thousands of pairs of lightweight tactical pants, but it’s kind of depressing to see it all going out the door knowing that we may never see these again.   We recently read a few responses from those that have worked with Remington and the state of the tactical clothing market, but we still don’t know what caused the demise.   Tactical clothing is a preference, but quality has to be there and it is often not.

All of our employees where tactical apparel made  by 5.11, Blackhawk, Proper and Woolrich, but we have a 100% response from our own Staff that the Eotac pants had the best pocket designs.   I’m still amazed that some can call their clothing tactical and you can’t even fit a j-frame revolver in the tactical pants.   I can carry a Sig 239 in my Eotac style 202 pants.   We were told that Eotac was shutting it’s doors and that there is a re-evaluation on the product SKU’s which we hope means some remnant of Eotac will emerge.   Since Marlin has closed down and been moved, Bushmaster closed down and moved, we hope that Eotac is doing the same.   The pants and vests and the Lizard pattern Field Jacket are going to be long missed.

Top

What’s the difference between Woolrich and Eotac?

It seems that Eotac is no longer in existence, but Woolrich Elite is still out there.  Its no secret that Fernando Coelho was involved with designing and marketting both product lines at some point the products like very similar.   The answer we always tell customers is the designs are different.   We did notice there has been some production changes to the original Woolrich Elite Series product line and the pants and shorts do have a much wanted change in the ID or wallet pocket.   The Woolrich Elite pants pocket designs were a little tighter and the fit was baggier but some people wanted that.

Woolrich has been around forever and it looks like they have survived bad economies and the tactical clothing shake down.  A few weeks ago we got word that another major clothing manufacturer just pulled out of China and is now making clothing in the Western Hemisphere.   Woolrich Elite pants are still made in China, and we have gotten price increase on all of their stuff, but according to the number of disgruntled 5.11 customers that we have, Woolrich Elite pants are the next best thing.

Top

Some improvements to the design

We’ve already know how well made the Woolrich Elite products have been for several years, but there have been some design issues that we have heard about from customers.   We still get a lot of complaints about the fit and design of the Woolrich Elite Algerian Jacket and all you have to do is read the product reviews under it on our website to find out.    We’re really glad that they made a few minor tweaks to the pants and shorts that they have been making in regards to the ID pocket.   The rear ID pocket on the pants is a major sore in my opinion because the previous velcro design made it very difficult to get your wallet out.

The style 44429 is probable the most popular style followed by the 44441.   I’ve had issues on the road where I had to get money out of my wallett to pay a toll and had to take my seat belt off to get my money out of my Woolrich Elite Pants.   Now that they  have removed the velcro and opened up the pants pockets a little more it does resolve the problem.   I also noticed the 44905 shorts have had this change and was pleasantly surprised.   The style 44905 shorts are my favorite shorts to wear in the summer because they have the deepest pockets and have lots of utility purposes.

Top
1 … 4 5 6 7 8 … 14 Page 6 of 14