About the Company
Sitka Gear is a transformational brand with big aspirations. The company was born in 2005, founded by Jonathan Hart on a very simple premise that hunters were way behind the curve realizing the advantages of apparel technologies that could keep them dry, warm, and comfortable.
In 1976 the outdoor industry was introduced to a revolutionary new fabric called GORE-TEX that was both waterproof and breathable. Meaning any garment made of GORE-TEX kept water out and even wicked moisture from within to the outside keeping the person wearing it dry in most any condition. Hunters were the last to reap the benefits of this and several other key technologies having simply grown accustomed to cotton, canvas, wool, and denim.
Jonathan was an avid skier and hunter and not only saw the gap, but did it one better and applied a rigorous product design and testing regimen in the creation of the first offering of technical apparel for hunters. Riding this wave Sitka Gear became the premiere hunting apparel designer and manufacturer in the US, but a host of competitors were following fast on their heels. And, with a declining endemic hunting customer base due to the aging out of avid hunters, Jonathan realized he needed to do something more than just produce high quality gear to continue to scale. After reading The Compass and the Nail, he reached out for help to discover what was the next opportunity for Sitka.
Our Partnership
The transformation began with an assessment of the industry and category trend analysis. Next was a deep dive into the organization to further understand capabilities. Then came an in-depth customer study. Early discussions with Jonathan revealed the lifestyle of the hunter was not simple. Interviews with existing long-standing customers told the same story providing definition of broad and nuanced characteristics. Most importantly was the reverence and connectedness hunters have for the wild world. Interviewees de-emphasized the importance of pulling the trigger. They instead spoke of family, lineage, mentors, life lessons, values, respect, mastery, and a deep abiding love of wild animals and the places they live.
Strategy Focus
The build of The Brand Ecosystem Model and ensuing strategic Loyalty Business Plan brought to the surface a path forward for Jonathan and Sitka that was heretofore unimaginable. The key finding was that hunters are innate environmentalists. They deeply believe humans are a species that is part of the ecosystem just like every other species and that living in harmony with the order of the wild world is not only natural, it’s an imperative if we are to sustain life on this planet. With that realization a much wider aperture now defines the Sitka brand opening the door to new categories of product from fishing to gardening, and from a financial perspective it invites an entirely new audience including, of course, hunters and fisherman, but also photographers, enthusiasts of nature, people that value living closer to the land, and those interested in understanding how the wild world operates in balance. With this understanding a re-establishing of the brand and operations was undertaken focusing on the Customer Activation Cycle as a means to operationalize purpose.
Demonstrated Impact
Enabling the onboarding of this expanded audience, work has included: Establishing the Brand Equity Index as a key objective, a new direct to consumer catalog, an entirely re-designed website, the establishment of a consumer marketing database, the ability to use email as a post purchase customer service platform, an editorial calendar process to drive content delivery, the re-architecture of the product and a new product roadmap, a new data dashboard providing commercial, customer, channel, and marketing vehicle performance metrics, a new organizational structure, new budgeting and forecasting tools, and the discipline of empathic user experience design to optimize in store, online, and cross channel experiences.
Sitka is currently outpacing growth of its competitors in category having scaled 5x over the past 4 years while exceeding profit goals year over year; and is now expanding beyond endemic hunting categories, establishing its voice “across the aisle,” intent to lead its constituency in getting back to living in harmony with the wild world. Jonathan recognized there was a bigger purpose and knew there was a broader audience to ultimately provide a service. Now he has the organization making it real.