Gear Organizer

OUTMōRE | May 2024

Overview

The Rock Climbing Gear Organizer is the simple solution for keeping your carabiners, quickdraws, shoes, chalk bags, and more all in one place and ready to go climbing. Hang the slings at home and bring them with you to the cliffs. These slings make picking up and moving between climbs quick and easy. Spend less time re-racking gear and more time climbing!

The Origin Story

As you learn more about rock climbing and start exploring different styles, you inevitably end up acquiring a sizable "rack" of gear. During climbing trips, more often than not this gear can end up jumbled in your bad leading to a huge mess you have to reorganize when you get home or even missing or lost gear. You can always just toss all your gear that has a carabiner onto one large loop called a sling. However, getting one specific piece of equipment from the middle of that heaping mass can turn into a pain, and the sling can get tangled easily too! Starting with these problems, I began sourcing some fabric and implements to prototype a sort of "gear roll".

This design was inspired by a common tradition climbers have of laying out their gear on a ground tarp before the climb to make sure they have everything they need and so they can easily identify when equipment needs to be repaired/replaced. My gear roll design allowed for the rack to distributed across webbing loops and secured with velcro straps around each "bundle". It would then fold into thirds and could be rolled up and clipped together like a tight carrying case.

As far as organization goes, this design was excellent. However, after some testing I began to realize it was quite laborious to add and remove gear from the gear loops and that this version would be quite difficult to produce in a cost-effective manner.

Version 2

With the goal of increasing ease of access, reducing cost and manufacturing time, as well as maintaining high levels of organization for your rack, I transitioned to a new design direction. This new concept centered around hand-held slings sewn into loops that would be far less cumbersome than the gear roll prototype. Individual slings also allowed for color-coding, so climbers could keep their gear grouped by style of climbing, type of equipment, or whatever schema they want.

I applied for a design patent on the appearance of the individual slings, sourced raw materials for the sling, and outsourced the manufacturing of the handles internationally. I constructed each individual sling myself and developed some efficiencies to increase the volume of output. Namely a device that helped slide the tubing onto the webbing which at first was a painful and difficult process, as well as a custom 3D printed jig to help form and retain the loops while they are sewn. I then began selling the Gear Organizer on Amazon and through the OUTMōRE site.

With some experimentation, I found that plastic tubing could be slid over the exterior portions of the webbing to create loops for gear to be clipped to which felt very similar to the loops on a climbing harness. This further improved clipping and unclipping speed. With the addition of a velcro handle that could be used to bundle multiple slings together and increase comfort, I felt this product was ready to launch.

The Outcome

Even though the Gear Organizer gained some traction, the process of constructing the individual slings became difficult to scale even with my custom tooling. Through getting quotes from contract sewers for outsourcing the sling, I found that due to it's unique design and somewhat bespoke construction process outsourcing was going to be quite costly. I eventually made the decision to discontinue this product, despite its traction and granted design patent. This was a valuable lesson in the importance of designing not only to solve a problem for your customers, but designing with the manufacturing process in mind as well.

Skills & Tools

Sewing
Small Scale Manufacturing
E-Commerce
Packaging Design