As outdoor recreation soared in the pandemic summer of 2020, increased demand for gear coupled with Covid-related supply problems caused shortages of everything from bicycles to tents.
And it doesn’t appear to be getting better this year as Americans continue to head for the outdoors in record numbers and supply problems persist.
“Demand is through the roof,” Big Agnes co-founder and President Bill Gamber says. “Every single piece has a challenge right now.”
The problems range from getting materials to factories, to finding shipping containers for finished products, to shipping slowdowns. Shipping that took 30 days can now take 90 days.
“The supply chain is in a wild ride,” Bill says.
And he expects shortages could last for one to two years.
Scroll through the website of almost any outdoor gear brand and you’ll find that gear from clothing to tents is not available directly from brands as they try to keep up with retailer demand. Retailers too are feeling the pinch, with supplies low for some gear.
Cascade Designs, parent company of MSR, Therm-a-Rest, and other outdoor brands, posted this notice on its website:
“Like many manufacturers, we’re experiencing unavoidable disruptions to our supply chain coupled with increased demand for our best-in-class outdoor gear from folks looking for new socially distanced adventures. Unfortunately, that’s left some of our most popular products out of stock, which we’re genuinely bummed about.”
Pattern, a Utah company that tracks e-commerce, says demand on the US Amazon marketplace for sleeping bags is up 73 percent in spring 2021 compared with spring 2020 and up 201 percent compared with 2019.
Demand for tents rose 97 percent compared with spring 2020 and 85 percent compared with 2019.
Bonie Shupe, general manager and director of product for clothing brand Ibex, says the company was hit hard at the start of the pandemic in 2020.
Beanie production halted in Italy when the country was devastated early in the pandemic, and Ibex is still having difficulty getting beanies. Merino wool is in good supply in Australia, but getting it processed and exported has been difficult because of frequent in-country lockdowns.
The pandemic has cast a broad reach over every step of the supply chain.
Nylon used for tents, clothing, and other gear was shifted to making much-needed medical supplies such as N95 masks at manufacturing plants in Asia.
Bonie says recycled nylon became scarce, and when she finally found some, “We had to hurry and pull the trigger.”
She expects nylon to be in short supply for at least another year.
And inspections of finished gear slowed when it was clear that sending inspectors into plants during the pandemic was not safe. So finished products were shipped to inspectors working near plants in the same country, adding one more production layer.
Surprise inspections of factories to ensure that manufacturing partners follow safe labor practices were also suspended.
Manufacturing continues to be spotty in some Asian countries where Covid remains a big threat. Bonie is clear that worker safety takes priority over supply.
Bicycles made in China have been sitting in shipping containers for over a year, says Jordan Todoroff, chief of sales for Ibex. “Bike companies are still selling vouchers for a year out.”
Global shipping already stressed by the pandemic was further snarled when the container ship Ever Given was stuck in the Suez Canal for six days this past March.
Slowdowns unloading cargo are also being felt at West Coast ports as the US economy reopens and consumer spending increases.
“We are seeing a historic surge of cargo volume coming into our ports,” Tom Bellerud, the chief operations officer of The Northwest Seaport Alliance, which manages cargo processing at the ports of Seattle and Tacoma, tells NPR. “The terminals are having a difficult time keeping up with processing all the cargo off these vessels fast enough.”
Gene Seroka, the head of the Port of Los Angeles, tells NPR that on average container ships are waiting about five days to get in, compared with no wait in normal times.
Bonie says that in addition to the shipping delays, customs inspections are taking longer.
Backpackers who can’t find new gear might consider used gear at REI, The North Face, and Patagonia. Facebook also has used gear groups.
Despite the problems, “I think things are getting better for sure,” Bonie says.
Bill takes solace in the high demand for gear, if not in the headaches caused by trying to get supplies.
Acknowledging that some businesses have failed during the pandemic, he says: “We’re in the right industry at the right time.”
