“You’ve raised the benchmark in adventure gears,” the CEO of Nabil Bank, Anil Shah, was heard saying to Tashi Sherpa, the founder and president of Sherpa Adventure Gear. Shah, along with his family members, was exploring the fleeces and trousers recently at the newly built Sherpa Adventure Gear Complex, located on the northern reaches of Hattisar in Kathmandu.[break]
The brand is a relative newcomer to the adventure gear market, dominated by US rivals such as North Face and Columbia, which recorded sales of US$1.32 billion last year. Nepal has recently seen an upsurge in adventure gear.
Set up in 2003 by Nepali native Tashi Sherpa, his Sherpa Adventure Gear now has an annual sale of US$2.5 million, and its design products are available in 170 stores in the US as well as in Australia and Europe.
A Seattle resident now, Tashi is officially launching his flagship store in the heart of Kathmandu Thursday (October 1), a move he hopes will bolster his claim to be the only adventure gear brand with its roots in the home of world mountaineering.
Currently, the four-storey building houses the brand’s flagship store on the ground level.
“The main store that defines the brand is the flagship store,” informs Tashi. Both hard goods such as tents, backpacks and climbing gears, and soft goods – the apparels, accessories, woolen hats for mountaineering and trekking –are on display.
Tashi also likes to play with names, colors and fabrics. And he has got a perfect taste for this. Rich and vibrant colors have been uniquely Nepalized, like Gurans (rhododendron) Pink, Namche Green, Rani Blue et al, and dominate both soft and hard goods. The apparels have been similarly christened with Nepali names in the men’s or women’s sections, such as Vajra Jacket, Kumari Shorts, etc. For Tashi, there is a romantic element involved in this aspect of clothing.
“Be it Newar or Sherpa names, it reflects our culture. And along with the brand, we’re promoting our culture,” adds the man, who has been in clothing import business for two decades now.
Tashi, whose family is from the Everest region, says he was inspired to start the brand after discovering that his uncle was part of the team that helped Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay climb the world’s highest mountain, Mount Everest, in May 1953.
Despite the availability of fabrics and raw materials in Nepal, Tashi, however, must import the textiles and even items like buttons and zippers from overseas to produce these international brand gears in Kathmandu. Drawing analogy from the car industry, he says, “We’re trying to create the BMWs of this field. So having the parts of (Indian) Ambassador car isn’t going to help manufacture BMWs.”
Fabrics vary from merino wool, bamboo charcoal to lighter materials like cotton and polyester. The omnipresent fabric is nylon.
“Our fabrics and gears are performance-oriented and very technical,” he says. “All our gears are tested by Sherpas in the rugged conditions of the Himalaya. The test summiteers come back and tell us the improvements that we must make on the gears.”
His confidence on the materials and his products is guaranteed by the warranty tags hanging from the gears. The tags read, “We provide you 100% life warranty. If there’s any defect on the details or apparels, we fix it free. And if we can’t, we replace it with a new one.”
His friend Appa Sherpa, who has climbed Everest for a record 19 times, has endorsed the new brand name at a trade fair in the United States, where the launch piqued the interests of outdoor adventure enthusiasts.
For Tashi, the label “Sherpa” is to provide well-made and world-class quality garments that resonates the country in its best.
“In this field, there are lots of foreign brands to compete with,” he observes. “Nepal, although being the Mecca for trekking and climbing, lacked adventure gears with the country’s authenticity.” For him, therefore, the brand is the outcome of his long experience in apparel business and emotional connection to his own culture.
Thus, the designs have been paid full attention to. Along with plain mono-colored apparels, checkered prints are also available in the store.
And a tiny piece of multicolored textile, which appears like a Sherpa prayer flag hanging on the pull tab of zippers on the various apparels, shows the designer team’s effort on minute details.
“Our production and merchandising team closely works with the designing development team, which works in the US,” he adds. “And all the samplings are done here in Nepal.”
Initially, Sherpa Adventure Gear made only about 40% of its products in Nepal. But the company now produces almost everything here – despite bandas, political disturbances and load shedding – after customers said they chose the brand especially for the “Made in Nepal” label.
Etching the notion that these adventure apparels are limited only to the trekking and mountaineering world would be a misleading one. Tara Merino Wool Hoodie, Khochen Jacket, and Chandie Top can fit for the regular winter days. Lhamu 4-Way Stretch shirt can be a working-lady’s relief if those underarm seams of a regular cotton shirt have restricted you from stretching out your hands. Multi-pocketed Rara blue shirt for warmer winter days, and Mantra jacket, a combination of nylon material on the chest, and wool on the sleeves, are a few apparels in the men’s department that one can sport even on regular days.
The US Dollar price marks on the tags can give any Nepali a stir. But Tashi defends it, saying they are “competitively priced.” The quality of the products and the lifelong warranty of the gears are some of the aspects to be looked into when it comes to the price margins. After all, they are international brands of adventure gears, though made in Nepal.
Tashi also adds that they are not only targeting foreigners but also new “young successful professionals of Nepal.” There is an increase in the generation of urban young participating in outdoor activities. And Tashi is well aware of the fact. He says that through this label, he wants to educate the younger generation that there is more to life than restaurants. For which, he has a local brand of global adventure gear bolstering the idea – “Go out trekking, know your country.” For which, Tashi has the essential apparels and gears.
On the ground floor, the Sherpa Gear House showcases the adventure gears of all sorts for people of all shapes, sizes and sex. The first floor is currently under construction. After its completion, hard goods will solely occupy the space. The third floor has eight rooms designed by Tashi’s wife Tseten Sherpa. The couple plans to run it as a lodge for foreign trekkers. The terrace, aptly called The Terrace Restaurant, is also open to visitors who will get glimpses of the inside of some white-stretched walls of the Narayanhiti Palace Museum.
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