Nitro's New Digs
9/16/98
By John Stouffer

Nitro's been quiet lately, and that's the way the company has wanted it. Last January, the company changed its distribution in the U.S. from Hood River, Oregon-based Da Kine to a more direct channel handled through the same offices as the Norwalk, Connecticut-based footwear and ski-boot manufacturer Dolomite.

John Eskow and Tim of Nitro.

The move actually made a lot of sense for Nitro, after Nitro's European owners sold 50 percent of the company to Italy-based Dolomite more than a year ago.

SNOWboarding Business recently stopped by Nitro's new Norwalk digs to better sort through the company's structure and hear what's been happening through this quiet time.

According to Nitro's U.S. Sales Manager John Eskow, the company's sales and customer-service departments are working directly for the owners in Europe, much like a wholly owned subsidiary, not as a distributorship,which requires a mark-up for the managers in each country.

Of course, things got a little more confusing recently, when Dolomite (remember, they own 50 percent of Nitro) merged with Tecnica (another ski boot and footwear manufacturer) in Europe. Dolomite is now a Tecnica group subsidiary, and its owner, Franco Vaccari, assumed a minority shareholder position in Tecnica as well. He will continue to operate Dolomite as an independent subsidiary company.

This move will actually benefit all the companies involved, with Nitro seeing huge advantages, particularly in its boot program, says Eskow. Tecnica and Dolomite will cooperate more closely on product manufacturing and outsourcing, materials purchasing, capital investments for production equipment, financial strategies related to bank relationships and currency issues, and further development of opportunities in the apparel business.

However, there will be no more consolidation of offices in the U.S. Unlike Nitro and Dolomite domestically, Tecnica USA is actually only partly owned by Tecnica Europe and will maintain its West Lebanon, New Hampshire offices.

With all these new alliances, the company has seen a huge jump in sales of its snowboard boots in the two years since the partnership with Dolomite, who has been making boots in Italy for 100 years. One big surprise for the company was that its patented custom-foam-fit-system boot's sales sales jumped 53 percent last year. This custom-foam-fit system allows the rider to get a custom-molded liner in less than fifteen minutes in the shop when they buy the boot. It doesn't require an oven or heater; it's all self-contained.

"We have seen well-rounded growth as dealers who carried this system last season commit more units to it, as well as seeing more dealers trying it for the first time this season," says Eskow.

Last season, Nitro offered this system on two boot models, and this year it was included on three boots, including the Clicker-compatible Stratus, and conventional Magna and Axis. Nitro riders Shin Campos, Kalei Pitcher, and Dan Hunt are all using the new boot-molding system.

Nitro has also added Seth Neary to the employment list, making him the team manager after many years of riding for the company. He will continue to compete on a limited basis, but will spend more time coordinating photo and video shoots and taking care of team members' needs throughout the season.

Although the company says it's been quiet for the last several months, a lot has been going on. Just wait until the people at Nitro start giving us the news they assured us is coming in the near future.

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