December 18, 2024 • 44 mins
In this special holiday episode, Brad and Holly catch up on their favorite local hikes this time of year, what festive libations they like, and "Christmas" movies (Die Hard, yes or no?). Then it's on to Reno Tahoe! Find out where Weekend Sherpa went and what adventures happened on their recent trip to Reno: hikes, hot soaks, après, and where to find the best outdoor gear at good prices. Later in the episode they're joined by Max Smith, vice president of Moment Skis, based in Reno. Employee owned, Moment Skis is carving out an independent and successful path as the Biggest Little Ski Company in the World. Their factory in Reno is where the ski magic happens, and you can visit it to watch how the skis are made, check out the showroom, and get advice on gear and where to find the best snow in Reno Tahoe—plus enjoy a complimentary beer. It's the holidaze... enjoy!
Reno Tahoe Care Package
Reno Tahoe Care Package
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Welcome to the weekend. Sure, but podcast take it outside.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
I'm brad day, I'm holly coolac and happy holidays, Happy holidays.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
I see you're in a Is that a thank goodness?
Speaker 2 (00:29):
We're not on uh on YouTube yet, because yes I am.
My office is quite chilly, and since it's the holidays,
I can get away with wearing a grinch onesie. Very
not acceptable and not professional. We didn't have any zoom
calls today?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Did I just out you? Did you not? Yes?
Speaker 2 (00:50):
No, No, I was supposed to know its professional listeners.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Wearing a grinch onesie. It's very much in the holiday spirit. Now,
are you matching the attitude of the Grinch? Right?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Not really? Eggnog and rum helps, but you haven't had
that yet, right, No, that's like a treat. That's my
that's my occasional dessert drink.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Actually, to be honest, it's a little it's actually I've
been doing like a little bit of tequila just as
and then egg because I read that a real thing. Yeah,
and it's just like a little I just I love
eggnog and like it just just a little bit. You know,
it's a good treat. What's your favorite holiday drink?
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Doesn't. I love beverage like Groni's or I really enjoy
a nice Negroni or a nice Manhattan either one of those.
Or great cocktails.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I've been into ka Oh like the or It's pretty tasty.
I'm sure it's loaded with sugar too. You know.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Quote health must be good for your like probiotics or something.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Yeah, I think your stomach like you're anyway, I just
like it.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
It's good. Oh that's good. Well, yeah, Happy Holidays. We're
in the thick of it right now, and we have
a great podcast on tap today. In just a little bit,
we're gonna be talking with Max Smith, who is the
vice president at moment Skis. And moment Skis they're based
(02:17):
in Reno and they're actually the largest ski factory in
the United States. They compete with the big boys out
in Europe. So we have a really cool conversation with
him talking about moment Skis, talking about Reno and and
all kinds of good stuff. And that's coming up in
a little bit. But I mean, we were just in
Reno a few weeks ago and it was like definitely
(02:42):
autumn when we were there, and since that visit, I
think they've gotten a little bit of snow. Probably more
than a little bit. I think they've gotten quite a bit.
I think Tahoe's getting some good stuff. So right now, Yeah,
if you have holiday plans for going to the Sierra
Nevada Tahoe Reno area, good for you because they're getting
some good good snow. And uh yeah, I thought we
(03:05):
could chat a little bit about what that kind of
trip was like and what that experience was like.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Rena it was great. I the beauty of Reno, you know,
you just you get there, It's like incredible dessert. The
colors in winter or fall. It was late fall when
we were there. Our spectacular, of course is the late
day sets in and I mean it is it is.
I called it the Reno Tahoe Care Package for our
(03:33):
issue on our website, we conserve dot com.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
It just came out a few weeks ago, so you
can check that out. It's in both our North Callin
so Cal sections of wee can sirp the Reno Tahoe
Care Package.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
And there's just like there's a lot. The our friend
that came with us, Miriam, part of our weekend Surbert team,
was lives in Las Vegas. She's just moved there from
Orange County, and she had the best time with us
on this because she said, I had no idea all
of the cool stuff that's here. I mean, I knew outdoors,
but she didn't know the spas, the thermal baths that
(04:08):
you can have, the short but like beautiful scenic hikes
practically right from town. You know you're in city limits, Yeah,
in city limits. And so it was really fun to
be with her because we're like, yeah, like this is like,
we love coming to Reno. It was her first time
and she said this is an ultimate girlfriend's getaway as
an example.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Well, I enjoyed it, and I'm not a girlfriend, yeah,
and uh but no, she did seem to have a really,
a really great time. And I really like just the
fact that it's so close to to all those ski
resorts that you might be interested in checking out and Tahoe,
but it's got its own thing going on. It's like
whatever you want to make it, really and everything in between.
And uh yeah, I remember checking out a few of
(04:51):
those hot springs, and one of them, I think it
was Carson Hot Spring. They had like all these different
outdoor pools and there was literally like hots spring water
coming out of like one of those mining picks. Like
they just like they had it like fashioned, it's like
a giant not like a real mining pick, but it
was kind of like it was this giant mining pick
(05:12):
and like and hot water was just like streaming through it.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, because they get it from like thirty five thousand
feet beneath the surface. That's like this natural mineral water.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Thirty five thousand feet. That's that's really far down.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah, it's really far down. I'm sure I have that correct.
I wrote the story. I was there.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
I'm not challenging.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
It's four of they have four of them, and they're
all like, you know, different levels of heat. I guess,
so you really like it hot you get in one.
I think the temperatures ranged from pool to pool from
about ninety eight two hundred and four degrees. Yeah, and
so you know, and it was busy. It was really busy.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
And that was like a weekday.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
Yeah, it was a weekday. I think it was a
Sunday actually. But it's a flow through system and that
means that the pools are drained and refilled daily, so
you know, it seems very fresh, and I don't know,
it makes me think of the Blue Lagoon in Iceland,
Remember the Blue Lagoon. I think he went there and
smothered your face and like mud stuff.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
These I think there is something in the waters here
Carson Springs too that you can that is supposed to
be really good for your skin, Like they say to
kind of slather some of it like that. I think
there's maybe a foam layer. I'm probably not describing that
very well, but you're supposed to actually take it and
sort of like smooth it over your skin.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Did you feel any of like the thermal effects of
like bathing in the natural hot spring water.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Well, I like dip my toes in. But like Miriam
went full on. She is a hot springs queen and
she you're.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Gonna say hot mess.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
No, Miriam, if you're listening, you're farthesting from a hot mess,
especially because you weren't in these hot springs. No, but
she said it like I did. I thought it was
really relaxing and it was fun. Yeah, it was really
kind of fun to be in this virnment. Nason scenic,
but it's you know, natural mineral content is supposed to
reduce muscle tension, improve circulation.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Yeah, there's supposed to be a lot of health caveats.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
That like, we're not doctors are specialists, but I believe it.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
I mean, there's so many hot springs around Reno. I mean,
and we went to a couple of the ones where
you you pay an admission feed to check them out.
But there's also like natural hot springs that you know,
you got to kind of know where to go to
go find them, and that's always a fun adventure figuring
out like, well, where is this hot spring and like.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Riding out nature. It's all private, I know, And if
you go to Reno Tahoe's website, they do have they
have a link that drops some serious hints on on
where to and being respectful about it too, you know.
I mean, it's it's incredible. You're kind of in the
middle of nowhere, surrounded by the mountains in the desert
(07:43):
and you've got a very own hot springs, natural hot springs.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
So cool. I mean, it's a really festive time right
now in general, but I mean in the Reno area too,
with their outdoor ice rinks. They have an outdoor ice
drink at the Grand Sierra Resort and they have that
you know, that Trucky River walk is really beautiful, like
right beside the Trucky River, and there's some great restaurants
and bars and pubs to go check out. I know
(08:07):
you guys checked out the restaurant at the Renaissance Hotel.
What is that? One called it the Sure right that
place that's pretty nice.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
It is very right on the river. It's a great atmosphere.
The Wineless is excellent. We got I had a burger.
I can't remember what Miriam had, but it was delicious.
It's just a beautiful setting. And then outside they have
a fire pitted area that they don't always have open,
but it's really like just warm and nice. And then
(08:38):
you get the like Reno. You can see the biggest
little city in the world lights and it's really cool.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Yeah, and other good operat places too. You went to
was it the Lodge Barn that was just outside of town.
It's kind of like you're coming down from the mountain.
You can go hang out by the fire inside and
they have a whole wall of like wine.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yeah, the wine library is called the Lodge Barn Patio
and they have an outdoor it's super dog friendly. And
then inside, Yeah, they had this amazing it's like a library,
wall of World Wines, so like it's right behind you
and you can sit. They have a fireplace. The food
was really good. You've got a view of Mount Rose.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
This is good stuff.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Yeah. They do events there too, like they have live
music or comedy sets I think almost every evening. So
it's a great place for a prey. And they also
have morning yoga with mimosas.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
What you can do yoga with a mimosa, Well.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
I think you might do it after, but maybe you
do it before. But I had their grilled cheddar cheese
panini and their everything pizza. Yeah, and it was legit.
It was good, delicious.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Well, if you're a beer person, you won't be disappointed.
There's a whole bunch of great brewing going on in
the Reno Sparks area as well. And one of the
places we went to was the Great Basin Brewing Company
and Sparks, And that's a good spot if you happen
to find yourself out in Sparks, maybe doing a little
bit of that outlet shopping at the Legends that Sparks,
which is really cool because you get to go see
(10:07):
an indoor ferris wheel, which I've never seen before. But
the Great Basin Brewing has all kinds of awesome i
pas and hazy IPAs, which I love. You got to
check out the fire lit haze going on at the
Great Basin Brewing. But yeah, there's just it's there's a
wealth of opre and hangout going on.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Yeah, in Reno, And I have to say I was
a little bit like, like, I don't know, the cold
air kind of got to my sinuses and stuff, and
I like beer, but it's like, you know, they had
they had other options to drink, but they're French onion
soup there and anything on that right chicken, Yeah, And
I mean they they're very focused on the food there
(10:50):
with it being sustainably sore. So it's like farm fresh
food at Great Basin. Highly recommend. But let's go back
to the indoor Ferris Wheel. Okay, at Legends Outlets, which
was it's an outdoor outlet mall filled with like restaurants
and you can go to the movies there and obviously
loads of great shopping at good deals. You can spend
(11:11):
a day there. They've got it beautifully laid out. They
have outdoor fire pits everywhere, so you can go and
sit down and relax. And warm up. I'm sure it's
super festive at the holidays. They have a farmer's market.
They had Santa I don't know how long he'll be there,
but probably at least till the end of December. And
they have like artwork, you know, art sculptures outside in
(11:31):
addition to all the shopping. So it's really entertaining. But
the ferris wheel, indoor fares wheel. The real thing at
Shields is the name is it Shields? Do I have that? Correct?
Speaker 3 (11:42):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (11:42):
No, we don't have those, at least that I've seen
in California. Yeah, Shields. It's just a massive like store
for all kinds of like recreational pursuits. And I know
you were quite attracted to the yetti section.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
They have, like this spectacular yetti section. You're just in,
like Yetty haven't, but it's everything.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
I mean in the Stanley section. If you're into those
Stanley mugs, like with the straw that all the gen
xers are going for. You almost grabbed one of those.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
I did because there was a guy there and he
said to me, well, you can only get this here.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
I mean that was gen X's or gen z Ors.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
I think I don't know gen Z. I'm not gen X.
What are we talking about? Gen Z?
Speaker 1 (12:25):
I'm like cool, totally gen Z.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
But yeah, it's I mean it's an employee owned sporting
goods stores and it's just Behemoth and it just had
it has that giant ferris wheel in the middle of it,
and I think every brand of outdoor product that you
can imagine, the North Face, Canada, Goose, I was gonna say, Canada, Geese, Canada, Goose, Arctics,
all of it. All the good stuff you can spend.
(12:51):
You can spend I think a few hours.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
If you haven't been to that Shiels, it is well
worth the visit to get your your hiking gear and
your biking gear and all kinds of other gear. And
when you have this gear, where are you going to go?
Use it?
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Though?
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Like in Reno one of the hikes that we did,
and I think this could be a hike that you
could do year round. Maybe it's a little snowy in
the wintertime, but was that Tom Cook Trail which is
dog friendly right in city limits, right near the Trucky
River And actually you're parking near where the Patagonia I
think factory is. It's like right across the street. From
(13:29):
the trailhead, which is kind of cool and all kinds
of different variations of hikes that you can do out there.
Lots of locals use it and you get a really
cool advantage of, you know, just kind of the surrounding
Sierra Nevada, but also looking back kind of a little
bit in the distance seeing the Reno skyline. And it
was just really kind of a beautiful, easy, simple hike.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Right, It's really popular with locals and little sunsets. I
mean you can see, yeah, downtown Reno. The sunset's you know,
up at like the high points of the trail are
and you're gonna be able to get back down no problem.
That trail is not eighty accessible. But nearby right across
the bridge is Mayberry Park and that has a beautiful
paved path paralleling the rivers. You can bike it or right.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Yeah, that's awesome. Well, I guess, you know, changing gears
just a little bit as far as hikes go, and
this holiday, what hike are you thinking of doing over
your your holiday break?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
I am thinking I would like to do the East
peak of Mount Town. Oh, the East Peak, Yeah, because
it's a classic, it's short, that's.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
The one that has like a little like viewing platform.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Right exactly. Yeah, and it's this time of year. I
think sunsets are stunning from there. Yeah, And so like
you know, you rive about an hour before. The trail
is maybe a quarter mile one way.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
You can basically drive up to it and then just
kind of like hike around the peak.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
Right, you walk up the plank trail, and then you
go to the east peak fire lookout in Summit. It's
like two seventy one feet.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
But no, it's just off the top of your head.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Who's ai ing this on Google right now? Yeah, And
it's really it's just you know panorama. It's gorgeous. Like
you can see some of Mount Town's northern lakes. You
see Diablo, you see Mount Saint Helena.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Oh, yeah, you're at one of the peaks, one of
the great peaks in the entire Bay area.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, and then the peak of Mount Tame. You can
see its shadow if you look east. I believe, and
I'm not good with directions, but I remember that it's
like the as the sunset and you get this really
cool shadow to the east. So you look west, it's great,
look east, it's great.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
That's a good one. I like that one because you
can be up there at sunset. You don't have to
worry about hustling back with a flashlight, right, You're just
getting this great view Mount Saint Helena. I remember I
was up I think for sunset many many years ago.
But that's just such a long way down afterward, like
in the dark, which kind of you know, can be
a bit sketchy. But that's also good. If you want
(16:04):
a good view in the North Bay or in the
Bay Area, Mount Saint Helena is a good one too. Yeah,
just kind of a hike or a bike ride to
get up to the top of it. But that's cool,
that's a great that's a good choice.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
What about you, I mean, you're biking a lot lately, right,
You're on you're back on the training schedule for biking
your new biking season in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Yeah, yeah, getting back after it with the biking and
the gravel biking and the mountain biking. But for hiking,
I mean, it's been so long since I've been to
Point Raise. I'd love to get back out there. I
find winter they're really beautiful. Just you get a lot
of bird life, you get the chance to see whales potentially,
(16:46):
and it's just it's just a really kind of magical time,
especially if you get some of those like big waves
coming through. And one beach that I particularly like is
McClure's Beach. It's kind of like on the very northern
part of Point Rays, like you're going up to that,
you know, where the tu Lee Elk are in the
northern part the Pierce Point kind of area. If you
(17:07):
go past the trailhead for Tamala's Point, you get to
this little trail that takes you out to McClure's Beach
and it's a short hike. It's like maybe a half
mile or a mile down to this really secluded cove beach.
And not that many people go that far out to
it because most people are going to like Jimmy Rock,
or they're going out to the lighthouse, or they're going
(17:28):
to Lemon Tour with their dog. But McClure's beach just
kind of like, I don't know, it feels like somewhat
hidden and it's awesome. Like you just I love beaches
that you can hike into because you know, you have
to work for it a little bit, and this one's
just enough, you know, like half a mile or whatever,
and it's just awesome. You're like at the very it
feels like you're at the end of the world or
(17:48):
something and you just hang out at the beach. Is
probably going to be too cold to sunbathe or anything
like that, but it's just a nice It's a great
way to go experience points. And plus you might be
able to see some of those those tuliolk which have
been in the news again recently, like because I guess
there's some agreement that they're going to take down the
(18:09):
fence where the tuliolk have been kind of like isolated
by this this two mile long fence and the Tamallest
Point area of Point Rays. I guess there's there came
to some agreement that they were going to actually remove that.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
That's incredible. Do you know the backstory on it?
Speaker 1 (18:23):
You know, that's for an upcoming podcast. We'll we'll dig
into that. But I think it got halted or it
got delayed or something. It hasn't happened just yet.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
That's so important because there's the whole issue where there's
constant issues around it. But one of them is that
they can't access water when they especially.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
When there's drought. Yeah, and they're like stuck there and
they can't roam to go find water. So that was
the kind of I think the big catalyst for a
lot of why they think they're going to begin to
open it up to them so that they can naturally
roam like they are meant to. And it's a national park.
I mean, it just kind of makes sense.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Yeah, I think that's such good news. That's some really
good holiday spirit right there.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Yeah, totally some.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
Other holidays before we move on to Max from moment
skis holiday movies. Have you watched it?
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Oh my god, I mean die Hard love die Hard.
It's a classic, you know any Diehard. Yeah, there's so
many buff I'm talking about the first one with with
Bruce Og the og and yeah, watch that recently. Indeed,
I know there's always this debate. It's a Christmas movie,
come on, man. And what it was interesting is like
(19:27):
that was filmed back in like, I don't know, the
late eighties, and there's no CGI. There's not even that
much like special effects. There's like one big explosion, but
there is. I mean, it's it's a really well made,
kind of suspenseful, somewhat campy. You know action movie that
doesn't you don't have to have like the cgi that
so many movies are just.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
In David the superhero movies.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah, so it's kind of good
just to be like, yeah, this is like what action
movies used to be, like, you know, you know what
struck me?
Speaker 2 (19:57):
And that was the soundtrack. I was like, oh, it's
I don't know, it felt very eighties. Yeah, I guess
that is a really good one. But how many say,
did die Hard and it's like Diehard too? And then
what was it? Die harder harder, die Hard?
Speaker 1 (20:15):
I don't know squared how.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Many were there?
Speaker 1 (20:18):
At least four?
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Oh my, I think I know. I saw the first one.
It's excellent. The second one I probably saw, but maybe
I don't remember it, so maybe I'll put that on
my best view over the holidays.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Yeah, you know, it's interesting like what movies came out, like,
what are good sequels? Like a sequel so hard to
do do well? People really like Home Alone two? Yeah, right,
It's been a long time since I've seen it, but
I know I saw it come up on TV the
other night and I was like, wow, Macaulay Culkin looks
(20:53):
just like he did in Home Alone one, Like they
must have turned that around right quick. They saw the
first Yeah, they saw opening weekend and they're like, all right,
we're doing this like right now, because he still looks
like a really young Like they did not wait like
two three or four years to do Home Alone two.
That was like done right away, right, I think? I mean, yeah,
(21:13):
but that's that's worth a watch. Checking that out.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
But I like the show A movie called it, and
I think it actually won the an Academy Award for Animation.
It's called Klaus Story of Santa Claus. Oh yeah, I mean.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
It's Jason Schwartzman.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yeah, he narrates it. O k L a U S.
It's good. I watched that every year. I don't like
sometimes you just have it on in the background, but
it's just I don't know, you know, you get caught
up into these like nostalgic moments of I must rewatch
this if it's on, I get sucked into it.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
What about this one that you just saw on Netflix
called carry On?
Speaker 2 (21:43):
It's a solid six six out of ten, Okay, you
know I think it was like.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
Can you say a solid six?
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Well, yeah, because it could be a week six like
it's barely clinging to it. It's barely passing.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
A week seven. It's a solid six.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
A solid six, not a week solid six, maybe medium.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Did you read that that was supposed to be like
the new Diehard?
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Yeah kind of, well I think yes in a way.
But it's I mean, it's not it's it's it's an
interesting it's an interesting, entertaining, bearably like good. You know,
you're not like like I'm totally wasting my time. You
kind of get sucked in.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Who's I mean, who's in it? We have Jason Bateman,
you have that guy that played Elton, John Tarn. Is
he British?
Speaker 2 (22:28):
Your friend Peter Erton Tarn British? He's I think he's British?
Is he he played John? And then he was in We.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Could have had an accent. Meryl Street does a really
good English accent.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Where is we should look at it? How do you
is it? Is it eager to I.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Don't know, sounds right anyway, but like we're so prepared
when we come up for ours and I swear I.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Have not had a single egg and.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Sure not yeah no, but but the premise of that
is like some kind of terrorist guy is like by
Jason but played by Jason Bateman teen Wolf too, and
he's don't worry, there's another sequel that's not as good
as original. But uh yeah. He's like the terrorist guy
(23:16):
who's trying to get in a carry on and he's
like negotiating like like secretly with this TSA guy saying
he's going to kill his girlfriend if he doesn't let
this carry on go through. And as a whole, the
carryon has like.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
A nerve agent that's intended to harm like a plane
of people, right, but the target is a congresswoman or something.
It's political. I mean it's a little unclear and slightly flimsy.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Is that?
Speaker 2 (23:41):
Is that a fair thing to say?
Speaker 1 (23:42):
I think if Jason Bateman links us to this podcast,
which I think he probably does, then he's going to
be pretty pissed with our description of it.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
I love SmartLess, I love smart I actually love Jason Bama.
Think he's fantastic. I mean Ozark, Yeah, he did a
good job. He's a great director, and he's a great actor, and.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
I mean he's good to like holiday office parties tiles.
You know. Yeah, that's that's another great Holly.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
I don't know how much this fit him, but it
was I mean, it was solid entertainment. It's not I
didn't feel like, Wow, I just wanted to turn off.
I got border charing.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Himself, right, he's like going beyond the stereotype role.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Or he's like I just made a paycheck to direct
my next movie.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
Yeah, all right, well cool, let's uh, let's talk to
our our friend Max Smith from moment Skis and get
some of his insights on what makes moment skis so
good and what makes Reno such a cool place to
be based.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
Let's do it, all.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Right, Well, we're really excited to be here today with
with Max Smith, who's the vice president at moment Skis
in Reno.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Welcome to the pod, Max, Thanks, happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Yeah. So, you know, I grew up in California, grew
up skiing in kind of the Central Sierra and Tahoe
and Mammoth and kind of all over this year in Nevada,
and moment Skis has been around for like twenty or
so years, a little over twenty years.
Speaker 4 (25:18):
Yeah, started out in two thousand and three. Was kind
of when the first pair start getting built. Yeah, that
was you know, more so for personal use and friends
and close family members and kind of around two thousand
and six when it molded into more of an official business. So,
you know, been building skis for a little over twenty
years here.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Now, that's amazing. And you call yourself the biggest little
ski company. Yeah, in the world, but that's a little
bit of a missnoverer because you guys are actually the
biggest ski manufacturer in North America.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
Correct.
Speaker 4 (25:52):
Yeah, so we are the largest ski manufacturer in the
US here now, and that biggest little ski company just
kind of a play the Reno being the.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
Biggest little city.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
So that's kind of stuck around as a tagline since
the inception of the brand.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
I love it. Are you from Reno?
Speaker 3 (26:09):
I am not.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
I actually grew up outside of Plastererville over in California, nice.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
And I moved over here for Reno for college and
never left.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
Right on, So tell us a little bit about that
origin story with Moment skis, Like that, you're building skis
for a few years, kind of family friends, and then
all of a sudden it's kind of like, well, this
is is pretty popular.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:30):
So you know, our founder Casey Hawkinson starred building skis
with the help of snowboard company that used to be
here locally as well, and he brought on our current CEO,
Luke Jacobson, who was going to college at YOU and
R in the very early years of the company, and
they were just building skis, you know, for the heck
(26:51):
of it. They couldn't find that style of ski that
they wanted on the market because a lot of stuff
was still the old school, traditional styled skis from Europe.
So kind of in that new wave of North American
freeride skis they were starting that. I was still much
younger at that time. I was actually building skis with
my dad in his garage because he.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
Was kind of, oh wow, doing the same thing.
Speaker 4 (27:14):
Yeah, he wasn't too well versed on computers at the time,
so you know, I was in high school kind of
drawing up ski shapes for him and helping him build
him And you know, I did the same thing as Luke.
He moved here from Auburn to go to the university
in Reno.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
I moved over from Plasterville.
Speaker 4 (27:30):
I found out that they were doing it here in town,
so I meandered on down and much like Reno, I
just never left the moment Ski Company and now we're
here today.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
So tell us a little bit about that philosophy that's
been driving the company since its inception and why you
think it's continuing to just build and build and build.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
Yeah, you know, back twenty plus years ago, it was
just the major European manufacturers that have been building skis
for one hundred years. And you know, you European skiings
pretty different from American skiing in terms of terrain choice.
Most Europeans they're sticking a lot to the groomers. There's
not a lot of off trail skiing because it's not
(28:11):
as managed by the ski patrol as far as avalanches go,
as it is here in the USA we have gates
and control on off trail terrain. So a lot of
the ski designs were very traditional in that sense, and
when Moment was starting out a kind of the big
boom of indie ski manufacturers in the US at that time,
you know, wider skis, skis with rockers, skis with a
(28:34):
more progressive mound point on it. Just skis that were
a little bit more designed for skiing off the trail
and in the deep powder and in the chopping crud.
And you know, getting away from that seventy five eighty
five millimeter underfoot ski and venturing into things that were
you know, one hundred and ten underfoot or even wider.
So just kind of a different philosophy and that's changed
(28:57):
the shape of the ski industry quite a bit, you know,
in part due to Moment as well as a lot
of the other kind of indie manufacturers that popped up
around that early two thousands. And you know, now you
see a lot of those newer designs that you know,
Casey and Luke were working on in those larger European
ski manufacturers as well. It kind of caught onto that
off trail skiing, wider skis, lots of rocker.
Speaker 3 (29:19):
Built into them, you know, just kind of stuff new.
Essentially seems like you.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
Guys are ahead of the curve on that really latched
onto that movement.
Speaker 4 (29:28):
Yeah, yeah, and you know it's done very well for
us over the past twenty years. You know, slow starts
and then just steadily growing every year. Now luckily never
made like that insane jump and left over with a
bunch of extra stock. You know, it's just a steady
growth year over year and kind of you know, not
playing it safe, but playing it to the fashion that
(29:49):
we can continue that steady growth instead of overstepping our bounds,
you know, based on our manufacturing capabilities for sure.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
And I mean the the skis themselves are also works
of art. They're really beautiful. Do you like work with
specific artists or there's a whole bunch of different artists
that kind of contribute to the skis.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
So our main artist also by the name of Max
Max Miller, he now lives in New York managing a
photo and video studio out there, but he was a
college buddy of our current CEO, Lukes, and you know,
he's very well versed in photoshop and he kind of
set that initial image for the brand back in the day.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
And we'll fly him.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
Out from New York for two to three months a
year and he'll manage a good eighty to ninety percent
of the graphics for us. And then we'll have some
kind of you know, step in artists every now and
then that we'll do a graphic for this model or
graphic for that model each year, and luckily that gives
a little extra flavor while still kind of staying true
(30:54):
to that original design ethos that Max set in place.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
You know, twenty years ago.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
So you're solely based in Reno and you're you do
soup to nuts so to speak with you know, making
the skis on site. Everything you have, the factory which
I love. Welcome to the thunder Dome is interro on
the website. Can you tell us what was the decision
around having it solely in Reno. I'm guessing because of
(31:19):
maybe the founders, but and then tell us a bit
about the factory and I understand that you do tours
of that of course.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
Yeah, so you know, the Reno location was more based
on Casey, the one of the founders, grew up here,
so he just started it up while he was here
and never quite left. We do have our own manufacturing
facility in the US here. It's where we make absolutely
every single pair of the skis. So you guys, anyone
(31:48):
can come on by during hours. We'll give him a
full tour of the factory while it's humming away, show
them how we build every little part of that ski.
Well then we have a whole showroom attached to that,
so nice big cleaner area for people able to check
out the final product, you know, get their skis mounted,
get some new booths, set up, grab a T shirt,
stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
But can they get some advice from you on where
they should be skiing? Like, what's where's your favorite place
to go skiing in Reno?
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (32:15):
You know, my my personal favorite would be Sierrat Tahoe
just because I grew up skiing there. It's a little
farther from Reno these days, so most of our skiing
will be done at moult.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
Rose just because it's so locally located.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
To Reno here, you know, right at the base as
well as we'll do a lot up at Palisades and
Alpine about.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
A truck eet.
Speaker 4 (32:34):
Those are the two big spots for the factory employees here.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Is that where you test skis as well? Like you
have like where do you test them? I'm guessing the
same spots.
Speaker 4 (32:43):
But yeah, So luckily having our own factory here, prototyping
for us is is much quicker than a lot of
other brands. You know, we can come in in the
morning with a brand new idea and build a totally
new ski and have it ready to ski the next day.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
That's incredible.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
So we'll use Mount Row.
Speaker 4 (33:00):
You know, maybe we need to dip out of the
office for a quick couple laps to test something real quick,
twenty thirty minute drive we're in the parking lot.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
Otherwise, if we've got a lot of.
Speaker 4 (33:09):
Things to test, we'll go up to Palisades on the
weekend and and ski all weekend on some some weird
skis that are sometimes great and sometimes not so much.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
Yeah, you feel like riding with you on the chairlift
like what are those?
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (33:21):
Every now and then someone's in the know enough to
go that's I've never seen that moment graphic.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
What ski is?
Speaker 2 (33:27):
That?
Speaker 3 (33:29):
Hush right now?
Speaker 2 (33:31):
I grew up in Canada. I always have to get
Canadian content.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yes, that's so.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
I grew up skiing. I'm not the best skier, but
I was looking at your skis and like they're so impressive,
and I felt like if I was one of your skis,
I would be the hot mess.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
Popular name in the line there.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Do you what's your favorite ski there?
Speaker 3 (33:55):
I definitely like the Meridian the most.
Speaker 4 (33:57):
It's one of our more niche we'll call reserve skis,
something that we build on occasion, not so much every year,
but that's definitely my go to ski. To the point
where people call the factory and they know to ask
for me if they want to talk about that.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Ski, Oh really, Yeah, what's your number one seller?
Speaker 4 (34:18):
It's pretty evenly split between the Death Wish in the
one hundred and twelve underfoot and the Wildcat in the
one hundred and eight millimeter.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
And what kind of skier would kind of veer towards
those two skis?
Speaker 4 (34:31):
Yeah, they're just kind of our great West Coast all conditions,
do a little bit of everything ski, especially for the
West Coast out to you know, Colorado Ish. It's our
go to for customers who just want one pair of skis,
they don't want to have a garage full and having
that hard decision of which pair to take up on
the hill that day, or it's going to be their
(34:52):
first pair of skis and they might plan on adding
some things later down the line.
Speaker 3 (34:57):
So those two are definitely.
Speaker 4 (34:58):
Our most well rounded or most skiers. Yeah, and you know,
we have some different options for say skiers who are
more dedicated to just skiing on trail on the groomers,
or skiers who like to go especially fast and really
aggressive skiing. But yeah, those two, the Death Wish and
Wildcat are by far and large are best sellers.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
So how did the name Death Wish come up for skis.
Speaker 3 (35:23):
Yeah, so very fun story here.
Speaker 4 (35:26):
It was kind of a unique thing that Casey and
Luke were working on and they were testing up at
Boreal up in Trucky one evening and skiing along, going
really fast, and they both ended up hitting a very
sticky patch of snow and luckily kind of recovered from it.
Casey unfortunately crashed and ended up breaking his neck. Well
(35:50):
recovery luckily, but taken back to the artist, you know,
we'll usually come up with graphics before it has a
name for the ski, and he would alway, he's put
placeholder names, and you kind of put a placeholder on
the on the art file.
Speaker 3 (36:05):
As the Death Wish.
Speaker 4 (36:07):
And while they were mocking it up, Luke and Casey saying,
we can't call the ski the Death Wish. That's we're
never going to sell any fast forward to sitting in
the hospital and finding out that Casey's okay, and they
kind of went, you know, we kind of have to
call the ski the Death Wish.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
So it's a story behind that.
Speaker 4 (36:27):
Definitely, it can be a hard push on specific customers
who don't want to ski on a ski named that,
but by and large it's it's got the biggest cult
following out of our lineup.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
That's awesome. And if you're not sure what ski you
would like and you happen to be local, you guys
have it looks like you have a demo season pass program. Yeah,
tell us.
Speaker 4 (36:49):
About that, so customers are more happy to come by
the showroom here. They can purchase a call it a
demo season pass. It's one hundred and fifty dollars that
allows them to take out a pair of skis for
up to a week at a time, go skiing wherever
they want, really put it through the ringer. You know,
when they drop that ski off, they can get a
different ski, whether it's figuring out which size.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
They want to be on or which model they want
to be on.
Speaker 4 (37:12):
And we essentially allow that to happen throughout the entire season,
you know, hopefully through April, snow dependent, and then if
they end up finding that ski that they really like,
that one hundred and fifty dollars essentially works as a
credit towards that final ski purchase.
Speaker 1 (37:25):
So that's a great Prostomers are.
Speaker 4 (37:27):
Really in the market and they know they want to
buy one can look at as a deposit for that
future ski purchase.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
That's really cool. Wow that Yeah, if you're not knowing
what you want to get doing that makes makes a
ton of sense.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
I have a question, Yeah, prey, this is very important
to me when skiing a prey, Like I I'm the
skier who's like, I'll get up when I get up,
maybe get there by nine or ten, do a few runs,
have lunch, maybe two more runs, one or more, and
then I'm ready for app prey. Yeah, where do you
(38:03):
recommend locally for a great appray scene in Reno? Powhoe?
Speaker 4 (38:08):
Yeah, you know, if you're up at Palisades, the slot
bar or the Chamois are pretty hard to beat. Those
are kind of the two key points as far as
trucky app ray scenes go. You'll find all the dirty
local skiers. They're there just about every day of the week.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
What about right in like the Reno area, What would
you do?
Speaker 4 (38:30):
You know, Midtown in Reno has completely transformed since I
first got here. You know, it was pretty run down
and you know when I came here for college and
it's sprouted up into a lot of just amazing bars
that either specialize in different style of cocktails or drink
specials or anything like.
Speaker 3 (38:49):
That, and a lot of really neat restaurants.
Speaker 4 (38:52):
You know, a huge range of different culinary tastes that
you can get your hands on, and most of it's
all within walking distance of each other. So the midtown
area in Reno is an excellent place to kind of
hit the night life.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
Okay, I love that area.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Stayed there a few years ago. It's got a great
restaurant's got a great bakery us.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Yeah, yes, well where would you go? I know ski
season is obviously your favorite season, but what if it's
not ski season? Where where would we find Where would
we find you? Would you be out on the hiking trails,
on the mountain biking trails? What what's your other passion?
Speaker 4 (39:28):
Yeah, most of the time you'll find me here at work,
but you know, even here in Reno and the Tahoe
area excellent mountain biking trails. That's a lot of us
here at the factory will transition to in the summertime
is either riding bikes up on Pevine at the north
end of Reno or going up in the trucky. We
(39:49):
have some excellent bike parks as well. If you just
want those quick laps.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
What are they what are a couple of those.
Speaker 3 (39:55):
We have this Sierra Vista bike Park here in Reno.
Speaker 4 (39:58):
It's on an old the golf course, and we have
a great trail crew here. I think they're the biggest
little trail crew. Nice you got to use that again, Yeah,
Ian do you excellent work. They're always putting up, you know,
new more aggressive lines for the really experienced people. Tons
of beginner trails at the bike park, as well as
(40:21):
kind of little training centers where you can practice, you know,
riding on skinny logs or little drops that progressively get bigger.
So they do a great job with that and helping
people get into that sport as well.
Speaker 3 (40:33):
Well.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
You're speaking Brad's language because he's a huge mountain biker.
Speaker 1 (40:37):
I am and gravel biker and uh yeah, I've I've
I've written out that that part of Nevada and it's amazing.
It's really really beautiful. What's that town that's like kind
of south of Reno's it pronounced Genoa or Genoa?
Speaker 3 (40:55):
Oh goodness, I should know that it's I think.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
It's like g e n o A. But that that
area was just is absolutely gorgeous and it's not far
from Reno.
Speaker 4 (41:05):
No, And that's the nice thing about Reno is there's
so many different regions that you can get too quickly.
You know, we have almost no shade for riding bikes
immediately in Reno, but you can have forty minutes here
in Tahoe, yeah, really wooded. You can also go ski
touring out east in Nevada, you know, the Ruby Mountain Ranges.
Speaker 3 (41:25):
Really cool stuff out there that you can get to.
Speaker 4 (41:27):
You know, everything's kind of we get the benefits of
living in a city with groceries and gas stations on
every corner. And yeah, but it's very easily to drive
thirty minutes or less and be somewhere completely different that
looks like there's no civilization anywhere close to it.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
Right on. Well, it's really cool to have you on
the pod and be able to talk about moments, skis
and some of your favorite places to go. And we
really appreciate you taking a few minutes out of your
d I'm sure you're busy it right now at the
factory doing all this, so we really appreciate it. Max.
Speaker 3 (42:05):
Yeah, of course, anytime.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
It was so nice to meet you, and I plan
to come into your factory next time. I'm in Reno.
Speaker 3 (42:12):
Yeah, absolutely, I might get back on the skis.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
Maybe there you go at least the Opre.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
The Opre you have beer there, right, we do.
Speaker 3 (42:21):
Yeah, so little details about the showroom.
Speaker 4 (42:24):
You know, we're here Tuesday through Friday from eight am
to six pm.
Speaker 3 (42:28):
People are welcome. Anytime. We got free beer, free heart seltzers,
got some waters in case you're not drinking. Okay.
Speaker 4 (42:35):
People come by, whether they just want to kind of
check stuff out and look at the new stuff, get
some new boots fitted up, or mount or tune up
their older skis, and you know, anytime during those hours,
we're happy to give people a tour the whole facility,
walk them through, you know, put a beer in their hand,
and show them some.
Speaker 3 (42:50):
Big machines in the back.
Speaker 1 (42:52):
They'll be buying skis before they know it.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
There.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
I do need some new skis.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Exactly, especially after the second beer. So people want to
find out more, they just go to moment skis dot com.
Speaker 3 (43:06):
Yeah, so you can go to moment skis dot com.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
You know, you can also give us a call and
during those working hours we usually have someone on some
called live chat. So a little bubble pops up on
the website. You can chat with us there directly as well.
If customers have any questions about anything, you know, it's
not someone in a in a far off land trying
to answer questions for you. It's it's usually myself, for
the CEO or one of our other top employees here,
(43:31):
who's gonna be there answering.
Speaker 3 (43:32):
Questions for you right on.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
We'll keep keep doing the good work.
Speaker 3 (43:36):
Yeah, we'll do.
Speaker 2 (43:37):
Thanks a lot, great speaking with you.
Speaker 5 (43:40):
Thanks, thanks for having men.
Speaker 3 (44:01):
He found out the up
Welcome to the weekend. Sure, but podcast take it outside.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
I'm brad day, I'm holly coolac and happy holidays, Happy holidays.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
I see you're in a Is that a thank goodness?
Speaker 2 (00:29):
We're not on uh on YouTube yet, because yes I am.
My office is quite chilly, and since it's the holidays,
I can get away with wearing a grinch onesie. Very
not acceptable and not professional. We didn't have any zoom
calls today?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Did I just out you? Did you not? Yes?
Speaker 2 (00:50):
No, No, I was supposed to know its professional listeners.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Wearing a grinch onesie. It's very much in the holiday spirit. Now,
are you matching the attitude of the Grinch? Right?
Speaker 2 (01:00):
Not really? Eggnog and rum helps, but you haven't had
that yet, right, No, that's like a treat. That's my
that's my occasional dessert drink.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
Actually, to be honest, it's a little it's actually I've
been doing like a little bit of tequila just as
and then egg because I read that a real thing. Yeah,
and it's just like a little I just I love
eggnog and like it just just a little bit. You know,
it's a good treat. What's your favorite holiday drink?
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Doesn't. I love beverage like Groni's or I really enjoy
a nice Negroni or a nice Manhattan either one of those.
Or great cocktails.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
I've been into ka Oh like the or It's pretty tasty.
I'm sure it's loaded with sugar too. You know.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Quote health must be good for your like probiotics or something.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
Yeah, I think your stomach like you're anyway, I just
like it.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
It's good. Oh that's good. Well, yeah, Happy Holidays. We're
in the thick of it right now, and we have
a great podcast on tap today. In just a little bit,
we're gonna be talking with Max Smith, who is the
vice president at moment Skis. And moment Skis they're based
(02:17):
in Reno and they're actually the largest ski factory in
the United States. They compete with the big boys out
in Europe. So we have a really cool conversation with
him talking about moment Skis, talking about Reno and and
all kinds of good stuff. And that's coming up in
a little bit. But I mean, we were just in
Reno a few weeks ago and it was like definitely
(02:42):
autumn when we were there, and since that visit, I
think they've gotten a little bit of snow. Probably more
than a little bit. I think they've gotten quite a bit.
I think Tahoe's getting some good stuff. So right now, Yeah,
if you have holiday plans for going to the Sierra
Nevada Tahoe Reno area, good for you because they're getting
some good good snow. And uh yeah, I thought we
(03:05):
could chat a little bit about what that kind of
trip was like and what that experience was like.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Rena it was great. I the beauty of Reno, you know,
you just you get there, It's like incredible dessert. The
colors in winter or fall. It was late fall when
we were there. Our spectacular, of course is the late
day sets in and I mean it is it is.
I called it the Reno Tahoe Care Package for our
(03:33):
issue on our website, we conserve dot com.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
It just came out a few weeks ago, so you
can check that out. It's in both our North Callin
so Cal sections of wee can sirp the Reno Tahoe
Care Package.
Speaker 2 (03:45):
And there's just like there's a lot. The our friend
that came with us, Miriam, part of our weekend Surbert team,
was lives in Las Vegas. She's just moved there from
Orange County, and she had the best time with us
on this because she said, I had no idea all
of the cool stuff that's here. I mean, I knew outdoors,
but she didn't know the spas, the thermal baths that
(04:08):
you can have, the short but like beautiful scenic hikes
practically right from town. You know you're in city limits, Yeah,
in city limits. And so it was really fun to
be with her because we're like, yeah, like this is like,
we love coming to Reno. It was her first time
and she said this is an ultimate girlfriend's getaway as
an example.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Well, I enjoyed it, and I'm not a girlfriend, yeah,
and uh but no, she did seem to have a really,
a really great time. And I really like just the
fact that it's so close to to all those ski
resorts that you might be interested in checking out and Tahoe,
but it's got its own thing going on. It's like
whatever you want to make it, really and everything in between.
And uh yeah, I remember checking out a few of
(04:51):
those hot springs, and one of them, I think it
was Carson Hot Spring. They had like all these different
outdoor pools and there was literally like hots spring water
coming out of like one of those mining picks. Like
they just like they had it like fashioned, it's like
a giant not like a real mining pick, but it
was kind of like it was this giant mining pick
(05:12):
and like and hot water was just like streaming through it.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, because they get it from like thirty five thousand
feet beneath the surface. That's like this natural mineral water.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
Thirty five thousand feet. That's that's really far down.
Speaker 2 (05:24):
Yeah, it's really far down. I'm sure I have that correct.
I wrote the story. I was there.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
I'm not challenging.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
It's four of they have four of them, and they're
all like, you know, different levels of heat. I guess,
so you really like it hot you get in one.
I think the temperatures ranged from pool to pool from
about ninety eight two hundred and four degrees. Yeah, and
so you know, and it was busy. It was really busy.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
And that was like a weekday.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
Yeah, it was a weekday. I think it was a
Sunday actually. But it's a flow through system and that
means that the pools are drained and refilled daily, so
you know, it seems very fresh, and I don't know,
it makes me think of the Blue Lagoon in Iceland,
Remember the Blue Lagoon. I think he went there and
smothered your face and like mud stuff.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
These I think there is something in the waters here
Carson Springs too that you can that is supposed to
be really good for your skin, Like they say to
kind of slather some of it like that. I think
there's maybe a foam layer. I'm probably not describing that
very well, but you're supposed to actually take it and
sort of like smooth it over your skin.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Did you feel any of like the thermal effects of
like bathing in the natural hot spring water.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Well, I like dip my toes in. But like Miriam
went full on. She is a hot springs queen and
she you're.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Gonna say hot mess.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
No, Miriam, if you're listening, you're farthesting from a hot mess,
especially because you weren't in these hot springs. No, but
she said it like I did. I thought it was
really relaxing and it was fun. Yeah, it was really
kind of fun to be in this virnment. Nason scenic,
but it's you know, natural mineral content is supposed to
reduce muscle tension, improve circulation.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Yeah, there's supposed to be a lot of health caveats.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
That like, we're not doctors are specialists, but I believe it.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
I mean, there's so many hot springs around Reno. I mean,
and we went to a couple of the ones where
you you pay an admission feed to check them out.
But there's also like natural hot springs that you know,
you got to kind of know where to go to
go find them, and that's always a fun adventure figuring
out like, well, where is this hot spring and like.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Riding out nature. It's all private, I know, And if
you go to Reno Tahoe's website, they do have they
have a link that drops some serious hints on on
where to and being respectful about it too, you know.
I mean, it's it's incredible. You're kind of in the
middle of nowhere, surrounded by the mountains in the desert
(07:43):
and you've got a very own hot springs, natural hot springs.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
So cool. I mean, it's a really festive time right
now in general, but I mean in the Reno area too,
with their outdoor ice rinks. They have an outdoor ice
drink at the Grand Sierra Resort and they have that
you know, that Trucky River walk is really beautiful, like
right beside the Trucky River, and there's some great restaurants
and bars and pubs to go check out. I know
(08:07):
you guys checked out the restaurant at the Renaissance Hotel.
What is that? One called it the Sure right that
place that's pretty nice.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
It is very right on the river. It's a great atmosphere.
The Wineless is excellent. We got I had a burger.
I can't remember what Miriam had, but it was delicious.
It's just a beautiful setting. And then outside they have
a fire pitted area that they don't always have open,
but it's really like just warm and nice. And then
(08:38):
you get the like Reno. You can see the biggest
little city in the world lights and it's really cool.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Yeah, and other good operat places too. You went to
was it the Lodge Barn that was just outside of town.
It's kind of like you're coming down from the mountain.
You can go hang out by the fire inside and
they have a whole wall of like wine.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yeah, the wine library is called the Lodge Barn Patio
and they have an outdoor it's super dog friendly. And
then inside, Yeah, they had this amazing it's like a library,
wall of World Wines, so like it's right behind you
and you can sit. They have a fireplace. The food
was really good. You've got a view of Mount Rose.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
This is good stuff.
Speaker 2 (09:20):
Yeah. They do events there too, like they have live
music or comedy sets I think almost every evening. So
it's a great place for a prey. And they also
have morning yoga with mimosas.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
What you can do yoga with a mimosa, Well.
Speaker 2 (09:34):
I think you might do it after, but maybe you
do it before. But I had their grilled cheddar cheese
panini and their everything pizza. Yeah, and it was legit.
It was good, delicious.
Speaker 1 (09:46):
Well, if you're a beer person, you won't be disappointed.
There's a whole bunch of great brewing going on in
the Reno Sparks area as well. And one of the
places we went to was the Great Basin Brewing Company
and Sparks, And that's a good spot if you happen
to find yourself out in Sparks, maybe doing a little
bit of that outlet shopping at the Legends that Sparks,
which is really cool because you get to go see
(10:07):
an indoor ferris wheel, which I've never seen before. But
the Great Basin Brewing has all kinds of awesome i
pas and hazy IPAs, which I love. You got to
check out the fire lit haze going on at the
Great Basin Brewing. But yeah, there's just it's there's a
wealth of opre and hangout going on.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
Yeah, in Reno, And I have to say I was
a little bit like, like, I don't know, the cold
air kind of got to my sinuses and stuff, and
I like beer, but it's like, you know, they had
they had other options to drink, but they're French onion
soup there and anything on that right chicken, Yeah, And
I mean they they're very focused on the food there
(10:50):
with it being sustainably sore. So it's like farm fresh
food at Great Basin. Highly recommend. But let's go back
to the indoor Ferris Wheel. Okay, at Legends Outlets, which
was it's an outdoor outlet mall filled with like restaurants
and you can go to the movies there and obviously
loads of great shopping at good deals. You can spend
(11:11):
a day there. They've got it beautifully laid out. They
have outdoor fire pits everywhere, so you can go and
sit down and relax. And warm up. I'm sure it's
super festive at the holidays. They have a farmer's market.
They had Santa I don't know how long he'll be there,
but probably at least till the end of December. And
they have like artwork, you know, art sculptures outside in
(11:31):
addition to all the shopping. So it's really entertaining. But
the ferris wheel, indoor fares wheel. The real thing at
Shields is the name is it Shields? Do I have that? Correct?
Speaker 3 (11:42):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (11:42):
No, we don't have those, at least that I've seen
in California. Yeah, Shields. It's just a massive like store
for all kinds of like recreational pursuits. And I know
you were quite attracted to the yetti section.
Speaker 2 (11:57):
They have, like this spectacular yetti section. You're just in,
like Yetty haven't, but it's everything.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
I mean in the Stanley section. If you're into those
Stanley mugs, like with the straw that all the gen
xers are going for. You almost grabbed one of those.
Speaker 2 (12:10):
I did because there was a guy there and he
said to me, well, you can only get this here.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
I mean that was gen X's or gen z Ors.
Speaker 2 (12:19):
I think I don't know gen Z. I'm not gen X.
What are we talking about? Gen Z?
Speaker 1 (12:25):
I'm like cool, totally gen Z.
Speaker 2 (12:29):
But yeah, it's I mean it's an employee owned sporting
goods stores and it's just Behemoth and it just had
it has that giant ferris wheel in the middle of it,
and I think every brand of outdoor product that you
can imagine, the North Face, Canada, Goose, I was gonna say, Canada, Geese, Canada, Goose, Arctics,
all of it. All the good stuff you can spend.
(12:51):
You can spend I think a few hours.
Speaker 1 (12:53):
If you haven't been to that Shiels, it is well
worth the visit to get your your hiking gear and
your biking gear and all kinds of other gear. And
when you have this gear, where are you going to go?
Use it?
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Though?
Speaker 1 (13:07):
Like in Reno one of the hikes that we did,
and I think this could be a hike that you
could do year round. Maybe it's a little snowy in
the wintertime, but was that Tom Cook Trail which is
dog friendly right in city limits, right near the Trucky
River And actually you're parking near where the Patagonia I
think factory is. It's like right across the street. From
(13:29):
the trailhead, which is kind of cool and all kinds
of different variations of hikes that you can do out there.
Lots of locals use it and you get a really
cool advantage of, you know, just kind of the surrounding
Sierra Nevada, but also looking back kind of a little
bit in the distance seeing the Reno skyline. And it
was just really kind of a beautiful, easy, simple hike.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Right, It's really popular with locals and little sunsets. I
mean you can see, yeah, downtown Reno. The sunset's you know,
up at like the high points of the trail are
and you're gonna be able to get back down no problem.
That trail is not eighty accessible. But nearby right across
the bridge is Mayberry Park and that has a beautiful
paved path paralleling the rivers. You can bike it or right.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Yeah, that's awesome. Well, I guess, you know, changing gears
just a little bit as far as hikes go, and
this holiday, what hike are you thinking of doing over
your your holiday break?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
I am thinking I would like to do the East
peak of Mount Town. Oh, the East Peak, Yeah, because
it's a classic, it's short, that's.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
The one that has like a little like viewing platform.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Right exactly. Yeah, and it's this time of year. I
think sunsets are stunning from there. Yeah, And so like
you know, you rive about an hour before. The trail
is maybe a quarter mile one way.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
You can basically drive up to it and then just
kind of like hike around the peak.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
Right, you walk up the plank trail, and then you
go to the east peak fire lookout in Summit. It's
like two seventy one feet.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
But no, it's just off the top of your head.
Speaker 2 (15:12):
Who's ai ing this on Google right now? Yeah, And
it's really it's just you know panorama. It's gorgeous. Like
you can see some of Mount Town's northern lakes. You
see Diablo, you see Mount Saint Helena.
Speaker 1 (15:26):
Oh, yeah, you're at one of the peaks, one of
the great peaks in the entire Bay area.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, and then the peak of Mount Tame. You can
see its shadow if you look east. I believe, and
I'm not good with directions, but I remember that it's
like the as the sunset and you get this really
cool shadow to the east. So you look west, it's great,
look east, it's great.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
That's a good one. I like that one because you
can be up there at sunset. You don't have to
worry about hustling back with a flashlight, right, You're just
getting this great view Mount Saint Helena. I remember I
was up I think for sunset many many years ago.
But that's just such a long way down afterward, like
in the dark, which kind of you know, can be
a bit sketchy. But that's also good. If you want
(16:04):
a good view in the North Bay or in the
Bay Area, Mount Saint Helena is a good one too. Yeah,
just kind of a hike or a bike ride to
get up to the top of it. But that's cool,
that's a great that's a good choice.
Speaker 2 (16:17):
What about you, I mean, you're biking a lot lately, right,
You're on you're back on the training schedule for biking
your new biking season in twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1 (16:25):
Yeah, yeah, getting back after it with the biking and
the gravel biking and the mountain biking. But for hiking,
I mean, it's been so long since I've been to
Point Raise. I'd love to get back out there. I
find winter they're really beautiful. Just you get a lot
of bird life, you get the chance to see whales potentially,
(16:46):
and it's just it's just a really kind of magical time,
especially if you get some of those like big waves
coming through. And one beach that I particularly like is
McClure's Beach. It's kind of like on the very northern
part of Point Rays, like you're going up to that,
you know, where the tu Lee Elk are in the
northern part the Pierce Point kind of area. If you
(17:07):
go past the trailhead for Tamala's Point, you get to
this little trail that takes you out to McClure's Beach
and it's a short hike. It's like maybe a half
mile or a mile down to this really secluded cove beach.
And not that many people go that far out to
it because most people are going to like Jimmy Rock,
or they're going out to the lighthouse, or they're going
(17:28):
to Lemon Tour with their dog. But McClure's beach just
kind of like, I don't know, it feels like somewhat
hidden and it's awesome. Like you just I love beaches
that you can hike into because you know, you have
to work for it a little bit, and this one's
just enough, you know, like half a mile or whatever,
and it's just awesome. You're like at the very it
feels like you're at the end of the world or
(17:48):
something and you just hang out at the beach. Is
probably going to be too cold to sunbathe or anything
like that, but it's just a nice It's a great
way to go experience points. And plus you might be
able to see some of those those tuliolk which have
been in the news again recently, like because I guess
there's some agreement that they're going to take down the
(18:09):
fence where the tuliolk have been kind of like isolated
by this this two mile long fence and the Tamallest
Point area of Point Rays. I guess there's there came
to some agreement that they were going to actually remove that.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
That's incredible. Do you know the backstory on it?
Speaker 1 (18:23):
You know, that's for an upcoming podcast. We'll we'll dig
into that. But I think it got halted or it
got delayed or something. It hasn't happened just yet.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
That's so important because there's the whole issue where there's
constant issues around it. But one of them is that
they can't access water when they especially.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
When there's drought. Yeah, and they're like stuck there and
they can't roam to go find water. So that was
the kind of I think the big catalyst for a
lot of why they think they're going to begin to
open it up to them so that they can naturally
roam like they are meant to. And it's a national park.
I mean, it just kind of makes sense.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Yeah, I think that's such good news. That's some really
good holiday spirit right there.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
Yeah, totally some.
Speaker 2 (18:59):
Other holidays before we move on to Max from moment
skis holiday movies. Have you watched it?
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Oh my god, I mean die Hard love die Hard.
It's a classic, you know any Diehard. Yeah, there's so
many buff I'm talking about the first one with with
Bruce Og the og and yeah, watch that recently. Indeed,
I know there's always this debate. It's a Christmas movie,
come on, man. And what it was interesting is like
(19:27):
that was filmed back in like, I don't know, the
late eighties, and there's no CGI. There's not even that
much like special effects. There's like one big explosion, but
there is. I mean, it's it's a really well made,
kind of suspenseful, somewhat campy. You know action movie that
doesn't you don't have to have like the cgi that
so many movies are just.
Speaker 2 (19:47):
In David the superhero movies.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah, so it's kind of good
just to be like, yeah, this is like what action
movies used to be, like, you know, you know what
struck me?
Speaker 2 (19:57):
And that was the soundtrack. I was like, oh, it's
I don't know, it felt very eighties. Yeah, I guess
that is a really good one. But how many say,
did die Hard and it's like Diehard too? And then
what was it? Die harder harder, die Hard?
Speaker 1 (20:15):
I don't know squared how.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Many were there?
Speaker 1 (20:18):
At least four?
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Oh my, I think I know. I saw the first one.
It's excellent. The second one I probably saw, but maybe
I don't remember it, so maybe I'll put that on
my best view over the holidays.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Yeah, you know, it's interesting like what movies came out, like,
what are good sequels? Like a sequel so hard to
do do well? People really like Home Alone two? Yeah, right,
It's been a long time since I've seen it, but
I know I saw it come up on TV the
other night and I was like, wow, Macaulay Culkin looks
(20:53):
just like he did in Home Alone one, Like they
must have turned that around right quick. They saw the
first Yeah, they saw opening weekend and they're like, all right,
we're doing this like right now, because he still looks
like a really young Like they did not wait like
two three or four years to do Home Alone two.
That was like done right away, right, I think? I mean, yeah,
(21:13):
but that's that's worth a watch. Checking that out.
Speaker 2 (21:16):
But I like the show A movie called it, and
I think it actually won the an Academy Award for Animation.
It's called Klaus Story of Santa Claus. Oh yeah, I mean.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
It's Jason Schwartzman.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yeah, he narrates it. O k L a U S.
It's good. I watched that every year. I don't like
sometimes you just have it on in the background, but
it's just I don't know, you know, you get caught
up into these like nostalgic moments of I must rewatch
this if it's on, I get sucked into it.
Speaker 1 (21:39):
What about this one that you just saw on Netflix
called carry On?
Speaker 2 (21:43):
It's a solid six six out of ten, Okay, you
know I think it was like.
Speaker 1 (21:48):
Can you say a solid six?
Speaker 2 (21:49):
Well, yeah, because it could be a week six like
it's barely clinging to it. It's barely passing.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
A week seven. It's a solid six.
Speaker 2 (21:56):
A solid six, not a week solid six, maybe medium.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
Did you read that that was supposed to be like
the new Diehard?
Speaker 2 (22:04):
Yeah kind of, well I think yes in a way.
But it's I mean, it's not it's it's it's an
interesting it's an interesting, entertaining, bearably like good. You know,
you're not like like I'm totally wasting my time. You
kind of get sucked in.
Speaker 1 (22:20):
Who's I mean, who's in it? We have Jason Bateman,
you have that guy that played Elton, John Tarn. Is
he British?
Speaker 2 (22:28):
Your friend Peter Erton Tarn British? He's I think he's British?
Is he he played John? And then he was in We.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Could have had an accent. Meryl Street does a really
good English accent.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Where is we should look at it? How do you
is it? Is it eager to I.
Speaker 1 (22:44):
Don't know, sounds right anyway, but like we're so prepared
when we come up for ours and I swear I.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Have not had a single egg and.
Speaker 1 (22:54):
Sure not yeah no, but but the premise of that
is like some kind of terrorist guy is like by
Jason but played by Jason Bateman teen Wolf too, and
he's don't worry, there's another sequel that's not as good
as original. But uh yeah. He's like the terrorist guy
(23:16):
who's trying to get in a carry on and he's
like negotiating like like secretly with this TSA guy saying
he's going to kill his girlfriend if he doesn't let
this carry on go through. And as a whole, the
carryon has like.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
A nerve agent that's intended to harm like a plane
of people, right, but the target is a congresswoman or something.
It's political. I mean it's a little unclear and slightly flimsy.
Speaker 3 (23:41):
Is that?
Speaker 2 (23:41):
Is that a fair thing to say?
Speaker 1 (23:42):
I think if Jason Bateman links us to this podcast,
which I think he probably does, then he's going to
be pretty pissed with our description of it.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
I love SmartLess, I love smart I actually love Jason Bama.
Think he's fantastic. I mean Ozark, Yeah, he did a
good job. He's a great director, and he's a great actor, and.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
I mean he's good to like holiday office parties tiles.
You know. Yeah, that's that's another great Holly.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
I don't know how much this fit him, but it
was I mean, it was solid entertainment. It's not I
didn't feel like, Wow, I just wanted to turn off.
I got border charing.
Speaker 1 (24:15):
Himself, right, he's like going beyond the stereotype role.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
Or he's like I just made a paycheck to direct
my next movie.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
Yeah, all right, well cool, let's uh, let's talk to
our our friend Max Smith from moment Skis and get
some of his insights on what makes moment skis so
good and what makes Reno such a cool place to
be based.
Speaker 2 (24:42):
Let's do it, all.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
Right, Well, we're really excited to be here today with
with Max Smith, who's the vice president at moment Skis
in Reno.
Speaker 3 (24:55):
Welcome to the pod, Max, Thanks, happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
Yeah. So, you know, I grew up in California, grew
up skiing in kind of the Central Sierra and Tahoe
and Mammoth and kind of all over this year in Nevada,
and moment Skis has been around for like twenty or
so years, a little over twenty years.
Speaker 4 (25:18):
Yeah, started out in two thousand and three. Was kind
of when the first pair start getting built. Yeah, that
was you know, more so for personal use and friends
and close family members and kind of around two thousand
and six when it molded into more of an official business. So,
you know, been building skis for a little over twenty
years here.
Speaker 1 (25:38):
Now, that's amazing. And you call yourself the biggest little
ski company. Yeah, in the world, but that's a little
bit of a missnoverer because you guys are actually the
biggest ski manufacturer in North America.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
Correct.
Speaker 4 (25:52):
Yeah, so we are the largest ski manufacturer in the
US here now, and that biggest little ski company just
kind of a play the Reno being the.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
Biggest little city.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
So that's kind of stuck around as a tagline since
the inception of the brand.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
I love it. Are you from Reno?
Speaker 3 (26:09):
I am not.
Speaker 4 (26:10):
I actually grew up outside of Plastererville over in California, nice.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
And I moved over here for Reno for college and
never left.
Speaker 1 (26:18):
Right on, So tell us a little bit about that
origin story with Moment skis, Like that, you're building skis
for a few years, kind of family friends, and then
all of a sudden it's kind of like, well, this
is is pretty popular.
Speaker 3 (26:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:30):
So you know, our founder Casey Hawkinson starred building skis
with the help of snowboard company that used to be
here locally as well, and he brought on our current CEO,
Luke Jacobson, who was going to college at YOU and
R in the very early years of the company, and
they were just building skis, you know, for the heck
(26:51):
of it. They couldn't find that style of ski that
they wanted on the market because a lot of stuff
was still the old school, traditional styled skis from Europe.
So kind of in that new wave of North American
freeride skis they were starting that. I was still much
younger at that time. I was actually building skis with
my dad in his garage because he.
Speaker 3 (27:10):
Was kind of, oh wow, doing the same thing.
Speaker 4 (27:14):
Yeah, he wasn't too well versed on computers at the time,
so you know, I was in high school kind of
drawing up ski shapes for him and helping him build
him And you know, I did the same thing as Luke.
He moved here from Auburn to go to the university
in Reno.
Speaker 3 (27:28):
I moved over from Plasterville.
Speaker 4 (27:30):
I found out that they were doing it here in town,
so I meandered on down and much like Reno, I
just never left the moment Ski Company and now we're
here today.
Speaker 1 (27:40):
So tell us a little bit about that philosophy that's
been driving the company since its inception and why you
think it's continuing to just build and build and build.
Speaker 4 (27:50):
Yeah, you know, back twenty plus years ago, it was
just the major European manufacturers that have been building skis
for one hundred years. And you know, you European skiings
pretty different from American skiing in terms of terrain choice.
Most Europeans they're sticking a lot to the groomers. There's
not a lot of off trail skiing because it's not
(28:11):
as managed by the ski patrol as far as avalanches go,
as it is here in the USA we have gates
and control on off trail terrain. So a lot of
the ski designs were very traditional in that sense, and
when Moment was starting out a kind of the big
boom of indie ski manufacturers in the US at that time,
you know, wider skis, skis with rockers, skis with a
(28:34):
more progressive mound point on it. Just skis that were
a little bit more designed for skiing off the trail
and in the deep powder and in the chopping crud.
And you know, getting away from that seventy five eighty
five millimeter underfoot ski and venturing into things that were
you know, one hundred and ten underfoot or even wider.
So just kind of a different philosophy and that's changed
(28:57):
the shape of the ski industry quite a bit, you know,
in part due to Moment as well as a lot
of the other kind of indie manufacturers that popped up
around that early two thousands. And you know, now you
see a lot of those newer designs that you know,
Casey and Luke were working on in those larger European
ski manufacturers as well. It kind of caught onto that
off trail skiing, wider skis, lots of rocker.
Speaker 3 (29:19):
Built into them, you know, just kind of stuff new.
Essentially seems like you.
Speaker 1 (29:23):
Guys are ahead of the curve on that really latched
onto that movement.
Speaker 4 (29:28):
Yeah, yeah, and you know it's done very well for
us over the past twenty years. You know, slow starts
and then just steadily growing every year. Now luckily never
made like that insane jump and left over with a
bunch of extra stock. You know, it's just a steady
growth year over year and kind of you know, not
playing it safe, but playing it to the fashion that
(29:49):
we can continue that steady growth instead of overstepping our bounds,
you know, based on our manufacturing capabilities for sure.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
And I mean the the skis themselves are also works
of art. They're really beautiful. Do you like work with
specific artists or there's a whole bunch of different artists
that kind of contribute to the skis.
Speaker 3 (30:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
So our main artist also by the name of Max
Max Miller, he now lives in New York managing a
photo and video studio out there, but he was a
college buddy of our current CEO, Lukes, and you know,
he's very well versed in photoshop and he kind of
set that initial image for the brand back in the day.
Speaker 3 (30:31):
And we'll fly him.
Speaker 4 (30:32):
Out from New York for two to three months a
year and he'll manage a good eighty to ninety percent
of the graphics for us. And then we'll have some
kind of you know, step in artists every now and
then that we'll do a graphic for this model or
graphic for that model each year, and luckily that gives
a little extra flavor while still kind of staying true
(30:54):
to that original design ethos that Max set in place.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
You know, twenty years ago.
Speaker 2 (30:59):
So you're solely based in Reno and you're you do
soup to nuts so to speak with you know, making
the skis on site. Everything you have, the factory which
I love. Welcome to the thunder Dome is interro on
the website. Can you tell us what was the decision
around having it solely in Reno. I'm guessing because of
(31:19):
maybe the founders, but and then tell us a bit
about the factory and I understand that you do tours
of that of course.
Speaker 4 (31:26):
Yeah, so you know, the Reno location was more based
on Casey, the one of the founders, grew up here,
so he just started it up while he was here
and never quite left. We do have our own manufacturing
facility in the US here. It's where we make absolutely
every single pair of the skis. So you guys, anyone
(31:48):
can come on by during hours. We'll give him a
full tour of the factory while it's humming away, show
them how we build every little part of that ski.
Well then we have a whole showroom attached to that,
so nice big cleaner area for people able to check
out the final product, you know, get their skis mounted,
get some new booths, set up, grab a T shirt,
stuff like that.
Speaker 2 (32:07):
But can they get some advice from you on where
they should be skiing? Like, what's where's your favorite place
to go skiing in Reno?
Speaker 3 (32:15):
Uh?
Speaker 4 (32:15):
You know, my my personal favorite would be Sierrat Tahoe
just because I grew up skiing there. It's a little
farther from Reno these days, so most of our skiing
will be done at moult.
Speaker 3 (32:24):
Rose just because it's so locally located.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
To Reno here, you know, right at the base as
well as we'll do a lot up at Palisades and
Alpine about.
Speaker 3 (32:32):
A truck eet.
Speaker 4 (32:34):
Those are the two big spots for the factory employees here.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Is that where you test skis as well? Like you
have like where do you test them? I'm guessing the
same spots.
Speaker 4 (32:43):
But yeah, So luckily having our own factory here, prototyping
for us is is much quicker than a lot of
other brands. You know, we can come in in the
morning with a brand new idea and build a totally
new ski and have it ready to ski the next day.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
That's incredible.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
So we'll use Mount Row.
Speaker 4 (33:00):
You know, maybe we need to dip out of the
office for a quick couple laps to test something real quick,
twenty thirty minute drive we're in the parking lot.
Speaker 3 (33:08):
Otherwise, if we've got a lot of.
Speaker 4 (33:09):
Things to test, we'll go up to Palisades on the
weekend and and ski all weekend on some some weird
skis that are sometimes great and sometimes not so much.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
Yeah, you feel like riding with you on the chairlift
like what are those?
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Yeah?
Speaker 4 (33:21):
Every now and then someone's in the know enough to
go that's I've never seen that moment graphic.
Speaker 3 (33:27):
What ski is?
Speaker 2 (33:27):
That?
Speaker 3 (33:29):
Hush right now?
Speaker 2 (33:31):
I grew up in Canada. I always have to get
Canadian content.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yes, that's so.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
I grew up skiing. I'm not the best skier, but
I was looking at your skis and like they're so impressive,
and I felt like if I was one of your skis,
I would be the hot mess.
Speaker 3 (33:49):
Popular name in the line there.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
Do you what's your favorite ski there?
Speaker 3 (33:55):
I definitely like the Meridian the most.
Speaker 4 (33:57):
It's one of our more niche we'll call reserve skis,
something that we build on occasion, not so much every year,
but that's definitely my go to ski. To the point
where people call the factory and they know to ask
for me if they want to talk about that.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Ski, Oh really, Yeah, what's your number one seller?
Speaker 4 (34:18):
It's pretty evenly split between the Death Wish in the
one hundred and twelve underfoot and the Wildcat in the
one hundred and eight millimeter.
Speaker 1 (34:27):
And what kind of skier would kind of veer towards
those two skis?
Speaker 4 (34:31):
Yeah, they're just kind of our great West Coast all conditions,
do a little bit of everything ski, especially for the
West Coast out to you know, Colorado Ish. It's our
go to for customers who just want one pair of skis,
they don't want to have a garage full and having
that hard decision of which pair to take up on
the hill that day, or it's going to be their
(34:52):
first pair of skis and they might plan on adding
some things later down the line.
Speaker 3 (34:57):
So those two are definitely.
Speaker 4 (34:58):
Our most well rounded or most skiers. Yeah, and you know,
we have some different options for say skiers who are
more dedicated to just skiing on trail on the groomers,
or skiers who like to go especially fast and really
aggressive skiing. But yeah, those two, the Death Wish and
Wildcat are by far and large are best sellers.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
So how did the name Death Wish come up for skis.
Speaker 3 (35:23):
Yeah, so very fun story here.
Speaker 4 (35:26):
It was kind of a unique thing that Casey and
Luke were working on and they were testing up at
Boreal up in Trucky one evening and skiing along, going
really fast, and they both ended up hitting a very
sticky patch of snow and luckily kind of recovered from it.
Casey unfortunately crashed and ended up breaking his neck. Well
(35:50):
recovery luckily, but taken back to the artist, you know,
we'll usually come up with graphics before it has a
name for the ski, and he would alway, he's put
placeholder names, and you kind of put a placeholder on
the on the art file.
Speaker 3 (36:05):
As the Death Wish.
Speaker 4 (36:07):
And while they were mocking it up, Luke and Casey saying,
we can't call the ski the Death Wish. That's we're
never going to sell any fast forward to sitting in
the hospital and finding out that Casey's okay, and they
kind of went, you know, we kind of have to
call the ski the Death Wish.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
So it's a story behind that.
Speaker 4 (36:27):
Definitely, it can be a hard push on specific customers
who don't want to ski on a ski named that,
but by and large it's it's got the biggest cult
following out of our lineup.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
That's awesome. And if you're not sure what ski you
would like and you happen to be local, you guys
have it looks like you have a demo season pass program. Yeah,
tell us.
Speaker 4 (36:49):
About that, so customers are more happy to come by
the showroom here. They can purchase a call it a
demo season pass. It's one hundred and fifty dollars that
allows them to take out a pair of skis for
up to a week at a time, go skiing wherever
they want, really put it through the ringer. You know,
when they drop that ski off, they can get a
different ski, whether it's figuring out which size.
Speaker 3 (37:09):
They want to be on or which model they want
to be on.
Speaker 4 (37:12):
And we essentially allow that to happen throughout the entire season,
you know, hopefully through April, snow dependent, and then if
they end up finding that ski that they really like,
that one hundred and fifty dollars essentially works as a
credit towards that final ski purchase.
Speaker 1 (37:25):
So that's a great Prostomers are.
Speaker 4 (37:27):
Really in the market and they know they want to
buy one can look at as a deposit for that
future ski purchase.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
That's really cool. Wow that Yeah, if you're not knowing
what you want to get doing that makes makes a
ton of sense.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
I have a question, Yeah, prey, this is very important
to me when skiing a prey, Like I I'm the
skier who's like, I'll get up when I get up,
maybe get there by nine or ten, do a few runs,
have lunch, maybe two more runs, one or more, and
then I'm ready for app prey. Yeah, where do you
(38:03):
recommend locally for a great appray scene in Reno? Powhoe?
Speaker 4 (38:08):
Yeah, you know, if you're up at Palisades, the slot
bar or the Chamois are pretty hard to beat. Those
are kind of the two key points as far as
trucky app ray scenes go. You'll find all the dirty
local skiers. They're there just about every day of the week.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
What about right in like the Reno area, What would
you do?
Speaker 4 (38:30):
You know, Midtown in Reno has completely transformed since I
first got here. You know, it was pretty run down
and you know when I came here for college and
it's sprouted up into a lot of just amazing bars
that either specialize in different style of cocktails or drink
specials or anything like.
Speaker 3 (38:49):
That, and a lot of really neat restaurants.
Speaker 4 (38:52):
You know, a huge range of different culinary tastes that
you can get your hands on, and most of it's
all within walking distance of each other. So the midtown
area in Reno is an excellent place to kind of
hit the night life.
Speaker 1 (39:05):
Okay, I love that area.
Speaker 2 (39:06):
Stayed there a few years ago. It's got a great
restaurant's got a great bakery us.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Yeah, yes, well where would you go? I know ski
season is obviously your favorite season, but what if it's
not ski season? Where where would we find Where would
we find you? Would you be out on the hiking trails,
on the mountain biking trails? What what's your other passion?
Speaker 4 (39:28):
Yeah, most of the time you'll find me here at work,
but you know, even here in Reno and the Tahoe
area excellent mountain biking trails. That's a lot of us
here at the factory will transition to in the summertime
is either riding bikes up on Pevine at the north
end of Reno or going up in the trucky. We
(39:49):
have some excellent bike parks as well. If you just
want those quick laps.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
What are they what are a couple of those.
Speaker 3 (39:55):
We have this Sierra Vista bike Park here in Reno.
Speaker 4 (39:58):
It's on an old the golf course, and we have
a great trail crew here. I think they're the biggest
little trail crew. Nice you got to use that again, Yeah,
Ian do you excellent work. They're always putting up, you know,
new more aggressive lines for the really experienced people. Tons
of beginner trails at the bike park, as well as
(40:21):
kind of little training centers where you can practice, you know,
riding on skinny logs or little drops that progressively get bigger.
So they do a great job with that and helping
people get into that sport as well.
Speaker 3 (40:33):
Well.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
You're speaking Brad's language because he's a huge mountain biker.
Speaker 1 (40:37):
I am and gravel biker and uh yeah, I've I've
I've written out that that part of Nevada and it's amazing.
It's really really beautiful. What's that town that's like kind
of south of Reno's it pronounced Genoa or Genoa?
Speaker 3 (40:55):
Oh goodness, I should know that it's I think.
Speaker 1 (40:57):
It's like g e n o A. But that that
area was just is absolutely gorgeous and it's not far
from Reno.
Speaker 4 (41:05):
No, And that's the nice thing about Reno is there's
so many different regions that you can get too quickly.
You know, we have almost no shade for riding bikes
immediately in Reno, but you can have forty minutes here
in Tahoe, yeah, really wooded. You can also go ski
touring out east in Nevada, you know, the Ruby Mountain Ranges.
Speaker 3 (41:25):
Really cool stuff out there that you can get to.
Speaker 4 (41:27):
You know, everything's kind of we get the benefits of
living in a city with groceries and gas stations on
every corner. And yeah, but it's very easily to drive
thirty minutes or less and be somewhere completely different that
looks like there's no civilization anywhere close to it.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
Right on. Well, it's really cool to have you on
the pod and be able to talk about moments, skis
and some of your favorite places to go. And we
really appreciate you taking a few minutes out of your
d I'm sure you're busy it right now at the
factory doing all this, so we really appreciate it. Max.
Speaker 3 (42:05):
Yeah, of course, anytime.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
It was so nice to meet you, and I plan
to come into your factory next time. I'm in Reno.
Speaker 3 (42:12):
Yeah, absolutely, I might get back on the skis.
Speaker 1 (42:14):
Maybe there you go at least the Opre.
Speaker 2 (42:19):
The Opre you have beer there, right, we do.
Speaker 3 (42:21):
Yeah, so little details about the showroom.
Speaker 4 (42:24):
You know, we're here Tuesday through Friday from eight am
to six pm.
Speaker 3 (42:28):
People are welcome. Anytime. We got free beer, free heart seltzers,
got some waters in case you're not drinking. Okay.
Speaker 4 (42:35):
People come by, whether they just want to kind of
check stuff out and look at the new stuff, get
some new boots fitted up, or mount or tune up
their older skis, and you know, anytime during those hours,
we're happy to give people a tour the whole facility,
walk them through, you know, put a beer in their hand,
and show them some.
Speaker 3 (42:50):
Big machines in the back.
Speaker 1 (42:52):
They'll be buying skis before they know it.
Speaker 2 (42:56):
There.
Speaker 3 (42:57):
I do need some new skis.
Speaker 1 (42:59):
Exactly, especially after the second beer. So people want to
find out more, they just go to moment skis dot com.
Speaker 3 (43:06):
Yeah, so you can go to moment skis dot com.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
You know, you can also give us a call and
during those working hours we usually have someone on some
called live chat. So a little bubble pops up on
the website. You can chat with us there directly as well.
If customers have any questions about anything, you know, it's
not someone in a in a far off land trying
to answer questions for you. It's it's usually myself, for
the CEO or one of our other top employees here,
(43:31):
who's gonna be there answering.
Speaker 3 (43:32):
Questions for you right on.
Speaker 1 (43:34):
We'll keep keep doing the good work.
Speaker 3 (43:36):
Yeah, we'll do.
Speaker 2 (43:37):
Thanks a lot, great speaking with you.
Speaker 5 (43:40):
Thanks, thanks for having men.
Speaker 3 (44:01):
He found out the up
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