SOAR Blog

Credit Matthew McDermott

Outdoor Retailer ended in late January on a high note with both industry attendance and optimism up from winter 2009. In the midst of writing orders and thinking about upcoming selling seasons, though, the industry as initiated dozens of efforts to provide relief for Haiti after its devastating earthquake.

Manufacturers across the Winter Market show floor offered product to an industry Haitian relief effort coordinated by Terramar, Sierra Trading Post & Eric Larsen. The Outdoor Industry Association (OIA) also partnered with Americares to get first aid kits, water purification systems, headlamps, tarps and hydration containers willing donated from manufacturers in the outdoor industry to Haitians in desperate need of essential supplies. (See below for more information on getting your product to Haiti via Sierra Trading Post and Americares).

In an industry that highly values authenticity and social responsibility, it’s no surprise that the outdoor industry mobilized so quickly to aid Haiti. It employs individuals with just as much strength and heart as the products it manufactures- prepared to be put to work at a moments notice. These qualities and others make SOAR super proud to be part of the outdoor industry.

In fact, we see these qualities in the outdoor industry year round. We associate with outdoor industry leaders that support advocacy groups and let their passion for their sport drive their compassion. SOAR has had some fun and rewarding opportunities to work on a pro-bono basis with non-profits like Bikes for Kids Utah and Trips for Kids. We get to see how much work goes into each event and initiative. Every donation, vote of confidence, re-tweet and sponsorship makes a difference.

Let’s all continue to heed OIA’s call for the industry to “dig deep” during this and every time of crisis and need.

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Click here to read about the partnerships forming in the outdoor industry to help Haiti.

To donate this urgently needed product/equipment contact Randy Weiss at Americares at (203) 658-9527 or rweiss@americares.org. All donations will be delivered by air and sea directly to the region by Americares.

Outdoor Retailer exhibitors are invited to donate show products to Haiti via Red Cross if it can arrive at Sierra Trading Post by FEBRUARY 8, 2010. All packages should be sent to  Sierra Trading Post Robin Jahnke/Haiti 5121 Campstool Road Cheyenne,  Wyoming 8200.

Mimi McDonald holding her daughter, Mia, post-op

Mia McDonald spent her first few months in the world with congenital heart defect. Fortunately, on Nov. 10, four months after her birth, Mia underwent a successful heart transplant. Mimi and John McDonald are overjoyed about their daughter’s recovery and at the same time overwhelmed with steep medical expenses associated with it. Friends of the McDonald family have collaborated to create the Mia McDonald Fund to help the family deal with its financial burdens.

Though the McDonalds are based in Seattle, their friends in Provo, Utah have planned the “Help Baby Mia Bike-a-thon” to give baby Mia supporters a per-mile opportunity to donate to Mia’s cause. The riders will travel between 40 and 60 miles in two hours, starting in Provo and ending at the Alpine Loop by the Sundance Resort. For more information about the ride, visit the Facebook group: “The ‘Help Baby Mia’ Bike-a-thon” or email Dane at gdanesmith@gmail.com or Abbie at abbierufener@gmail.com. You can read more about Mia’s story at http://helpbabymia.blogspot.com/.

For more bike-related advocacy opportunities, visit the Bikes for Kids Utah website to learn about a non-profit organization with a mission to provide free bikes to underprivileged children in Salt Lake County.

Samson Riders Bicycle Club

Considering the plethora of well-established mountain biking cultures that exist worldwide, it is telling that Trips for Kids (TFK) would establish its first international chapter in Israel. In addition to the typical complexities that challenge childhood, Israel’s youth faces the challenge of developing tolerance for the variety of ethnic, educational, socio-economic and immigrant groups in their communities.

I imagine this is true even in Beit Shemesh, Israel, where Trips for Kids Israel- Samson Riders Bicycle Club (TFK Israel-SRBC) has been established.  This community in the heart of the Judean Plains merits a group like TFK Israel-SRBC that encourages young people to understand and unite with their peers of all backgrounds. Before Samson Riders Bicycle Club became the foundational group for TFK Israel, it had already been successful in bringing Jewish and Arab youth together to ride, learn about each other, break down barriers, discover new interests and respect the land. The club’s new relationship with TFK will make it possible to expand this program, Riding for Co-Existence, to give more underprivileged youth in Israel a chance to experience mountain biking and involve youth from other local ethnic communities in the bike ride planning and implementation.

Come late November, riders with TFK Israel-SRBC will take their first tour of the monasteries, water springs and olive groves as an official chapter of the Marin County, Calif.-based non-profit organization. For many of them, it will be their first time exploring their historic surroundings. For some, it may be their first time riding side by side with a peer who claims a different culture than their own.

You can learn more about Trips for Kids at www.tripsforkids.org.

Well . . . it’s finally official: SOAR is now the public relations agency for Outdoor Retailer! Way, way cool!

I plan to write more about this in the near future, but for now, I’ve enclosed below the “official” text of the full news release announcing this news.

Later,

David (”Poppa P”) Politis

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Outdoor Retailer Signs SOAR Communications as its PR Agency of Record

SOAR Communications selected to manage public relations efforts for Outdoor Retailer, a division of Nielsen Business Media and producer of the leading trade show for advancing the active outdoor marketplace

DRAPER, Utah and SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO, Calif. - Oct. 21, 2008 - Outdoor Retailer (OR), a division of Nielsen Business Media, today announced it has signed Utah-based SOAR Communications as its public relations agency of record.

Under terms of the multi-year agreement, SOAR Communications (a full-service marketing communications agency), will develop and execute public relations campaigns serving each of OR’s annual events, as well as all of its year-round PR needs.

“During the past three years, SOAR Communications has generated great results for our sister shows - Interbike and Health+Fitness Business Expo - so it’s clear they understand the specialty sports marketplace and our culture,” said Kenji Haroutunian, OR’s show director. “Naturally, we’re looking for similar results from SOAR with Outdoor Retailer, both in solidifying our support for trade media journalists, while also broadening our efforts to reach consumer-focused media outlets throughout the U.S. and abroad. As expected, SOAR has already hit the ground running on some key OR and industry initiatives. We look forward to a long and successful relationship with the SOAR team.”

Formed in 2004, SOAR Communications serves the Sports, Outdoor, Athletics and Recreation industries, thus the moniker SOAR.

“After attending my first OR (Summer Market) in 2004, I soon discovered that there wasn’t a single agency in recreation-rich Utah that focused specifically on servicing the sports, outdoor, athletics and/or recreation industries,” said David Politis, chief executive officer for SOAR Communications. “That led me to form SOAR in the first place, which is why it’s so cool to now be working with OR and the great OR team. I feel like I’ve now gone full circle back to SOAR’s very first beginnings, and that’s just awesome!”

As well as being the CEO of Draper, Utah-based SOAR Communications, Politis is the president and founder of Politis Communications (a long-time strategic communications and public relations agency focused on serving technology clients).

A year after forming SOAR, Politis invited Chip Smith to take the position of president at SOAR, thus leveraging Smith’s nearly 20 years of marketing and sales experience, including 10 years with bicycle industry leaders Shimano and Specialized and three years with Ogilvy & Mather, one of the largest agencies in the world. The resulting combination of Politis and Smith has helped transform SOAR Communications into one of the up-and-coming sports marketing communications agencies in North America.

“We’re excited to take the lessons we’ve learned with Interbike and HFB and apply them to OR,” said Chip Smith, president of SOAR Communications. “Naturally, SOAR will continue to serve the media in a collaborative manner that best meets their needs, while always looking for the best ways to land positive media exposure for the show and its exhibitors. We’re also eager to help Kenji and his team achieve their goals of further strengthening the relationships between OR exhibitors and endemic media, while also expanding exposure to non-endemic journalists as well.”

About Outdoor Retailer
Outdoor Retailer (OR), produced by Nielsen Business Media of San Juan Capistrano, Calif., is a full service trade show company that creates, markets and produces high-quality expos and educational conferences. OR is the leading outdoor industry business-to-business event management company, bringing together manufacturers, retailers, industry advocates and media to conduct the business of outdoor recreation. Now celebrating more than 25 years of successful events, Outdoor Retailer (www.outdoorretailer.com) gathers approximately 40,000 attendees on a semi-annual basis for its Winter and Summer Market shows.

The next opportunity to preview the future of the outdoor industry will start at the 6th Annual Backcountry Base Camp at Snowbasin ski resort on January 21, 2009, followed by the Outdoor Retailer Winter Market at the Salt Palace Convention Center from January 22-25, 2009 in Salt Lake City, Utah. The Outdoor Retailer Summer Market will bring the best of summer outdoor brands to Salt Lake City, Utah at the Open Air Demo from July 19-20, 2009 and the Trade Show from July 21-24, 2009.

About SOAR Communications
Voted one of Utah’s top three marketing agencies of 2008 by the readers of Business Connect magazine, SOAR Communications is an innovative strategic marketing communications agency focused on the sports, outdoor, athletics and recreation industries. SOAR offers clients a variety of services including advertising, collateral development, database-marketing, graphic/web design, public/media relations, social media/networking campaigns and sales support programs. Visit www.soarcomm.com or call 801-556-8184 for more information.

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The 2008 IMBA World Summit started in Park City Wednesday with several pre-conferences and opening ceremonies at the Utah Olympic Park. One of the conferences was for one of our clients Trips for Kids.

Close to 30 people representing 12 Trips for Kids chapters attended, and two attendees even came from as far away as Israel and New Zealand. Both of them want to open Trips for Kids chapters in their respective countries, which would be the first international chapters in the organizations 20 year history. Trips for Kids provides mountain bike rides for at-risk youth.

During the Trips for Kids conference topics such as how to start a chapter, how to find and work with volunteers, and how to effectively fundraise were discussed. Along with Jen Nibley, director of Trips for Kids Utah Valley, and Rick McFerrin of Two Wheel View/Trips for Kids Calgary, Canada, I spoke to the group about how to approach and work with a public relations agency on a pro-bono basis.

IMBA, which stands for the International Mountain Bicycling Association, is a non-profit association whose mission is to “create, enhance and preserve great trail experiences for mountain bikers worldwide.” Every two years, IMBA holds a world-wide conference bringing mountain biking advocates, land managers, ski resort professionals, trailbuilders, park and urban planners, tourism officials and the bike industry together for collaboration, planning, and celebration. This year’s Summit runs from Wednesday, June 18 through Saturday, June 21 at the Marriott-Park City.

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Debbie Reid, founder and director of Bikes for Kids Utah, was a guest Thursday afternoon (5-29-08) on 1280 the Zone (1280 AM), the most popular sports talk radio station in Utah.

Thanks to the team at 1280 for letting Debbie come on the “Jake and Jim Show” to talk about Bikes for Kids Utah and what a difference a brand new bike can make in the life of any kid.

We at SOAR Communications are proud to support such a fantastic non-profit, a 501(c)3 status corporation. In case you didn’t know, Bikes for Kids Utah has donated 1,000 brand new bikes each year (since 2006) to underprivileged children in Utah, along with helmets, bike locks and assorted other items.

After holding the bike giveaways in September in 2006 and 2007, this year’s giveaway will be held this Saturday morning (5-31-08) at Intermountain Healthcare’s fantastic new Intermountain Medical Center in Murray. And once again, yours truly — Poppa P — got snagged to do the emcee duties. 

Anyway . . . here are a couple of the photos from Debbie’s interview on 1280 the Zone on Thursday.

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Debbie Reid, founder and executive director of Bikes for Kids Utah, being interviewed Thursday, 5-29-08, on 1280 the Zone (Utah’s No. 1 sports talk radio station in Utah).

Jim Fuchuck, one of the hosts of the “Jake and Jim Show” on 1280 the Zone (the best sports talk radio station in Utah), interviews Debbie Reid, executive director of Bikes for Kids Utah on Thurs., 5-29-08.

David, Maura and I visited Delta 7 Sports in Payson, Utah last Friday. Things are going pretty good for the start-up. They are putting the finishing touches on the first few Arantix IsoTruss mountain bike framesets going out to distributors in the UK and Australia, a dealer here in the U.S. and the first frame to a consumer (a doctor in Texas). The photo to the left is of Tyler Evans, Delta 7’s bicycle program manager, tapeing off one of the frames for its final clear coat.

We met with Delta 7’s executive team to check in on them. They are pretty happy about getting some bikes out the door!

We had a great year thanks to all of you - our clients, journalists and vendors. We hope you all did too. We are looking forward to working with you again next year!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

The SOAR Communications Team
David Politis, Chip Smith, Jonathan Hawkins, Jonathan Bacon, Kris Beldin, Maura Lansford and Lindsay Thomson

It’s just after midnight, early Friday morning, and Chip and I are in Lumberton, N.C. for a day-long strategy and planning meeting with our new SOAR Communications client: The Tour of America.

We helped TTOA with its initial press conference and publicity efforts back in September at Interbike, and we’ve now been awarded a contract to handle all of the PR efforts for The Tour of America.

We distributed a news release yesterday announcing plans for a new, shortened race route (21 days, approximately 2,200 miles) for The Tour of America. A copy of the release can be found here at Bicycle.net, while some of the media outlets that have picked up the story include VeloNews, BikeRadar, CyclingNews.com, the Orlando Sentinel and Cincinnati Enquirer, among others.

Although there’s much to be done between now and September 2008 (the planned launch for the inaugural race), we’re excited to be on board and help move The Tour of America forward.

Wednesday night, Debbie Reid, executive director of Bikes for Kids Utah, got to drop the puck to start the game between the Utah Grizzlies and the Stockton Thunder. Last month, with the help of Dave Zabriskie, the third American to ever wear teh Yellow Jersey during the Tour de France, Bikes for Kids Utah gave away 1,000 bikes to underprivileged kids around the Salt Lake Valley. During the bike giveaway, the Grizzlies also gave two tickets to each kid (one for them and whoever they wanted to take) to the November 28 home game.

It was fun. I got to waddle out on the ice and get a shot of Debbie dropping the puck along with her son Tyler. When they announced Debbie and that she was with Bikes for Kids, there was a big cheer from the audience, especially from the kids that were there.

After the puck drop, a bunch of the volunteers who helped with the event got to hang out in a VIP suite located on the third level, center ice watching the game and munching on some nachos and sodas. We had a great view of the game and it was a fun night. Unfortunately, the Grizzlies lost in a shootout with a final score of 4-3. You can read about the game here.

A big thanks to Adrian Denny of the Grizzlies marketing department for his help with Bikes for Kids Utah, donating the tickets and for providing a VIP suite, and to Todd Reid of Intermountain Financial for providing the food for the night.