The BOA project was the first project I got to work on when stepping into the global product manager position and it has been a passion of mine for the past 3 years so now seeing it come to market is crazy!
Today we launch two new boots, the Recon 120 BOA and the Anthem 95 BOA
These two models are are mid level alpine boots but in the fall of 23 we will launch a full collection of Recon and Anthem alpine boots and Mindbender freeride boots. This mix of products was really important for me. I knew from first trying the products back in early days of the project that the fit of the boots was far soupier and after testing and realizing the performance was also improved I knew we had to have products in both alpine and freeride. Just launching in one category would be missing so much potential.
So in the fall our full lineup will be:
Recon 130 BOA, Recon 120 BOA, Recon 110 BOA, Anthem 115 BOA, Anthem 105 BOA, Anthem 95 BOA, Mindbender 130 BOA, Mindbender 120 BOA, Mindbender 115 W BOA and lastly Mindbender 95 W BOA.
So as you will see we will have a boot for a lot of different skiers. I wanted to have a broad range so as many skiers could benefit from this new technology as possible.
All New BOA Shell
So what makes these boots so good? Well the closure system BOA created alone was excellent. We first were using the system on our existing buckle shells and even with these existing shells we could feel the system was offering something buckles just could not. But we thought we could take it further....
Look at any other BOA product and you will see the very best are always built specifically for BOA, which makes sense! if you want the best performance you build a product for the system you are using. Because of this we decided we would make BOA specific shells and we would not compromise the design by making them capable of using BOA and Buckles. We wanted a no compromise approach and this means we built a BOA Shell, not a shell which could also use BOA. So you will see we did not update our buckle boots. All new BOA boots are brand new and if in the future we determine there is a need for new buckle boots those will be developed. We will not use BOA and Buckles on the same shell as you always need to make compromises to make both work and this is not something we are willing to do.
So what is different? Well the first thing we realized was to improve the wrap we needed to rethink how a toe seal works. In basically all boots until this point the toe seal has been a rather large area at the mid forefoot where the overlaps sit behind.
This system works well and has for years but it has a problem. It really does not allow the width of the boot to compress in teh forefoot as it is solid. The overlap can compress a little but really not much. This needed to change.
What we cam up with was an all new shell design which moves this toe seal area further forward and also changes the shape so that the solid section was much smaller and the overlap on the medial side sat over an open section. This design actually allows the forefoot of the boot to close inwards and it is primarily this design which allowed us to achieve the far greater range of closure than we have ever had from an overlap boot.
This new way of creating the lower shell really is what allows us to get the best possible wrap out of the new system and is responsible for giving our boots the best closure on the market. Without this design change the system simply can not work to its maximum potential.
This new shell design also allowed us to move forward with what we call multi-last. In buckle boots we offer both a Low Volume and a Mid Volume. The basic difference is that the forefoot of the LV boot is 98mm and the MV is 100mm. These new BOA boots can offer both these fits in one shell and actual increase the range. Out of the box you can expect to get around 97-100mm fit out of the forefoot. Heat mold the shell and that goes to about 104mm.
The heel of teh shell will not change so its still really important to ensure the hell fits but the new shell will now fit a much broader range of forefoot shapes and eliminates the need for shops to spread there buy beteen our mv and lv boots. This means they can go heavier on one model instead of two which hopefully means boots being in stock more often but also potenitally means a better range of sizes availble so smaller and larger feet can hopefully be taken into account in a shops buying plan easier.
Another advantage is it decouples development of buckle and BOA. What this means is we don't need to wait for a buckle boot to need updating to add BOA. We can add BOA as soon as we feel makes sense and it is for this reason you will see us expand our BOA offerings quicker than many other brands.
We will still offer buckle boots we will just add additional new BOA versions, so if BOA for some reason is not your thing, no problem buy the buckle version but we will have a BOA version of everything very soon.
Other Updates
So we have an all new shell built for BOA but we did not want to stop there. We wanted to upgrade other aspects of the boot too.
One issue we had with the buckle versions of the Recon, Anthem and Mindbender boots was we could not offer a soft boot board. As a park rider myself I always thought this was a miss, so being able to offer a shock absorbing boot boot was high on the list of updates, but just like everything else on these boots we took it a stage further.
We had already designed the honeycomb boot board for our Dispatch free tour boots. The honey comb design has tow main advantages. The honeycomb shape itself is very strong and this meant we were able to hollow out much of the design to give us an incredible light yet strong boot board. But the honeycomb shape being hollow also allows the boot board to work much to keep the boots warmer. Much like the feathers in a down jacket the pockets of air in the honeycomb shapes trap warm air and through our testing we found this design keeps the boots 15% warmer compared to a flat standard board.
But where is the shock absorbing? Well the green part you see in the heel is our modular design. All BOA boots will come with two different inserts, one is stiff and one soft. Users will be able to decide if they want the boot board soft or hard and can change it at any time.
The other change we made was to the toe area of the liner. The cable system of BOA works really really well but anytime you use a single pull cable design the force will always be greatest at the start of the chain nearest the dial. This means the force over the toe will be slightly less than the instep area. The redesign shell really helps here but we wanted to add something so customers could quickly and easily adjust the toe box feel.
Boot fitters for years have added foam shapes to the toe box of the liner to change the pressure so we decided to make our liners work in a similar manner. Its really a simple system, the liner has a pocket sewn to the top of the toe box and in the box we have a couple of foam inserts. Put these in the pocket and the toe box is instantly tighter. Its also super easy to adjust this shims or even add more or different shapes. We are basically making the custom fitting as simple as possible.
Don't need the extra volume but have cold toes, put a toe warmer in the pocket. Need somewhere to hide something else? well we made you a little stash pocket.
So How expensive?
So how much will all this cost? The BOA system is more expensive than buckles so there does need to be an increase. But you are not just getting the BOA system, you get the new shell, the new boot board, the adjustable liner and the better fit and feel. We decided to increase the price $100 Usd over our buckles boots meaning the Recon 120 BOA will cost $699. But that $699 price point puts us on par with where most brands have their buckle 120 boot. This was key to me in the pricing plan. I wanted our BOA boot to cost the same as our competitors buckle boot. This is where we ended up and I really think the value you will get with our BOA boots combined with all the other BOA advantages make our boots the best value in the industry.
Overall
So these boots fit better, ski better and have more features than any boot we have made before and they cost the same as our competitors boots! We really think this is going to be huge for the industry as a whole. Boot fitting will become easier and shops will sell more boots. More skiers will find a comfy boot and hopefully spend more time on snow. All our athletes are moving to the new BOA system so this really is a system for everyone. Basically I see no reason for basically everyone to switch to BOA!
So that's our boots for F23. Let me know what questions you have and I'm really excited for you to get on them!!
