The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Romp Ready
[ by Than Acuff ]
Romp skis, started by Caleb and Morgan Weinberg, joined in the niche of custom ski makers around the world in 2010. They hit the ground running opening their shop at 420 Belleview building custom skis and gaining local support and some attention outside of the valley, though they could always use more.
“We’ve got some notoriety outside the valley but that’s still our major challenge,” says Morgan. “Our goal is to become a regional brand, successful in the mountain west.”
They expanded their efforts in 2016 to produce skis for the U.S. military and then four years ago, Romp added a new option to their ski line-up. As the cost and effort of building custom skis continued to drive up the prices, they looked at a way to get their skis under people who can’t necessarily afford the custom ski market.
“We had to raise the prices on our custom skis and we didn’t want to price out the core skiers,” explains Morgan.
They started off calling them “stock” skis but have honed the new line of skis down to select shapes and sizes and are launching their new line as Romp Ready skis for the 2021-2022 season.
Essentially, they have five distinct models offered to provide a Romp Ready ski for customers depending on what they are looking for. They have everything from a skimo type ski to the Zorro, the original Romp design that you can get with an 89 mm waist, a 100 mm waist or a 115 mm waist. And, they have plenty of options in between.
“We are going with our most popular skis in the Romp Ready line,” says Morgan. “And we’re launching them as ‘families’ of skis.”
Furthermore, on the back end of the company, Romp is working closely with Western Colorado University (WCU) to get students into their operation in a variety of intern positions, a real-life experience for WCU students.
“It’s been exciting and productive to work with them,” says Morgan.
What does this mean for the consumer? Well, now Romp has skis in their shop ready to go out the door and once a model is sold, they will crank out another pair to keep their supply available for purchase.
If you want to ski them before you buy them, Romp has a Demo days schedule for the season and reviews of their skis should be popping up on Unofficial Networks as well as Blister Gear Review.
Additionally, they’re looking to expand to shops throughout the mountain west. Most corporate ski shops are already flush with the usual line of skis and lack the room or desire to carry Romp skis. As a result, Romp is looking to get into the smaller shops including CB Sports in Mt. Crested Butte.
“We think there’s a lot of room for us to get into the independent ski shops,” says Morgan.
If you can’t find them in a ski shop, you can always swing by 420 Belleview Avenue right here in Crested Butte, buy a pair of Romp Ready skis off the rack and head to the mountain, or mountains.
“The interest in Romp Ready has been really good,” says Morgan. “We just launched our new website (rompskis.com) and snow is falling.”
