Venture Snowboards/ BackTPack

Venture Snowboards

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What it is: High-performance snowboard made with Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) wood

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Who makes it: Venture Snowboards

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Where it’s made: Durango, Colo.

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For more information: www.venturesnowboards.com

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With global warming bearing down, who knows how much snow the Pacific Northwest can expect? As long as the powder remains, Venture Snowboards will endeavor to build a more environmentally correct board.

Venture uses FSC wood, and with its natural-toned boards, employs organic cotton or hemp topsheets (a topsheet sits above the board’s wood core, melded to it with resins). Venture also said it strives for zero waste in the production process.

“To date the core and topsheet are the only components we’ve been able to find suitable sustainable alternatives for,” said spokesperson Lisa Branner. “This is an ongoing process and we continue to research materials we can incorporate without sacrificing performance.”

Venture’s boards are made in small batches in Durango, and the company sells them through specialty sports gear retailers, as well as selling the boards, logo apparel and hats on its web site. Venture’s logo T-shirts are from Patagonia and American Apparel, while its hemp hats are unionmade in New Jersey and its gray fleece beanies are manufactured from recycled pop bottles by Screamer Hats in Seattle.

 

BackTPack

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What it is: Pannier-style book satchel

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Who makes it: BackTPack

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Where it’s made: Neskowin, Ore.

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For more information: www.backtpack.com

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It’s not the load students carry, it’s the way they are loaded, says Marilyn von Foerster, designer of a side-loading satchel called BackTPack. A physical therapist specializing in rehabilitating bad backs and fostering good posture and usage, von Foerster is convinced that backs were never designed to carry a nylon bag stuffed full of textbooks. She said more and more teens and young adults are prone to back pain and future structural problems as a result of ubiquitous school backpacks — approximately 40 million students carry them daily.

So von Foerster had a friend sew a prototype for a bag that spreads the weight load over both hips, as well as one that uses a forehead strap to balance a load.

Von Foerster admits her creation may need some selling to peer-sensitive teens. But in a pilot she did with BackTPacs at Neskowin Middle School on the Oregon coast with 60 sixth- to eighth-graders, students reported a significant reduction in aches and pains. The second generation of BackTPacks also has concessions to the trend-sensitive — water bottle holders and two cell phone compartments. The packs, available on the web site or at the University of Oregon bookstore, start at $50 and can be adjusted for bodies from 4’4” to 6’5”.

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