**UPDATE**
The Beginner Box has launched! Read the detailed post or follow the link below and order now!


My first hiking experience was a daunting one. A four day, three night adventure laid in front of me, far away from the luxuries I had been accustomed to. What if I forgot something? Items as simple as bug spray could prove to be a disastrous and uncomfortable experience. I had spent the better part of a year gathering all the materials, waiting for items to go on sale, reading reviews, and wondering if there really was space for an item in my pack. In this post we’ll outline the ways a Beginner Box could save you time, money and worry for your first trip.
Gear isn’t cheap; a quick look into any hiking magazine will provide you enough sticker shock to scare you straight back to the couch (for a nice Netflix session.) Sure, you could go to Walmart for a sleeping bag but they will be big and bulky. On the trail every added pound to your pack feels like ten times the weight.
Ever Been to an REI Garage Sale?
Nothing ever goes on sale.
All the costs of each piece of critical hiking gear can quickly add up. You can wait for each individual item to go on sale (most items don’t go on sale at the same time.) Waiting and checking for these sales can be tedious and time consuming, and sometimes can even possibly take up to a year. Ain’t nobody got time for that, especially when you want to hit those trails now! With our Beginner Box, we get outstanding deals from manufacturers. By bundling all the gear together, we can pass on most of the savings to you.
For example, you get invited on a hiking trip in a month or two, it’s your first overnight hiking trip so you need to get all the gear that covers your own needs. You’ll need to search for all the right gear in a limited time frame. Thing is, you don’t want cheap hiking gear that won’t last or, worse yet, fail you on the trail. You then start looking at all the different sleeping bags. You want something small, warm, and light, so you start looking at hundreds of options each with several reviews that have conflicting opinions, opinions and ratings. Quickly you’re overwhelmed by just that one item. You still have ten more absolutely necessary items to find. You have work and friends to hang out with, and you need to be ready in a month…
Enter the Beginner Box. Your box would save you hours and hours of reading one-star reviews from people who bought a 50 degree bag expecting it to keep them warm in 30 degree weather. Let us put tried and true products in your pack, perfect for beginners and ready to hit the trail next month, and the month after, and the month after that.
Don’t be like the people in the movie “Alive”
One of the biggest fears about being miles away from cell service and civilization is not being prepared. There are things you will completely forget about until it comes time to use them (maybe even a couple days into your trip.) Trial and error is a good way to figure out what NOT to bring, but is a terrible way to figure out what to bring. If you bring a water filter and forget a backup, you will be screwed seven ways to Sunday when your only option fails for some rare reason. Alleviate these nightmares and let us give you that backcountry sleep you’ve been dreaming of!
We provide most of the large essentials, and for those things that we don’t include we provide a handy checklist of the MUST HAVE essentials (we also explain where you can find all the things we feel are optional). Don’t be stuck up a creek without a figurative paddle. With our Beginner Box you’ll sleep soundly with the raccoons and deer. All of this with the comfort of knowing you are prepared to take on most of what nature has to throw at you.
The Beginner Box has more benefits than what can be described here. Better yet, if you are going to buy all your gear anyway why not get it all at once, and save some MAJOR cash while you’re at it? Your wallet and your worrying mind will thank you later.
Curious as to what exact items will be in our Beginner Box? Keep posted to the blog to find out!