News - Scandinavian Outdoor Group

R & D
Houdini Cloud Nine T-neck.
challenging
down
Gone are the days when wool and down easily outperformed
synthetic fibers. Together with several outdoor
brands, PrimaLoft has developed some new materials
that are real alternatives to what nature can offer.
Haglöfs’ Barrier Pro Hood.
priMaloFT is cooperaTiNg with Houdini, as well as
other leading brands from Scandinavia, like Norrøna,
Helly Hansen, Hestra, Haglöfs and many other SOG
members.
“We don’t want to be just a vendor of our products,”
says Jochen Lagemann, Sales and Marketing Director
at PrimaLoft Europe. ”We want to be a strategic partner
in the entire process – from the development of a new
product, to the education of the sales people, retailers
and the marketing.”
At last year’s Ispo fair PrimaLoft introduced Synergy,
an insulation technology engineered for sleeping bags
and jackets.
”Synergy is a further development of PrimaLoft’s
Infinity-insulation. They’re both high loft con-
tinuous filament insulations, which means
that they are very ”fluffy” and don’t consist
of many short fibers, rather one long fiber
that ”snakes” like a climbing rope inside the
fabric,” explains Lagemann.
“we want
to be a
strategic
partner.”
This Year sYNergY is FeaTured in for
example Houdini’s Cloud Nine T-neck, a
lightweight mid-layer jacket that can be used under your
shell instead of fleece or a lightweight down jacket. The
fabric is soft, light and highly breathable in combination
with the non-migrating insulation.
Another recent joint project is Haglöfs’ Barrier Pro
Hood; a very compressible, lightweight, wind resistant,
hooded jacket, insulated with PrimaLoft One.
Also, there is the 66°NORTH Vatnajökull jacket with
PrimaLoft One insulation, a women’s jacket that is lightweight,
compressible and made for both multipurpose
backcountry use, as well as for strolling the city streets.
”Today, many thermal-protection jackets use PrimaLoft
as filling,” says Lagemann.
66°North Vatnajökull jacket.
A fourth example of PrimaLoft’s cooperation with
clothing brands is Lundhags’ Gusta Jacket, available in
both male and female versions. The jacket will have PrimaLoft
Eco-insulation to shield the wearer from the cold.
These are just a few examples of where PrimaLoft has
developed a strategic partnership with a brand and has
been able to tailor the demands for a specific product.
At the same time PrimaLoft is enlarging their share
in fashionable city clothing. Both the Swedish fashion
brand J.Lindeberg and Norwegian UBER uses PrimaLoft
insulation in their urban jackets.
priMaloFT iNsulaTioN was originally developed for
the US Army as a water-resistant synthetic alternative
to down.
According to PrimaLoft, their products
mimic the structure of down and have the
advantages of down filling (lightweight, traps
a lot of air and is highly compressible).
“However, our synthetic polyester filling
also gives you better water-repellency and
the capacity to retain heat even in extreme
wet conditions,” says Lagemann.
PrimaLoft has a good reputation among retailers and
in the outdoor media. Yet some shoppers have second
thoughts about PrimaLoft because of its relatively thin
appearance compared to puffy down jackets.
Fabian Lidberg, Store Manager at Swedish outdoor
retailer Naturkompaniet, explains.
“Ten years ago there was a big difference between
synthetic fibers and down. Sleeping bags and jackets
with synthetic filling took up a lot of space and were
heavier, especially if they were to withstand cold temperatures.
Over the last few years, the synthetic materials
being developed are now warmer, lighter and more
compressible.”
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