Hey, Summer Camp Fans!

Today I want to tell you about a great company whose products can be found right here at Everything Summer Camp. Red Ledge—a leading brand in outdoor apparel and rain gear  for the avid outdoorsy folk—provides its customers with attractive, comfortable, technical, and affordable products.

Red Ledge, a very charitable company that’s been developing their products and satisfying their customers for over fifteen years, seems to really enjoy thinking outside of the box and going above and beyond in order to help those who are in need.

The Red Ledge mission statement reads, “Rain doesn’t have to be such a bad thing, it does so much good for the world and WE can too.” Everything Summer Camp is more than honored to be working alongside such a charitable business that gives so much back to emerging countries and the people in the world who are truly in need.

How does Red Ledge help others who need it? Well, this year they’ve funded their first water project completely through charity. Water, Red Ledge’s non-profit organization helps brings clean drinking water that’s actually safe to consume to the people in developing nations who don’t always have clean, safe drinking water readily available like we do in America.

And so, Red Ledge painstakingly designs an attractive rain-jacket along with other rain gear, producing performance-driven fabrics with technical features to provide their avid outdoorsy customers with suitable clothing that can stand up to the elements only to selflessly dish their profits out toward funding projects that help the needy.

They did it this year and they aim to continue funding future water projects in the coming year. In doing so, Red Ledge hopes to cut down the stereotypes and typical behavior of successful companies. Showing the world some class and initiative about issues in our modern world is a great way to start! When you buy a Red Ledge rain jacket, you are vicariously helping those who can use fresh and safe drinking water.

The gang here at Everything Summer Camp salutes you, Red Ledge. Thank you for showing the world the compassionate side of a company.

- John

Hey, Camp Aficionados!

Today I want to give you a little glimpse behind the scenes of a company that Everything Summer Camp is delighted to be working with: Columbia Sportswear. Columbia is a family-run company that, in its seventy years of business, has gone global.

After seventy years of continually satisfying their customers and beating their competition, Columbia likes to think that they know what it takes to make exceptional outdoor gear. How are they so good at improving their products and evolving as a company? Because they love the outdoors—just like you.

Columbia is more than aware of the gear you’re going to need in order to enjoy your summer camp experience to its full capacity; and with recent advancements in technology, Columbia’s high-quality performance apparel is able to protect you from harmful UV rays as well as buggy locations! From Columbia jackets to a sleeping bag, they’ve got a wide range of products.

Columbia is a company whose history is centered around one, great woman—Gert Boyle. Gert is the Chairman of Columbia. The company’s story begins in 1938, when two German nationals (Gert’s parents) fled Nazi Germany and bought a small hat company once they arrived in Portland.

When they came upon the Columbia River they knew they could make this new place their home and they named their new hat company after the body of water that helped encourage their stay. With the freedom of their fresh start, the company supported the Boyle family. Gert grew up, got married and eventually her husband took over the company.

When Gert’s husband died, she took over. She stepped right up and transformed herself from a housewife one day to an executive the next! Still a family-run business as it’s always been. Columbia is now run by Tim Boyle, Gert’s son. Tim has now been the company’s longtime president and CEO.

Columbia has continued to see great success because it is a company that truly believes in its products. They have a knack for trying different things to develop their technologies. As they say at Columbia, “Trying stuff made us what we are.”

Thanks for reading. Till next time, Camp Fans!

Hey, Camp Fans!

Today I want to tell you about another outstanding company with whom everyone here at Everything Summer Camp is very proud to be doing business. And that company is JanSport. This extremely well-known name is the Original Outdoor Gear Brand that we all know and love.

A division of VF Outdoor, Inc., by 1967 JanSport was founded in Seattle, Washington thanks to three innovators of the outdoor industry. Manufacturing and marketing topnotch outdoor backpacks has always been JanSport’s calling though they do now offer other outdoor gear, travel gear, daypacks, as well as collegiate decorated apparel.

You can find JanSport backpacks and products all over the world in sporting goods stores, college bookstores, department stores, as well as specialty and boutique retail stores. The entire idea of JanSport is based on helping people get from point A to point B—whether that means going to school or going across the world, JanSport is there to help you do it.

It doesn’t matter whether your destination is the longest of distances or just a couple blocks down at your friend’s house—it’s typical to have essentials that you need to bring along. That’s where JanSport comes in. They help you get to point B with utter convenience and functionality.

That’s what they mean by their Brand tagline: Discover Freedom. It means, get out there and discover who and where you are in the world. JanSport can help you with everything you’ll need. It’s all in your backpack. Now go have an adventure.

As basic as they may be, JanSport puts a good effort forward to make their backpacks versatile. The same backpack that you load up with books to take home from school may be what you bring with you to hike the trails at camp. Keeping this concept forefront in the minds of the designers, each backpack design is made to be useful on multiple levels—flexible.

Safe travels, campers! Wherever you’re going, go with JanSport.

- John

Hey, Camp Fans!

Today I want to tell you about the one, the only, the founder of TruKid, Jennifer Adams Bunkers. This incredible entrepreneur had a dream and then made it a reality with nothing more than a considerate thought and her own hard work.

When Jennifer, a mother of six, mind you, discovered that two of her kids had gotten into her wrinkle cream and applied it to themselves as a joke, she got it in her head that a cream that’s used to wipe the wrinkles off your face probably isn’t the safest product for children to be messing with.

And that made her realize further that there wasn’t much on the market for children’s products for skin care, hair care, or baby-safe sunscreen. Since everything else that was out there was all filled to the brim with a bunch of chemicals that nobody can pronounce or had an unpleasant odor.

After that, she decided she would concoct skin and hair care products that weren’t only safe for children to use but fun for them too. Her one hundred percent natural, essential oils, shampoos, sunblock, and other products come packaged with educational activities that help teach your kids about taking care of their skin, the hair on their head, and the world they live in.

One might think that Jennifer must be Wonder Woman in her alter ego’s everyday disguise to be such an amazing entrepreneur and a mother of six. But really she’s just prone to handling stressful and chaotic situations. She’s doing something that she loves to do which makes it all worth it to her at the end of the day.

In the coming fall season, Jennifer intends to launch the TruKid Foundation™, an organization for kids, by kids to create a focus on charity work in the Bay Area. This includes product donations, outreach activities, and educational projects.

- John

Hey, Crazy Campers!

If you’re an avid reader of our blog and a frequent visitor on our website, then you may already know some of what I’ll be discussing in today’s post—like how Everything Summer Camp wasn’t always called Everything Summer Camp. The company used to be C&N Footlockers, named after Craig and Nancy Cornell.

Craig and Nancy founded C&N in 1987, manufacturing their classic trunks right out of the proverbial home-garage in Boyd, Wisconsin. There they made 380 black footlockers—all the same size—with unmatched, rugged construction. Along with excellent customer service, C&N Footlockers was sure to be a success.

As business picked up, they started offering trunks in more colors and different sizes. In need of more space for the manufacturing and storage of their trunks, they soon relocated. The business continued to grow and they relocated once again to a bigger building.

This final move was to the same building that we reside in today, although we've added on for even more space over the years! In the building’s factory is where every single C&N Footlocker is manufactured.

We remain modest people at Everything Summer Camp, but facts are facts and C&N Footlockers are truly the best camp trunks you can find. Made with unquestionably rock-solid craftsmanship, C&N Footlockers are built to last a lifetime.

Everything Summer Camp, the home of C&N Footlockers, now offers four different trunk sizes, twenty solid colors and a black trim option. We have create-your-own designs and dozens of designer pattern choices. We also offer lots of awesome trunk accessories that really optimize the use of your camp trunks.

A lot has changed since we got our start twenty-six years ago, but we’re still just as dedicated to making our trunks the same way we always have. That’s why we still brand every trunk we make with the C&N Footlockers emblem. Happy camping!

- John