AT Binding Brands-what do you think is most popular.

I am trying to collect some information as far as AT Bindings go...
I think there are 5 major brands: Fritschi, Dynafit, Silvretta, Marker(Duke), Naxo and Alpine Trekkers from BCA.

1.How many people tour, or own touring gear in the U.S.?
2.What Brand is most popular?
3.What percentage of people own what brand?

Basically I am trying to gather logistics for a homeade binding type deal and I am looking for some marketing stuff to see if launching another binding would be possible, could the market support it, is there a need?
I am aware of the lack of strength in the majority of the current models and a new system needs to adress that. My idea is a permanent adaption contraption to mount regular downhill bindings to. The heel would be lockable and it could tour, although the pivot point would be located 3 in. in front of the toe. It would be something like a 1/2 lb. addition to each ski so 1lb. total.

I used Naxos..3 rigs.

M

My guess for the US market will be something like
45% duke
30% Dynafit
15% Fritchi
14% Naxo
1% silveretta

in 2 years
I have no idea about treckers, but I think they are in many ways kind of a different product (like snowshoes), plus each person will only have one pair not one pair per set of skis.

As for your idea,
I think there is a reason that sliveretteas, Frischi's and marker have a short toe piece, and naxo's have the double piviot. Having the piviot 3 inches in front of teh toe will unacceptably suck for touring.

Go ahead right now and glue boards that are 3 inches longer than your feet to your shoes and walk around.

Issue 2 is compatibility with AT boots - alpine bindings are not very compatible with AT boots, this will reduce the market you can sell to.

I am not trying to just hate on your idea, I am all for better bindings. I just think you need to think it through.

Fritschi has been the market leader for a long time worldwide and in the US, Dynafit is perhaps in Second Place

Marker Dukes could be the leader at some point in the future, but its unknown as very few people are skiing them so far... not to mention they seem to be more of a nitch AT bindings than others. even with all the love they get around here, many people dont need or want a heavy Din16 Clamp for touring. I dont think that Fritschi and Naxo will be out of business anytime soon.

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Originally Posted by cliffhucker

although the pivot point would be located 3 in. in front of the toe.

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That'll suck. Be like touring in clown shoes or swim fins.

Getting the pivot point close to or under the toe is what makes the whole thing difficult.

Regardless congrats on timing your entry into the market place with a shitty solution and at the same time as an industry heavyweight who'll probably completely kill the non dynafit share of the market.

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Originally Posted by PNWbrit

industry heavyweight who'll probably completely kill the non dynafit share of the market.

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Not until they get the weight down and make it so I don't have to step out of the binders to switch modes they wont..

M

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Originally Posted by Skidog

Not until they get the weight down and make it so I don't have to step out of the binders to switch modes they wont..

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To what, the whole 100 maggots who are interested in such a solution? People have talked on boards for years about a similar idea. 5 years ago you could have had a shot. Now, not going to be a serious contender.

S916 = 7lbs + 1lb for plates ~= Weight and DIN range of Marker Duke

^^^
in reality, i think the dukes are under 6 lbs, with a smart design that is burly but light. having a short toe helps this a lot...look how long the atomic race toes are and how heavy they are.

frankly, the duke satisfies the tgr need. so unless there is a new market, you're screwed. also, there is a lot of liability in bindings. be prepared to have a full-time legal department. or develop the technology and then sell it to the big companies

Thanx for the input. I thought I had a sweet idea for some home binders and was thinking of possibilities.

I think the USA right now the largest market share:

1. Fritschi
2. Naxo
3. Dynafit (far behind 2)
4. Silvretta (close behind 3)

Soon to be

1. Naxo
2. Fritschi (close behind 1)
3. Marker (far behind 2)
4. Dynafit
5. Silvretta (far behind 4)

In the far future.

1. Marker
2. Naxo (close behind 1)
3. Dynafit
4. Fristchi
5. Silvretta (far behind 4)

Fritschi is only in first now because they have been around the longest with a decent product, but they've shown little to no innovation since the Freeride came out what... 7 years ago or so? Even Silvretta has shown more innovation (far far more innovation).

Marker will take a while to get market penetration due to production issues (in the short run), cost, and weight.

Dynafit will grow because of wider boot compatibility but will still be hampered by price and durability. There is nothing that compares.

Naxo provides a great price point for a good binding with good performance, ease of use, compatibility, and ergonomics which will probably keep it in close to the #1 spot... the Duke will eventually be *the* binding for tall charging ATers, the ever growing demographic of "slack country" types, the everyone-has-marker-proform crowd, and of course the rich BC poser crowd too ;)

No way Marker will ever take over the AT market. There are millions of Fritchis and Dynafits in use right now. What did Marker produce, a few 1000, maybe? How many will actually be used for serious bc skiing. They are too heavy. I've got 5 dyna rigs and 1 pair of dukes. No way I'd pick the Duke day in and day out over a dynafit. Neither would every other skier I ride with. Put in 80-100 days of 5000+ vert on a duke/monster ski combo and let me know how much physical damage you do to yourself. Its basically an alpine binding that allows you to wear AT boots. The Marker rep said they were targeting the resort "poser"(his word) crowd, not the core bc crowd. But maybe I'm just a puss. If I didn't do a little snowmobile skiing, I'd have no use for them.

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Originally Posted by cliffhucker

Thanx for the input. I thought I had a sweet idea for some home binders and was thinking of possibilities.

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Oh, I think it's a cool idea for some home binders. It's just a bad idea for a profitable business.

Marker will take the slackcountry/yoyo/inbounds crowd the Freeride had, which judging by the maggot quivers, accounts for quit a few pairs of bindings sold. In my survey last year maybe 70% of the touring binders were Fritschi, 20% Dynafit, 10% other.

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Originally Posted by cj001f

Marker will take the slackcountry/yoyo/inbounds crowd the Freeride had, which judging by the maggot quivers, accounts for quit a few pairs of bindings sold. In my survey last year maybe 70% of the touring binders were Fritschi, 20% Dynafit, 10% other.

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Survey of whom? TGR is a terrible baseline for making judements about the worldwide AT market.

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Originally Posted by Dirk Diggler

Survey of whom? TGR is a terrible baseline for making judements about the worldwide AT market.

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bindings seen on people and stored in the huts at night in the US, India, Austria, Switzerland and France

yurp:
fritschi dominates (say 65%), dynafit has a good niche (say 25%), naxo plus silvretta have the remaining 10%. Not sure about the future marker for the duke, I still have to see one... the weight will be a major issue

oh, I did not see the post by cj001f.... I wrote more or less the same, and my sources were exactly the same

Diggler has a very valid point- Marker isn't even trying to take over the AT market. Whle the Duke is a viable option for people who hike on the weekends but never actually tour (you know: posers like me), Fritschi, Dyna and Naxo will still be hammering it out for top dog in five years, and die-hard at guys and gals will still be more than happy with the product.

Another thing to consider with an under-the-binding AT plate: getting the boot farther away from the ski on today's fat boys will make them even slower edge to edge. They'd have to be light, thin, and still have a solid hole pattern. Good luck with the venture.

If you want bindings that break while touring, Fritchi Freerides are the market leaders in overpriced pieces of useless junk.

Go with Naxo NX 21 or Marker Dukes.

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Originally Posted by ZomblibulaX

getting the boot farther away from the ski on today's fat boys will make them even slower edge to edge.

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Better get your facts straight. More riser will actually make the skis easier and faster to edge than when mounted flat... There is a reason the WC Slalom bindings have an UPPER limit on risers.

But mounting with a high riser will make the skis more prone to catch and edge, as the height also increases small subtle movements into bigger ones (ie. leverage).

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Originally Posted by Altaholic

If you want bindings that break while touring, Fritchi Freerides are the market leaders in overpriced pieces of useless junk.

Go with Naxo NX 21 or Marker Dukes.

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There are more broken Freerides because there are more Freerides around. Per number of bindings at least as far as Chamonix goes (most locals skibums and residents ski AT) Naxo has a lower reliability record.

The marker duke looks like a good idea but is unproven.

If you want reliability go with Dynafit, yeah I've seen broken ones but less than anything else.

but the thing about marker duke sales is are they an actual AT binding vs. an alpine binding with a tour function?

I think in the last couple of years the Freeride started to have a "SUV owner" syndrome, where a bunch of people were buying them just because they had a touring function, and were taking them OB or touring maybe 5% of the time, the rest of the time they were skied in the resort. I have a sneaking suspicion that the Marker Duke is going to absolutely dominate that market, but are the people that buy them really using them for touring?

Don't get me wrong I'm not trying to be condescending, I'm just saying since there are more people who own alpine bindings then AT bindings, and more and more of them are going to buy Dukes, and many of these new Duke owners are only going to use them for lift accessed sidecountry instead of all day human powered tours, doesn't that slightly skew the numbers?

I know its splitting hairs, but if you break down the numbers and find that 5 pairs of Dukes are sold for every pair of dynafits, but 4 of those pairs of dukes wind up on skis that rarely ever tour, is the Duke really a more popular backcountry binding?

so says the owner of 2 pairs of Dynafits and has a pair of Dukes on order:D

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Originally Posted by laseranimal

I think in the last couple of years the Freeride started to have a "SUV owner" syndrome, where a bunch of people were buying them just because they had a touring function, and were taking them OB or touring maybe 5% of the time, the rest of the time they were skied in the resort. I have a sneaking suspicion that the Marker Duke is going to absolutely dominate that market, but are the people that buy them really using them for touring?

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I agree. It is why I gave Dukes the eventual number one US market share in my prediction.

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Originally Posted by Summit

the Duke will eventually be *the* binding for tall charging ATers, the ever growing demographic of "slack country" types, the everyone-has-marker-proform crowd, and of course the rich BC poser crowd too ;)

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Laser, Ive read your many posts about how lame it was for Marker not to have included the adjustable AFD on the Jester. I agree with you 100%. It sounds like we both would have bought the Jester over the Duke had they done that. So doesn't that basically indicate that we are viewing the Duke as "an alpine binding with a tour function"?

Cutting through all the chatter, what I'm seeing here is that the Duke will do exactly what it was designed to do. That is to be a binder that can (hopefully) take the beating of an alpine binder while offering a full touring functionality for the vast majority of posers that side/slack country tour. If they can take the beating they will have filled a niche that the Freerides failed at. Bravo to Marker for paying attention to the way people are using gear.

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Originally Posted by Dirk Diggler

Laser, Ive read your many posts about how lame it was for Marker not to have included the adjustable AFD on the Jester. I agree with you 100%. It sounds like we both would have bought the Jester over the Duke had they done that. So doesn't that basically indicate that we are viewing the Duke as "an alpine binding with a tour function"?

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Yeah basically, which is exactly what I was looking for, I've got dynafits for touring, now I want an alpine binding that I can skin back to the lifts with.

As to the movable AFD and buying Jesters instead of Dukes, I'd probably have bought both Dukes and Jesters(possibly multiple pairs of Jesters)

I'm looking to buy new boots, they're probably going to be 4 Buckle rockered AT's, possibly with dynafit fittings. I think we've finally gotten to the point where 4 buckle AT's are good enough to ski inbounds without giving up too much performance vs alpines. Plus it'd be really nice not to have to lug multiple boots around with me every time I go somewhere.

Unfortunately, as I looked over my quiver I come to the following realization, the 1 boot idea won't work because I can't ski my alpine setups(PE's w/ Mojo 15's and Pow Plus w/ 977's) with a rockered AT boot.

It'd be moronic to put Dukes on the PE's and while the Pow Plus is somewhat appealing, they're a bit too heavy for sidecountry. I think I'm going to have 2 pairs of Heli Daddies, one's already mounted with Dynafits as my primary touring rig, and the 2nd pair will get dukes as my primary inbounds/sidecountry rig.

If the Jesters had movable AFD's, all I'd have to do is buy two pairs, and my entire quiver of fixed heel skis could be managed with one pair of boots. Even scarier is the thought that if I compromised a bit on boots and bought the new Terminator X's and NTN, I could theoretically bring every single pair of skis I own in my rooftop box, and one single pair of boots:eek: