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Equipment Offering
Our focus and function is to serve Alpinists,
Ice Climbers, alpine style Rock Climbers, and
Mountain Guides by offering select equipment manufactured
by leading and innovative companies, that have
a focus on Alpinism. We at Bradley Alpinist feel
that if an equipment item is offered by us, it
is absolutely the some of the best equipment you
can buy for high altitude climbing. In many cases,
the good gear we are talking about is hard to
find at your local climbing store or large catalog/on-line
suppliers, such as Hunersdorff
High Altitude Water Bottles, and RDM
Stove Platforms. From products that protect
you from the extreme sun at high altitude,
to the tent
stakes that actually work at 20,000 ft on
glacial ice, from 3rd
tools to insulators
for your fuel bottles, we trust that our ultra
finite Alpinism niche will super serve the very
discerning big peak enthusiast. If you are looking
for unique, Alpinist related products, you just
may find those "hard to find" pieces
right here, such as the classic Austrian made,
"Dachstein"
wool sweaters, mitts and hats (just like that
of now closed Lackner Wolle). Our gear selection
is purposefully narrow, and everything we do offer
was selected with Alpinism in mind.
Equipment Design
One eventual arm of the business will take up
the design of innovative and functional equipment
for mountaineers who climb the high peaks. Our
equipment designs will always have the integrity
required to deliver performance, trip after trip,
expedition after expedition, in the harsh climates
of the world’s most punishing mountains,
and used by climbers who are minimalists, and
require light, bombproof climbing equipment. Ideas
for our line include a hydration system accessory,
a cooking pot system, two-way radio harnesses,
tent stakes suitable for ice penetration, and
a variety of other much needed accessories. One
notable product line we already offer is burly
jewelry inspired by climbers, including unisex
silver bracelets, amulets, and necklaces. After
your climb, these fine pieces are designed to
compliment your look and mood once you are on
top of a bar stool in some mountain town, pulling
down a tall cold one, sporting your wool toque
and stained, tattered and duct-taped down jacket.
Burly Climbing Jewelry, or what we call
"Bar Stool Fashion"
At the end of your climbing excursion, you can
get that much needed hot shower, then accessorize
your jeans, down jacket (or Dachstein
Wool Pullover) and sandals/clogs with what
we call our bar stool fashion;
burly
silver jewelry designed by climbers. When
you climb atop that bar stool in some mountain
town, pull back the customary post trip tall cold
one, you'll be sporting one of our eye capturing
pieces, as the intensity of the trip's little
epic (that had you quite puckered) fades to something
way less intense as it seemed. We offer you several
classic, timeless pieces, but none more signiture
than that of our Alpinist's
Piolet Cuff; a design inspired by the famous
bamboo shafted Chouinard-Frost
Piolet that was tooled in Permana, Italy,
by the Codega brothers. These pieces are unisex,
and are not like anything else you have seen in
climbing styled jewelry.
Mountain Guides, Our Cause of Interest
Although there are many excellent charitable organizations
involved with the outdoor industry, we have chosen
to communicate our strong advocacy for the mountain
guiding profession, through many several channels
of support. Mountain Guides inspire us, and always
climb the hard stuff, and often. Mountain guides
see more trips, more summits in a year, than a
serious recreational climber will see in five
or more years. Guides live that life that eluded
the rest of us. At Bradley Alpinist, we celebrate
Climbing Guides, and the guide lifestyle. Our
site, media, and marketing pieces provide support
for guide services, individual certified guides,
and UIAGM member organizations that educate and
certify climbing guides, such as the American
Mountain Guide Association in the United States.
As part of our support of the mountain guiding
profession, we extend a 25% discount to current
certified guides, as well as 20% to clients of
certified guides or guiding companies (within
45 days before or after a booked climbing outing).
See our Guide
& Client Discount Program for the fairly
laid back details.
Also, we provide as a resource for our customers
and visitors, an easy but comprehensive tool to
locate a guide to
hire. The Hire
a Guide section of our website, and our dedicated
website at www.hireamountainguide.com
(The Mountain Guide Bureau)
is designed to educate the climber on the benefits
of hiring a guide for instruction, climbing partnership,
and extensive outings. Visitors can review detailed
profiles of most certified guides and mountain
guiding services around the world, and are provided
telephone contact information and links to the
guide's or service's websites and email. The site
is a FREE guide locator for potential
clients of guiding services, and a FREE
marketing resource for Guides and Guiding Companies
to profile themselves in our comprehensive search
directory. PLEASE NOTE: This feature is not a
brokering or referral service in any way, but
a tool for guides and clients looking for guides.
The third part of our focus in supporting guiding,
is in the form of sponsorship. Bradley Alpinist
is proud to the sole financial sponsor and operater
of the Mountain Guide Bureau web directory (described
above), as well as one of the Patron Sponsors
of the American
Mountain Guide Association, and a supporting
sponsor of the Certified
Guides Cooperative.
  
Gear Lists
Since gear is gold, gear is wealth, then a gear
list helps keep track of what you have, or what
you need to make sure you have. We provide as
a resource to our climbing customers, sample gear
lists applicable for several types of trips.
We wish to continually compile good gear lists
from our guiding friends, and serious enthusiasts,
sharing the wealth of information with our community.
Don’t leave the rope at home(done that)!
A good gear list is a part of every trip.
Inspired by ideas to improve equipment for the
higher peaks, Lance Johnson, also answers to “Jono”
(self-given European nickname), founded Bradley
Alpinist in June of 2005 following an epiphany
during a climbing trip in Peru's Cordillera Blanca.
Bradley Alpinist is proudly named
after his father, Colonel Bradley Johnson
USAF, an avid alpine skier, bird hunter,
fly fisherman, and a man who appreciated simple,
yet purposeful equipment in the outdoors, such
as duct tape. A graduate of Texas A&M Military
School, and retired in 1980 from the US Air Force
as a full colonel, Bradley dedicated 29 years
to military service, which included direct involvement
in the Cuban Missile Crisis, and tours in both
the Korean and Vietnam wars.
Brad's youngest son, Lance Johnson, is a mountain
runner, skier, ice climber, rock climber, and
alpinist, and is a proud father of two, who are
currently undergoing their own outdoor apprenticeships
(his son and daughter were each given mountain
axes before the age of 8). Lance enjoys traveling
to climbing destinations around the country, including
Alaska. He has climbed in Mexico, New Zealand,
and Peru. He is a veteran of multiple mountain
trail ultra-marathon endurance runs, including
a finish at Arizona's Crown King 50-Mile Trail
Run, the Leadville Trail 100, and four finishes
at the Hardrock 100 Endurance Run in Silverton,
Colorados. Lance has an old school cell phone,
a television that is always off, a Starbucks stainless
steel coffee press, and a black lab named Scout.
His favorite muppets are the guys in the balcony.
In addition to being the buyer, janitor, product
designer, and owner of Bradley Alpinist, he also
operates Full Circle Marketing Communications,
an advertising and marketing consulting company
in Albuquerque, New Mexico. As part of Full Circle,
a division called The
Direttissima Group,
works with the professional mountain guiding industry
on various marketing projects. Marketing work
is performed the American
Mountain Guide Association, the Certified
Guides Cooperative, as well as for individual
mountain guides and mountain guiding companies.
Lance serves on a steering committee for the Certified
Guides Cooperative.
Borrowing a great line from an old co-worker
from the now closed Wilderness Centre in Albuquerque,
NM, a climbing shop he was employed with during
his college years, Lance suggests that when it
comes to your choice in equipment, “The
best is always good enough!".
Thus Bradley Alpinist's tag line, "NOW
YOU'RE GOOD! ”. Another company
adopted tag line is "UP FOR A TALL
COLD ONE?", which is a play on a
ice cold 22oz glass of beer, and high altitude
peaks. Many of the company's decals, advertisements,
and logo'd gear carry one of these tag lines.
“
The
mountains have always held a special place in
my life. When you're on a rock or ice climb, or
just up on the mountain, your mind gets clear.
Mountain activity just magically filters out the
noice, the voices, the stress, and the unimportant
worries in the mind. For me, climbing always has
a way of fortifying my personal relationship with
God, and also refreshes within me the realization
that life can and should be simpler, and your
relationship with God and your family are the
most important. Climbing is a worthwhile and rewarding
way to combine fitness, recreation, and renewal
of the mind. On a side note, beer is colder and
tastier when you're a climber...like it's made
just for us. After climbing, or coming down off
the mountain, I'm quite Up For a Tall
Cold One(now a classic Bradley Alpinist tag line)!
A few magical places for me are the Grand Tetons
in Wyoming,the Ouray/Ridgway area of Southwestern
Colorado, and Huaraz, Peru. I really, really want
to get to the Dolomites in Italy, and Chamonix,
France.”
Lance
Johnson
Photo of
Bradley Johnson (above and right)
Photos of Lance
Johnson and Scout(above and left)
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