The Big Interview – Colin Baden
Oakley CEO Colin Baden talks exclusively to sportindustry.biz through their latest product, and dropping Lance Armstrong from the brand.
You have just launched your latest product, Oakley Airwave, what can you tell us about it?
When we started working with Recon a couple years ago, we liked the concept and saw what they were doing, but it wasn’t necessarily where we wanted to be with it. However, as we started to work more and more with them we saw improvements in how we could develop the user interface. To start with, we designed and built a goggle around the technology as opposed to trying to take the recon mod live and stuff it in an existing designs. We took the best of Oakley’s snow technology and started with a completely new design that properly integrates it, properly balances on the face, and marries the electronics technology with snow goggle technology, so it’s all about the complete package.
We like the Heads Up Display (HUD) technology using the micro prism display with the near eye focus, we like the fact that it doesn’t project out in space, we don’t want it to be projected on the inside of the lens because we’re a sport optics company, so optics are very important to us. We don’t want the HUD to interfere with your sport. What we want is it to be readily available, when you want the information, clean, concise and easy to use.
Like a dashboard?
Perfect, it’s an example I use a lot. If you think about it, it is like driving. You use your windshield, and you have your dashboard with lots of information, but you don’t stare at it constantly while you’re driving, it doesn’t interfere, you are used to it. When you need some information you take a quick glance. It’s feeding you live data but you can also review it later.
The social aspect is important as well, it’s all about trying to improve your day on the mountains. The goggle has a built-in GPS, accelerometer and a gyro, so it really knows where you are using those data points. It also has a barometer, temperature sensors, along with IP’s and Bluetooth that communicates both to the remote control and to your smart phone, which gives you additional functions.
Oakley created its own app, Recon has its engage app which is great, but we wanted to take it to the next level to really give the Oakley consumer the Oakley experience that they would expect. There is the Oakley airwave app for the iPhone 4S and 5 and for the android with music control giving you the ability to pick and choose the music you listen to on the mountain from your remote control.
You can see the dashboard with your speed, distance and jump analytics too. Jump analytics allows you to perform a jump and then review your distance and airtime. Not only does it store the data on the goggle, but it uploads it via the cell signal on your phone to your engage account so you can and share it later and track your entire season.
When it’s connected to your phone you also get text messaging and caller ID, you don’t want to be reading text messages when your skiing down a hill but it scrolls across and you can easily read it later so you don’t have to take your gloves off to use your phone. You can even reply with the remote using a pre-programmed response.
Don’t forget onboard mapping and GPS as well. The goggle is pre-loaded with over 600 of the top resorts. You get trail level mapping, similar to street level mapping, so you can see all of the runs on the resort, the difficulty of those runs, where the lifts are, where the lodge is, all this different information and your buddy tracking.
Buddy tracking?
Buddy tracking allows you to see your friends on the map and they don’t even have to have the Airwave goggle, they just need to have the free airwave app on their phone and you can see where they are. That’s great because we are trying to add enjoyment to your time on the mountain. If three of us went skiing, there might be different levels of ability or we might have different goals that day, so with this app you can easily find each other even on the busiest mountain and communicate.
There are even additional apps you can download with this now. There is an app you can use to operate a POV camera, similar to the GoPro, where the eyepiece of the airwave goggle will be the viewfinder of your camera. There should be more in the future as well, after Recon formed a Software Developers Kit so third party developers can create additional apps. The consumer can then download these and add and take away apps, just like you do on your phone.
Where can you see it going in the next couple of years?
One aspect of this project that is very interesting to us is that it’s the first time the optics will be available in apple stores. It is a better understanding of that channel of how we have enabled devices that communicate to mobile devices. There is a synergy that happens in that channel that we are very interested in understanding, it’s part of what we are going to learn in the next few months. If you think of all the sports that the brand is involved with, there are a number of permutations of this hardware that can apply to those sports.
So is there anything stopping you moving into BMX, for example?
The only question is how do you package it? How do you get it down to that scale, so it is not so heavy that it becomes obtrusive. We would want to ensure that it would still be a meaningful experience, a good experience, and have it benefit your activity.
You had a pretty busy summer with the launch of your Beyond Reason and your London 2012 collection, how did it go?
Well, typically, anytime it is an Olympic year the brand gets a certain lift, although not necessarily a big business lift. This is the one year when, thanks to the coordination of our efforts, we could see a significant brand uplift which we historically haven’t really measured in terms of our financial performance.
If you go back to before the Atlanta Games, we would put our product on athletes through our contractual relationships that we had. At the Atlanta games we created a safe house where athletes could get away from the Games, then as your progress through the Vancouver Olympics and Beijing we actually started branching out.
If you look at the London Games it is the first time we became an official licensee, it was the first time that we created products tied to the Games and it was also a time when the brand did a lot of strategic in-city campaigns. So when you were experiencing the London Games you were engaging with the brand in a way we have never invested in before.
Most people associate Oakley with sunglasses, is that something you are trying to change?
I believe the brand has aspirations to be bigger than just a sunglasses brand. I think the principles that made us great in that one product category have relevance in prescription lenses, in goggles, the verticals that we perform in our apparel programmes, so they are all an extension of what made the brand successful and I think eye-wear can be relevant in those other categories. It’s the scale of the brand.
Oakley ended their partnership with Lance Armstrong in the fallout of the doping scandal, will that have any affect on future sponsorship strategy when it comes to supporting individuals?
No. We still speak to the elite class of competitor. Typically those individuals are an affirmation of why you should wear our product, they are winning because they are really good at their sport but they use a piece of equipment that enhances their competitiveness.
We will always try and align ourselves with athletes who not only reflect some of our values as a brand, but are also dedicated to their sport in a way that elevates their category. In the case of Lance, he was that guy, and in the case of all professional athletes that are part of our programme, we support them until they are proven guilty, which as it turns out was also the case with Lance.
It was a personal disappointment, my wife is a cancer survivor and I look at what his foundation has done and I find that it was one of the big three pillars of fighting cancer, but I’m not sure how much good or bad this will be for that community. Saying that, I personally believe that what his foundation does will continue despite what Lance decided to do in his career.
Colin also took part in Sport Industry TV’s ‘Podiums Change Careers’ series, where he revealed the biggest influences in his career, and offers advice to the next generation. Check out the video here.
