Do you ever wonder why most Australian ski shops don’t carry handmade skis? They mostly carry a selection of the usual suspects from the same big brands: K2, Rossignol, Volkl, Dynastar, Head, Salomon, Nordica, Blizzard, Atomic, Kastle, Fischer  and occasionally you will see brands like Armada, 4-Front, Line and a few other mid-sized brands.

The reason a lot of our Aussie ski shops (not all) do this is because they have long standing relationships with these brands and they are a “safe bet.” The owners and managers of these shops have a pretty good idea of how many they can sell and what will sell. These ski brands are, in their mind set, the "best ski brands."

The last thing ski shop owners and managers want is for September to come around and to still have a large amount of inventory leftover. If they do, they drop the price to liquidate these skis, which just devalues the product instantly and makes it harder to sell skis at the start of the season at near full price. So the cycle perpetuates.

Blackbird Bespoke Skis is one place where you can find a great selection of small handmade ski brands, many of which are considered to be among the best ski brands. So for those of you who don’t have an epic local ski shop that carries handmade skis from the best boutique makers like Rocky Mountain Underground, Sego Ski Co, Soul Skis, Fat-ypus, Caravan Skis, HG Skis, Coalition Snow and Skevik Skis (soon to be on our site), we've created a store where you can find the best handmade ski brands, at very reasonable prices, so you can see what you are missing out on. As an avid skier and past ski patroller, I guarantee you will find at least one boutique ski company on our site that will blow you away and make everyone in the lift line say “Whoa, what kind of skis are those?!”.

After all, these boutique manufacturers just want to make "the best pair of skis you've ever been on." What's not to love about that! - T