(Personal Note: Since this is my first blog entry, I want to share my objective with you. I love my job because I get to meet and interact with some pretty interesting people and businesses. A big part of my role at bloomfield knoble (bk) is to really learn and understand these businesses, then define the marketing challenges they face so we can offer our help. To do that, I first have to get to know the people that make the tough marketing decisions every day. With such a diversity of leaders at my fingertips, it only made sense to me to start sharing with you what I learn.)
![Kirsten Ashmore[1] copy](https://www.bloomfieldknoble.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Kirsten-Ashmore1-copy.jpg)
Last year I was lucky enough to have met Kirsten Ashmore, a brand manager at Redington, while attending iCast, then again at the Outdoor Retailer show. I found Kirsten to be very friendly and intelligent – a genuinely nice person who seems to love her job. When I meet someone with those qualities, it motivates me to learn about their company because it often means it is a pretty cool place to work. On the Redington website, they describe their business this way: “We deliver more in everything we do. From a diverse base of products grounded in fly fishing, Redington offers active outdoor enthusiasts a complete offering of great quality, versatile performance products at an affordable price.” I think this is a pretty strong mission statement. I hope you enjoy our discussion:
Q: A lot of outdoor enthusiasts love your brand. I am sure many would love to work at Redington. How did you end up working there?
A: My brand experiences serendipitously lead me to working with Redington. When my husband and I decided to relocate to the Seattle market, we moved to Bainbridge Island, and I continued to work remotely for my previous employer. We joked about how it would be great to work with Far Bank (the holding company that owns Redington, Sage and RIO) since they are located on the island. About six months into the long distance work arrangement the position at Redington presented itself — it was a great fit.
Q: Was your husband jealous? (I asked about her landing such a great job.)
A: Well, he is a huge Redington fan; he’s fly fished since he was three years old and his favorite rod is a Redington. So, there might be just a hint of jealousy.
Q: What year was that?
A: I joined Redington in June of 2013 after relocating to Bainbridge Island in December of 2012.
Q: How is Redington unique to work for compared to other places you’ve experienced?
A: Redington has a small company feel. It’s very goal-collaborative in spirit. We, as cross-functional teams, collaborate on many projects bringing a richer array of products and stories to the market.
In my previous employment, jobs tended to get silo-ed and roles were narrow in definition. At Redington, the team approach runs all the way through the organization.
![Redington Vapen Red Rods 2014 Angle Shot43408[1] copy](https://www.bloomfieldknoble.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Redington-Vapen-Red-Rods-2014-Angle-Shot434081-copy.jpg)
Q: What do you think makes the Redington brand appeal to the consumer?
A: I think people come to our brand for the great products we offer because we make approachable, high quality products. At Redington we recognize we are a part of an outdoor adventurer’s lifestyle and we understand people want to fly fish and take part in other outdoor activities.
Q: What is your focus in 2014 with the brand?
A: Our objective in 2014 is to align the brand from a communication standpoint with the visual that appeals to our customers. We will be launching a new website in March that is highly visual and interactive. Our new website will be more nimble with a larger brand message. We will include more video on products like our rods and the waders. We want our product to be relatable to our target audience.
Q: How does that differ from 2013?
A: We introduced some wonderful and technological breakthrough products in 2013, including Vapen Red Fly Rod, Dually Spey Fly Rod, Butter Stick Fly Rod, and we can’t forget the Super Dry Wader series. These products solidified our team for 2014-15 and beyond.
![SUPER DRY FLY WADER GRIT_TITANIUM_Front[1] copy](https://www.bloomfieldknoble.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/SUPER-DRY-FLY-WADER-GRIT_TITANIUM_Front1-copy-200x300.jpg)
Q: What are your preferred mediums to get the message to your target audience about your products’ advantages?
A: We utilize traditional mediums – print, trade shows – as well as social media to share our message. Social media has become huge in getting to our “key point of contact.”
Q: Which social media outlets have you found most successful?
A: All social media is important, but Instagram is huge for us. We spend a good amount of time developing the content for Instagram. If you think about fly-fishing, pictures tell the story. We are lucky that we have a large following and internal staff that love the sport and are willing to share their pictures. We get a lot of post-fishing beauty shots, trophy shots and some great shots of live action moments of release.
We also use Facebook, Twitter and Google+.
A big thank you to Kirsten for sharing her story and some of the exciting projects they are working on at Redington. For more information about Redington, you can go to http://www.Redington.com, or follow them on Instagram (RedingtonGear) or Twitter @RedingtonGear.
Luann Boggs is the Vice President of Business Development for bloomfield knoble. She works with new and existing accounts as a liaison between client and creative. Her favorite part of the job is meeting and working with interesting and intelligent people. Her personal interests are family, friends, good books and travel including all 50 states and over 25 countries.