Sacramento Skiers and Snowboarders get hi-tech at Sacramento 's newest retail store, Sierra Snowboard & Ski. The new and exciting store broke the trend of old traditional ski shops relying on sales people to service you. In the last ten years, the Internet has embedded itself into our daily lives. In preparation for the upcoming winter, I found myself researching possible snowboards on the Internet. On the Google browser I typed “Burton Clash Snowboard”, which is a snowboard that I had heard about from a friend and wanted more information on. One of the first organic web sites to appear was SierraSnowboard.com. This web site answered all the questions I had about this snowboard and even had the size and color I wanted in stock. The best part of my shopping experience was the location of the store, right here in Sacramento . I did not need to risk buying this expensive snowboard over the Internet, because the store was twenty miles from my house. What are the chances that the website I shopped was a local store, I had to inspect further. Walking thru this store is an experience; the focal point is the 20ft by 20ft High Definition projection screen showing the high flying stunts of professional skiers. The screen was complimented with Internet kiosks displaying their homepage. When shopping at a store with over 1000 skis and snowboards to choose from, how do you know if you are making the right choice? For me, it just so happened that one of the sale representatives confirmed what the website said and sent me off completely satisfied.

Sierrasnowboard.com is an impressive website for a local, privately owned store. The site loaded quickly, had simple navigation, a nice mix of graphics and provided answers to any question I had. For example, there are multiple descriptions written by the staff for each snowboard or ski offered in the store. These descriptions are backed up with an advice page, which teaches the novice shopper the proper terminology and technology in the equipment offered. If all else fails there are links to many staff members who specialize in different aspects of skiing and snowboarding. Shopping the website was just as easy as talking to Steve Boutte, the manager of the snowboard department, who confirmed my thoughts on the Burton Clash and provided me with some important information on their new website. Sierrasnowboard.com goes further than selling their products online, they promote skiing and snowboarding in Northern California by consolidating key information for avid customers. The site has links for current conditions and cams at each resort, current road conditions, specials on lift tickets and current events. Ultimately sierrasnowboard.com is a one stop shop for a great experience on the slopes.

I've shopped at many local ski and snowboard retailers and nothing seams as progressive as Sierra Snowboard & Ski. “Our store has a futuristic outlook, we embrace our website because it allow us to serve customers twenty four hours a day” says owner Michael Harrosh. “…The Challenge for us in creating this website is to give the same level of customer service on our website as we do in our store. We have the most knowledgeable staff possible, working at our store and we are always exploring new ways to expand their knowledge to a greater number of people through different communication channels. We hope Sierrasnowboard.com becomes a hub for our hometown customers. We provide superior service and a different shopping experience on our website and can back that service up with our store. If there are any problems with a product, customers can come into our store and get taken care of!' Michael elaborates, “In the future we plan to create a secondary web page that will focus more on the ski and snowboard community. Customers will be able to communicate through forums, post pictures and write their own reviews about our products.” Sierrasnowboard.com is still in its infancy; it just launched on October 1, 2005 and will evolve with changing conditions.

Every aspect of sierrasnowboard.com is run inside their store. The owner, sales staff, and webmaster, Eric Christianson all collaborate and execute new ideas daily on the sales floor, where they are in direct contact with their customers. For Eric, the biggest challenge is managing the inventory for both the website and in the store. Eric States , “We only have one inventory for both stores and need to establish a system which updates the inventory when customers buy things off the web or our store.” The solution to the inventory problem is far from over; Eric explains that they are looking for a system which suits their needs at a reasonable price. For the time being, they update the website inventory in batches every hour on the hour, so that customers can view a close to real time inventory. One step at a time, sierrasnowboard.com is custom built to better meet the needs of customers and the staff of Sierra Snowboard & Ski. After finding sierrasnowboard.com on Google, I will never shop for snowboards in the traditional manner. Within the last ten years, ecommerce has seen rapid growth in the world. Companies like Sierra Snowboard & Ski continue to make shopping easier for busy Generation Y professionals and students. Even specialty markets, like skiing will benefit from further expansions in ecommerce.