Nancy Grimes writes, "When we sold the company in 1980, we had just completed a year of $1.2 million in sales. We had about 50 employees, mostly sewers, in our 12,000 sz. ft. Longmont, Colorado factory. We did no work overseas or with any contractors. We still used a team of independent sales reps who also sold other brands, like Wilderness Experience."
A signature of Banana products was their
fanciful use of yellow and green fabrics in many of their products.
The company's Goretex mountain pants take an award in the history of gear as probably
the first full-featured, commericially available Goretex mountains
pants. My
wife and I owned a set-- hers yellow and mine bright green.
We were two peak-bagging
bananas! In the picture below, 
we
see her Banana pants atop the summit of 14,162 ft. Mt. Shasta
in California. I title the picture "The Joy of Climbing,"
in wry remembrance of the brutal cold, the thin air, the evil
wind, and the lack of any summit view! (by the way, the greenish
mountain parka with the orange accents in both pictures is a Synergy
parka, as is the black parka in the picture with the dogs)
More Banana images:
Above: in the picture of Jim Heiden sewing, Nancy Grimes pointed out, "Look at the time!" It is past 2 a.m. and there's Jim still working! Next is a Banana ad from Backpacker Magazine in 1977. And final image is of a Banana metal snap following the company's fun-filled tagline: "Products with Appeal" -- it's a banana half-peeled!
Please Note: All Material on this page, and in all my "History of Gear" webpages, is copyrighted, and no usage of my material is permitted unless explicit permission is granted by me, Bruce B. Johnson, owner of OregonPhotos.com. The images of the founders were provided by Nancy Grimes in 2018.
Please Note: All Material on this page, and in all my "History of Gear" webpages, is copyrighted, and no usage of my material is permitted unless explicit permission is granted by me, Bruce B. Johnson, owner of OregonPhotos.com. Contact is oldgear@Oregonphotos.com
