A Sucker Is Born Every Minute

I just read in an outdoor industry on line magazine that the Gore Company will start an advertising campaign shortly on television promoting their non-existent product that they claim to be “waterproof and breathable”. They have said this claim so often that they actually believe it I guess. It is now as it was in the past a claim that is false. It always has been and always will be. The only entities that are waterproof and breathe are living organisms; such as humans, as well as all other animals and plant species. Inanimate objects such as material can be made waterproof with various coatings and if not coated with any material they are naturally VAPOR PERMEABLE! They the manmade materials do not breathe. The materials are not alive and only living entities are capable of BREATHING! Do they get this, probably yes, but they have to ignore reality in order to sell their bogus product.

Since I have been selling my leather boots many of the buyers have asked a great many questions regarding why my product is superior to the Gore-Tex/Thinsulate boots available from every other boot company in the country. Since the greater majority of my customers have shown an interest in getting factual information about my products as well as my opinion of the other products available, so I do not think these inquiries are not unusual. What is constant I have found is that virtually everyone who owns the boots with Gore-Tex/Thinsulate experiences cold feet once the temperature gets into the teens and lower. As I have explained in the October 3rd newsletter COLD FEET it is again the fact that the moisture retained in the boots gets cold so your feet get cold. The Gore-Tex PTFE film as well as the Thinsulate does not allow the moisture to get out of the boots. Hence wet cold feet.

Now that Gore is embarking on this campaign to present their product in a different light it makes no difference it will not change the fact that it simply doesn’t work as they still claim. What they are doing with this new advertising campaign is offering to a new generation of people their bogus information, working on the premise that a “sucker is born every day”. They go to manufacturers and tell them about the campaign and say they can be included in the ads probably. These large companies are notorious for taking any advertising they can get. I remember when I was selling fiberfill to skiwear manufacturers they didn’t just want polyester fiberfill in their jackets they wanted either Dacron from DuPont, Kodel from Eastman Chemical or Fortrel from Celanese, why because they received $0.25 per pound or more in advertising allowance. They had to use something in the way of insulation so why not partner with a company that gave them the most money. Today the manufacturers think they must have a waterproof and breathable component in their garments even though they know it doesn’t work so they go with the highest bidder. Maybe the company that markets Event which as far as I am concerned is the same PTFE film laminated to fabric that Gore-Tex is will via for some of the business with an aggressive advertising campaign as well.

When it gets down to it as I have said for years starting in 1977 when I first encountered Bobby Gore at a trade show, and told him then that what he had doesn’t work now and will not work in the future. Those of you who have found out that these so called waterproof breathable materials regardless of brand name do not work should educate your children to these facts so they do not waste their money on bogus products. This will stop the cycle of a “sucker born every minute.”