An updated version of the iconic Bunny Boot is about to hit the market. An Alaska-based company is bringing back the white vapor barrier boots long relied on to keep feet warm in extreme cold.
Sean McLaughlin, CEO of the Alaska Gear Company, said his firm has spent the last three years developing the updated boot.
“It seemed strange to us that there was a need and a demand for a product that was out of production 30 years ago,” McLaughlin said.
According to McLaughlin, the project fits the company’s existing business.
“Everybody who uses our sleds, uses our Arctic Oven tents, flies our plane parts all around with Super Cubs and so on, a lot of them own a pair of Bunny Boots,” he said.
McLaughlin said there are no legal barriers to copying the Extreme Cold Vapor Barrier Boots, originally created for U.S. troops during the Korean War.
“When the U.S. Army designs something they have to publish the specs of it for bidding, so all the specs for the Bunny Boot are public domain,” he said.
The basic design of the new boot mirrors the original: inner and outer layers of rubber, sandwiching wool felt insulation. But McLaughlin said the design is difficult to manufacture, and no factories in the U.S. can do the job.
“There’s literally two factories in the world that looked like they could make this boot and one of them is in China,” he said. “So we went and flew out and met the people that ran that factory, and they became part of de-facto kind of part of our R&D team for how to actually build it.”
The company made a run of prototype boots, which were field tested by 30 people last winter.
“We put out a note saying we’re building a new Bunny Boot, we need testers and we had over 10,000 people put in requests to be a tester,” McLaughlin said. “We sorted through that. We tried to pick male, female all around the country doing different types of cold-weather activity. Everything from linemen, Iditarod people, Iron Dog people…we even had a goat herder from Norway.”
The new boot is less clunky than the original, but McLaughlin said the biggest feedback received was that it still didn’t hike well.
So they did another redesign.
“We redesigned the way the materials, and the way the boot can be laced up your calf to basically tighten it in so there’s no heel slip,” he said. “And this new boot, it hikes orders of magnitude better than the original Bunny Boot.”
According to the company’s website, the design omits an air valve in the original military boots, intended to be opened during air travel to keep them from rupturing due to pressure differences. The new boots are still safe for commercial air travel.
McLaughlin said the new Bunny Boot also has a more aggressive sole and is a little taller than the original. There are also special insoles to improve air circulation, and accessories including gaiters, ice cleats and multi-color laces. The new Bunny Boot became available for pre-order at Alaska Gear Company stores and on its website on Tuesday.
“The cost for pre-orders will be $360 for a set, and then after the pre-orders are over the cost is $390,” McLaughlin said.
The company’s first run of 10,000 pairs is scheduled to begin showing up in Alaska in late October.
McLaughlin said the military is interested in the new boot. If there’s large-scale demand, the company will look into building a factory to manufacture Bunny Boots in the U.S., ideally in Alaska.
Dan Bross is a reporter at KUAC in Fairbanks.
