Team Spotlight: Ben

Who are you? Give us some outdoor highlights from your past

Hello! My name is Ben.

I’m originally from Seattle, and I moved to Portland about eight months ago for an internship with Minimal Gear. After I finished my internship, I was fortunate enough to stay on with the company full-time.

I grew up car camping with my family. We never did anything too crazy. Lots of casual, type-1 fun. Some time in high school I watched a few of the Reel Rock climbing films, which sparked my curiosity for more outlandish ways to have fun outside. This led to a job at a climbing gym in college, and that opened my appetite for type-2 fun. Lots of climbing, backpacking, scrambling, biking, bikepacking, bike crashing, and bike fixing followed.

Tell us about a very memorable trip outdoors from the last few years

About five years ago, I was camping at Cape Disappointment. After a long day of road tripping I crashed out in my sleeping bag and fell asleep early in the evening. I blissfully enjoyed my slumber, until I felt a rustle and a tussle near my feet…

Lo and behold, I woke up to a raccoon inside my tent, stealing trail mix out of the bag.

This is a cautionary tale, folks. Keep your doors zipped. Food away from the tent. The masked bandits are coming for you.

What do you do at Minimal Gear?

My official title is Marketing Specialist, which means I play a hand in a little bit of everything around the Marketing Department. I create email campaigns, film and edit video content, work with your favorite influencers to promote our gear, staff our booth at events, update social media, etc.

What is a running project you are working on at the moment that no one knows about yet?

I’m currently editing a backlog of videos for a new brand that we’re launching! We haven’t publicly announced the brand at the time of writing this, but you’ll know all about it in a few weeks from now.

What is your favorite piece of gear that we make?

Probably the 4L VectoPlus. I appreciate the functionality of the handstrap, and I think it’s our coolest looking piece of gear. The corner tassels make it easy to mount on a bike for longer water carries, and the size makes filtering convenient on group trips.

I also like the Cowboy Camping Saddle Bag for keeping climbing stuff separated in my pack. It’s been a great addition for isolating clothing from smelly shoes and chalk.

What’s an interesting (or not-so-interesting) non-Minimal Gear factoid about yourself that is important to who you are as a person?

Perhaps my least-interesting interest is learning about corporate food history. Sometimes I listen to podcasts on the topic.

Did you know Chuck E. Cheese is a by-product of Silicon Valley? And the mascot was originally named Rick Rat? They almost named the first location “Rick Rat’s Pizza”. Who names a restaurant after a rat? And don’t even get me started on the “Lady Doritos” marketing campaign.

I find it comically interesting. We live in a crazy world.