As every small business, ATD Supply is influenced by personal life and this last year was heavy and life changing for many people around the world. Lots of new challenges, lots of changes, lots of new things to learn and, during the lockdown, lots of time to design new gear and some time to travel and test it. We’ve been asked to develop an ecosystem around the ATD1 since its launch. We know we are slow at dropping new products, and this launch wasn’t different: we wanted to take our time, aiming to create something simple, not overcomplicated, but well thought and with the same “fresh” approach. Afterall, ATD1 has often been referred to as a “league of its...
Here you can read an interesting interview with Jon Custis at Carryology.com. Enjoy the pleasant chat about running a small independent brand, product development, crowdfunding and future drops!
I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of making a backpack for kids. Not just a scaled down version of a full sized pack, but a product that is intended for the actual users. Like adults, kids need abrasion resistance, easy access, comfortable suspension and well thought organization but, compared to adults, they don’t have the time to get used to exotic design choices. Kids have way more important things to do than handling roll tops, compression straps, double compartments, etc, and the benefits of these solutions are not something they can easily get in everyday use. In other words, it had to be “Simple”. As many other ideas, this just remained at that stage until Peter and Nana from Copenhagen...
Our bags, including ATD1 Backpack, are made in an advanced workshop set in a secluded countryside area in Central Italy, just between the beaches of the Adriatic sea and the Apennines mountains. The setting is inspiring, surrounded by green, rounded hills and medieval towns. I like to call our production process "industrialized craftmanship". "Craftmanship" because all of them are entirely built from scratch by a single artisan and his intern, and every step is made in-house. "Industrialized" because all the bags are made one step at a time: all the cutting, all the straps, all the bottoms, and so on. It usually takes 7 to 9 weeks to fully produce a 100-pieces ATD1 backpack run from the moment we receive all the raw materials. We start...
*** NOTE: 21 Dec 2020 - Run 4 will be using X21 instead of VX21. The X-pac® fabric is exactly the same but it has a thicker film (0.5mm instead of 0.25mm) and lacks the taffeta backing. We opted for this solution since the pack is fully lined and the backing was really unnecessary, while a thicker film improves structure and water resistance. ATD1 Backpack now comes in two fabric options: for our 3rd production run we decided to play around and experiment using X-Pac® VX21 for a limited amount of packs. X-Pac® fabrics are laminated products originally developed by Dimension Polyant for sail makers and they became increasingly used in the softgoods industry. VX21 is a solid balance of...
