George Gaines

George Gaines was a three- or four-times-a-year skier when he decided to rethink the whole recipe of ski design.  A lot of sawdust, a Kickstarter campaign and awards from the University of Montana’s Blackstone LaunchPad program later, his Chilton Bitterroot Buttersticks now await their first winter of heavy use. Gaines’ interest in wood has spread in numerous directions. … But that inspired an interest in forestry, which brought him to UM’s Franke School of Forestry and Conservation. Then he started turning out custom-made skateboard decks. That led to ski construction.  “What I saw was the vast majority of skis available were cranked out by robots in factories overseas,” Gaines said. “I felt strongly I wanted to build my own skis. But I found it was a more costly engineering challenge than skateboards were.”