Ep. 134: Initial Ascent with Joe Elliston and Dennis Stokes

Cutting The Distance

MeatEater

Wilderness, Sports

4.9 • 6.8K Ratings

🗓️ 24 April 2025

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Jason sits down with Joe Elliston and Dennis Stokes of Initial Ascent to dive into the story behind their hunting pack company. They talk about what inspired them to start the brand, the hands-on prototyping process, and the rigorous testing their packs endured before ever hitting the market. The conversation highlights the innovation that sets their pack system apart, as well as where they're headed next in the world of high-performance backcountry gear.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to another episode of cutting the distance.
0:13.8	Today I'm joined by my buddies Joe Elliston and Dennis Stokes of initial
0:17.8	ascent packs.
0:18.6	They're out of Caldwell, Idaho.
0:20.6	Just got some time with these guys.
0:23.0	We were all at the Mile High show there in Denver.
0:26.1	Got to talk to these guys and glad to have them on the podcast.
0:30.2	Welcome to the show, guys.
0:32.0	I'd be here, man.
0:33.4	Yeah, thanks Jason for having us on.
0:35.3	Yeah, yeah.
0:35.9	Safe travels back home.
0:37.1	Everything went well. I know you guys were travels back home. Everything's went well.
0:38.2	I know you guys were a little nervous that, you know, some of the employees were at the show
0:42.4	and you guys were going to have to go back and try to figure out how to take orders, build the packs.
0:46.5	No, no, all joking aside, how did you guys manage without the crew?
0:52.3	You know what?
0:53.0	The old timers figured a few things out.
0:55.5	We did.
0:56.3	We did.
0:57.7	Yeah, it was, uh, it, you know, we had to dust off our hats a little bit, our, our fulfillment
1:04.2	hats.
	...

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