Gear pooling for gear addicts

I think that it could work. Backpackers in general seem to be very honest, considerate people, so I wouldn'tworry too much about getting ripped off. But there would have to be some rules or basic understandings. What would happen if nobody wanted the gear? Just sell it off on the forums and split the recovered cost? If someone did want to buy it, would there be a discount, since the gear is used at that point?

All-in-all, it seems like a good idea. Of course, in some ways we do the same thing already when we pass things around the Gear Swap…!

This idea is better for a group of people in the same area, otherwise shipping kind of kills it: it’s like selling on Gear Swamp

I try to do it with people I know, or even keep it in the car for trailhead discussions.

Hey if you don’t have one yet, check out the Tool Lending Library in Berkeley. This is a fantastic program and a model for community sharing…
LINK

I agree with Paul. This can work for a group of hikers living in the same general area.

But the rest of us can still play with gear. We buy what we like, use it carefully and resist the urge to snip off labels, etc. — and when we are done testing, we either keep the stuff — or put them up for sale on "Gear Swap" or Ebay.

I keep track of everything that I buy, keep, versus resell. Over the last four years, I spent $2,729 on stuff that I decided against keeping — and sold them for $2,911 — making a small "profit" of $182.

I was wondering how many hands your gear actually passes through. The gear swap isn't really good for getting your hands on cutting edge, often expensive, and potentiall fragile gear. My idea was more of a BPL sanctioned gear subscription (or something like that) where we would all be required to submit a report (Backpackergeartest style), but lots of different folks from different strokes could not only try it for a short while, but also keep track of thinks like robustness, longevity, versatility, etc…

As an example, "the ONE" tent has raised a lot of interest, including me. However I don't really need or want a single tent, but I'm CURIOUS like most of us here. If ten of us were interested, and let's say, hypotehtically, the tent retails for $300, then we could all put in $30, plus postage to WHEREVER. Let's say postage is $10 on average, so that's $40 to get to play with new gear without having to 'own' it and try to hawk it off on eBay or BPL or whatever (which also involves postage).

It's kind of a global leap of faith, but to be able to play, test, assess durability over many users in many different environments, etc, seems to me a good and workable idea. Of course, a lot of the manufacturers may not like the idea as almost certainly they would sell less gear overall….At leat 2/3 of the gear I've bought is just plain not suitable, or superceded by newer technology.