Mountain Laurel Design gear smell like cigarettes?

First I've heard of that.

Maybe they've been outsourcing work to smokers. I always associate UL gear with the more fit and healthy backpackers out there but I suppose smokers would benefit quite a bit from lighter gear as well.

Weird, this has never been the case with the orders I've placed with MLD.

Maybe your USPS carrier is a chain smoker and lights up on the job.

"Maybe they've been outsourcing work to smokers"

Nope.

Ron has a skilled staff in Roanoke, VA making custom orders as they come in.

It says it on the Homepage:

"Thanks for your patience while WE build your Super Awesome UL Gear."

My MLD gear smells like roses. I'm going to second the USPS comment.

+1 on the USPS carrier. Until a few years ago I had the same UPS driver deliver to me for a long time. He literally chain smoked, and every thing I got delivered from UPS smelt like smoke. It was mainly just the packaging though, and after I got my product away from the original packaging for a few days, the smell would slowly dissapear.

Maybe the material was made in a cuben cigar factory.

Negatory on the smoke smell. I just got a pair of MLD rain mitts about a week ago and I am super-sensitive to cigarette smoke. They were fine and had no smoke smell at all (and worked like a charm in the rain.)

"Maybe the material was made in a cuben cigar factory."

Ding ding ding. That's gotta be the answer!! :)

It's a mystery to us here too. None of us at MLD smoke and I too am very sensitive. Samuel emailed us overnight and we replied we would get him all fixed with a new bivy asap no problem.

Ron is a good guy when he is willing to exchange a problem item that MLD is likely not responsible for.

That would be SERVICE in the highest order!

I used to work with a guy who was a heavy smoker. We noticed that everything he touched smelled like smoke, even if it wasn't actually exposed to smoke. If we handed him a memo and he handed it back to us, for example, it would smell like smoke.

I recently got a multi-item MLD order. Absolutely no trace of smoke odor. BTW order was delivered sooner than promised and is of excellent quality.

Gary

Now if it only was doused in bourbon, cheap perfume and smeared with gaudy lipstick!

Alas, Ron runs a tighter ship than that.

"Now if it only was doused in bourbon, cheap perfume and smeared with gaudy lipstick! "

Nah, that would be me after a week on the trail……

Doug may man, I want to go hiking with you. But you have to promise to lay off the lipstick.

Yes, I just got Ron's email saying he shipped a new bivy for me to change out. Thanks for the great service Ron. I guess this was just an anomalous event and not indicative of MLD. Thank you all for the quick replies. Great forum you have here.

I have been airing out the bivy in the yard all day and the smell is quickly going away, which is surprising to me as it was so powerful when I first opened it. Smelled like it had spent the last year in a Chinese track betting bar.

Can't wait to use the bivy it's just what I'm looking for! Needed something to keep moisture off my down and protect me from mosquitoes and ticks while I'm sleeping under my tarp. And it's big enough to fit my Exped Downmat 7 deluxe , yet light enough to have virtually no effect on my pack weight.

But what if the new one shows up the same because of a 'stinky' postal delivery person?

Just to add to the positive MLD comment chain – I've got my third shipment an MLD item (superlight bivy) on the way right now — all his prior deliveries where fine – no smell at all. BUT – 2 years ago our local UPS guy changed routes — and we all noticed that suddenly every package we got stopped smelling of cheap cigarettes…I bet that is the problem ! +1 on the rain mitts – used them on a 27.5 mile section of the Connecticut A.T this past weekend and they performed wonderfully — can't wait for my bivy to show up now :-)

Well it's not something that's been a problem in the past. I've never received smoky packages here before, although I don't order things from Virgina often. And if no one else is having this problem it's not the carriers closer to Roanoke. Maybe it's happening somewhere in the middle.

Same here, none of my gear from MLD arrived smelling of cigarettes.

I've also noticed that most people who smoke smell like cigarette smoke, and that smell sticks to just about everything. People who smoke heavily make everything around them smell like smoke eventually.

It isn't a big deal.
Hang it outside to air out. The smell will be gone in no time.

Be glad you weren't around in the days when you couldn't escape from cigarette smoke.
Everything smelled like cigarette smoke back then and people seemed to adjust to it.
If you went to the supermarket, went to see a movie, went to the gym, … your clothes would smell of cigarette smoke when you got home.

My guess is the post office (or whatever delivery service brought it to your door). I've had drivers smoke and stink up certain deliveries too despite it being a no-no. Ron takes a lot of pride in what he does and I highly doubt he'd let anything like that happen intentionally.