Alameda Runners – Get After It!

FINIS is a company well known to swimmers and triathletes, as a company that specializes in performance clothing, equipment and gadgets aimed at people who play in the water.  Alameda Runners recently contacted the company to learn more about the company’s products, outlook, and future in the swimming market.

I previously reviewed the FINIS SwiMP3v2 MP3 player for MyCE — a tech site I write for — last year, and am currently working on a review of the FINIS XtreaMP3.1G MP3 player for Alameda Runners.

“With today’s technologies creating an MP3 player is easy, but waterproofing that player and also integrating new sound technologies such as ‘Bone Conduction’ is another story,” Finis recently told us during an interview.  “Our engineers have worked hard to develop our current players, make them extremely durable, and have them be completely waterproof. Their successes only give us more confidence to dive into future electronic devices for swimming. In the end, waterproofing electronics is certainly not easy. ”

Many triathletes who participate in open water swims use wetsuits to help stay warm and increase swim performance.  Some have questioned why FINIS hasn’t branched out to offer wetsuits.

“There are very good technical wetsuit suppliers who focus specifically on their market, and we have close alliances with several of them. However, we have made a conscious decision to focus on our product development strengths in the competitive swimming arena. Ultimately we will look to bring our businesses closer together with other wetsuit suppliers, so that FINIS does not get directly involved with wetsuit production.”

FINIS also outlined its goal in the swim market which, not surprisingly, focuses on creating the newer generation of products designed to increase comfort and performance.

“Our goal is to be on the leading edge of swimming development, and our focus has always been to create products that help people swim better. Swimsuits and goggles are the most common products swimmers purchase, but when they want to improve their technique, they look to FINIS.”

You can read the rest of the interview after the jump.

FINIS wants to offer swimmers the best chance to test FINIS products compared to other products before making a final decision.

“Unlike the other suit and goggle suppliers, we are also the only supplier who offers a 90-day guarantee on our AquaTuff swimsuits. Once a swimmer tries our suits, we tend to keep those converted athletes. With respect to goggles, we first chose to concentrate where the market was not: kids goggles.  In 1999 we started supplying goggles to Swim America Swim Schools and The United States Swim School Association. Today we outfit over 600 swim schools in the USA with swim goggles and believe as the children grow, they and their families will trust the FINIS brand.”

To wrap up the interview, Finis discussed the broad appeal of swimming.

“Swimming reaches a very broad cross section of athletes. Our desire is to share our experiences we gain from speaking with coaches and athletes at every level of swimming. FINIS has distribution in 60 countries around the world, and in effort to reach all of these swimmers, our new Blog is able to be translated into 40 different languages. We hope our Blog and our products will continue to add quality and value to for those who enjoy swimming. Keep an eye on us for the Fall as we intend to introduce a few new revolutionary products for everyone to use.”

Mike’s Note:  Feel free to visit the Finis blog by clicking here.