GOBLES, MI – You can leave the gloves and long underwear tucked away, but it's time to break out the skis. Two West Michigan men, Luke and Adam Schrab, have created a way to hit the slopes in July.
The 33-year-old twins, who are former professional skiers, say you don't need frozen temperatures to continue freestyle skiing year-round.Their snow doesn't fall from the sky -- and it isn't white. Three years ago, the Schrabs designed mSnow, which they manufacture from recycled construction barrels. The synthetic snow comes in tiles of circular patterns of protruding pegs.
Southwest Michigan skiers can get their first look at mSnow this Saturday. The Rail Jam takes place on July 13 at Timber Ridge, where the company is setting up a synthetic snow surface jump for freestyle skiers. “Inspired Sound Sessions” will feature world champion freeskier Tanner Hall and Zion Lion reggae band and Kevin Perron will perform from 3 to 11 p.m. Tickets are $10 online and $15 at the door for admission. Those who would like to strap on skis and try out the surface for themselves will need to pay an additional $15.
“Our goal is to become the best maker of summer ski surfacing,” said Luke Schrab, who lives in Plainwell. “The only other stuff in the world is very expensive and made in Italy, New Zealand and a few other places.”
They haven't quit their day jobs yet, but they say sales are growing about 25 percent annually. Since 2010, the Schrabs estimate they've sold about 30,000 square feet of mSnow. They offer cheaper mSnow for kids building backyard jumps, which costs about $2.49 per tile, as well as commercial snow for businesses.
Luke Schrab, a mechanical engineer who works as a part-time terrain manager at Timber Ridge in Gobles and his brother Adam Schrab, a civil engineer who once competitively skied in the X Games, know a thing or two about the ski industry.
The twins grew up building jumps in their Wisconsin backyard and eventually followed their passion to Utah to ski competitively. While attending college, the twins traveled the country, competing in regional freestyle events and eventually launched a trick show called Absolute Zero Air, performed at various ski resorts. For eight years, they also hosted a ski event called “Hootenanny” at Boyne Mountain.
Over the years, they became familiar with synthetic snow, a plastic material skiers attach to plywood to create jumps.
The Schrabs' mSnow is created with a trade secret mixture, which Luke Schrab said enhances speed, withstands UV rays and is durable.
“My brother and I always had the entrepreneurial spirit and we were looking for the next thing after we got to know the industry so well, ” Schrab said. “We could do the shows in the summer but we couldn't do them well. We became friends with a guy who has an ejection mold company. I designed the product and we built a prototype.”
Most synthetic snow is made from recycled plastic, which can be expensive, Schrab said. So, the brothers decided to take recycling into their own hands, collecting spent roadside construction barrels that would otherwise end up in a landfill from Give 'Em A Brake Safety, a roadside safety equipment rental company in Grandville.
“We haul the barrels, chop them and wash them. We’ve taken a lot of steps out of the recycling program by doing it ourselves,” Schrab said. “Every barrel bears about 12 square feet of mSnow and when we're working hard – and it's hard work to wash and chop – we can process 500 barrels.
“For us it's totally worth it. Most people don’t want to recycle them because they are dirty, they can have lights and concrete is splashed on them and those stickers are hard to get off,” he said. “They are not easy to process. The U.S. goes through 1 million barrels per year that end up in a landfill.”
With the growing prominence of freestyle skiing, especially with the ski halfpipe added to the 2014 Olympics, the backyard mSnow product seems to be gaining traction, he said.
Schrab said mSnow will continue to focus on younger customers, who are building backyard jumps. The brothers
For more information about mSnow, visit msnow.com.
Contact Ursula Zerilli at uzerilli@mlive.com. Follow her on twitter.