1979 - GORE-TEX® - A REVOLUTION WITH DIFFICULT BEGINNINGS

In the 1970s the new age of technical clothing got off to a gradual start. New materials, new coating procedures, and new trends characterised the late 1970s. And Hubert Schöffel, too, was looking for alternatives.

The impact was huge in Autumn 1979. A large advert announced "GORE-TEX® - revolutionising the anorak". Hubert Schöffel described this experience several years later as "A thunderbolt which hit us head on". Welded seams instead of sewn ones were suddenly the thing. And Schöffel took it all to heart.

But the revolution almost consumed its children. Technical defects caused complaints to pour into GORE-TEX® and by 1981 this chapter appeared to be closed. The teething troubles for the product may have been overcome, but the market refused to believe in a new start, and GORE-TEX® once again disappeared from the collections.

Only two men continued to believe success was possible: Thorger Hübner, development manager of Gore, and Hubert Schöffel. And so in 1983, Schöffel was almost the only one who continued to have anything to do with the product.
Going it alone like this was seen as a great opportunity, but also posed a huge risk. However Schöffel and Gore put their all into it, with a desire to work together to make a real vision come true. In order to make enough garments available for a forthcoming publicity campaign by Gore, Schöffel ordered welding capacity for 24,000 jackets - without having a single item in the order books!

The start was two-track: a trial series of the mountain anorak "Tibet" was produced, Sport Schuster in Munich ordered 70 anoraks, and Gore took out a full-page advert in a daily paper. And by mid-day of the day it appeared, all the anoraks were sold, with thousands of this style to follow in the coming months. The triumphal advance of GORE-TEX® and Schöffel had begun. The successful introduction in 1983 was followed by the boom years.