Ever stopped through a small town on a road trip and noticed the people to be over-the-top friendly? When you go to pay for your gas, and you feel like you’ve made a best friend at the pump? Or when your waitress at the diner is so personable, you feel like you’ve known her your whole life? Well, that’s what it’s like talking to everyone in Corpus Christi, Texas. All 305,000 of ‘em.
This past weekend, AfterShokz headed into the recently flooded city for their 41st annual (and our 2nd annual) Beach to Bay marathon - a six-leg relay made up of 2,000 teams. Beach to Bay was the first running event we’d attended as a brand, and the response from runners on AfterShokz headphones was overwhelmingly positive, so signing up for a second year in a row was a no-brainer. Just 3 days before getting there, cars were halfway underwater, so imagining runners relaying along the beach didn’t seem possible, BUT Mother Nature was on Beach to Bay’s side and she cleared out the water just in time!
AfterShokz has marketed our headphones to just about every demographic, but when we started narrowing in on smaller audiences, the business started to boom. We’d go to running events, and runners would mention their criteria for running with headphones:
- They need to run with one earbud out so they can be aware of surroundings. Duh.
- They need to be wireless. Bouncing around with wires in the way is a big NOPE.
- They need to be sweat proof. They’re runners, they get sweaty, and they get caught in the rain.
- Speaking of sweaty, they can’t slip out of their ears on the run when they get sweaty.
Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that AfterShokz headphones are a perfect fit for runners.
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They don’t go in your ears, so you don’t have to run with one earbud out - you can run with them both out! You can hear everything when your ears are open - traffic, bears chasing you, and your running buddy cheering you on.
- Wires shmires! We cut the cords on Trekz Titanium so you never get tangled again.
- Trekz Titanium are IP55 rated. Google defines that as “protected from low pressure water jets from any direction”. We get that Texas gets LOTS of rain, but no amount of rain can be considered a low pressure water jet from the sky. These headphones’ll survive any amount of sweat or rain.
- Since AfterShokz headphones don’t go in your ears, they also won’t slip out! Win-win.
The kind people of Corpus Christi flooded around our table (no pun intended!) wanting to try out the AfterShokz experience at the Beach to Bay expo, and get their hands on some Trekz Titanium for themselves and their relay team members for the marathon the next day.
It feels good to wrap up a long work day knowing you’ve just brightened someone’s day with some bomb headphones that’ll stay comfortable, sound great and keep them safe on a long run! For those on-the-fence about buying, we loaned out a pair for race day and used the good ‘ol honesty policy hoping they’d return them after the relay. Most did, and ended up buying a brand new pair!
We loved all the exciting feedback from expo-buyers who sought us out after the relay to say how much they loved their new favorite running buddy.
“I hope AfterShokz continues to amaze people as they have amazed me.” - Joshua, Corpus Christi
“They work beautifully. I hope you sold a lot of them as they are awesome.” Ed, Corpus Christi
We did get rained out by the end of the day, but our Trekz Titanium powered through, and so did our AfterShokz ponchos. Already looking forward to our next visit to the extra-friendly city of Corpus Christi :)
