UKC

For cold days of hillwalking, winter climbing or skiing, their combination of warmth, weather-resistance and breathability makes these softshell trousers close to perfect, says Toby Archer. 

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One hundred and sixty five pounds for some trousers to go walking in?

Good god.

Hiya Simes - good to see you back keeping it real on price! 😀 

They are pretty pricey, but short of some similar Decathlon mega market size product, I don't think you'll find similar products for much less. Buffalo Teclite trousers are about 30 quid less, but I'd pay the extra for the much more normal aesthetics of the Rab ones I think. 

And I wouldn't buy them just for walking in unless you live in a much colder place than the UK. For here they are really winter specific trousers, best suited for winter climbing/mountaineering I reckon, as you can see in some of the pictures. 

I'm sorry, I tried to resist saying anything but that one is just ridiculous.

I'll try harder to not comment on bonkers prices.

"Keeping it real"? Thank you.

Si.

Great review, I'll be lurking around the Alfreton factory shop to see if a bright orange pair show up in the bargin bin.

Are you thinking of doing any vid reviews? I'm seeing your next kit test on film up in somewhere like the Cuillin?

They were £150 ten years ago!! 

I don't object to comments on price - it's a fair point. Whilst of course Rab, like any other company, has to make a profit on these trousers, I suspect they aren't making ridiculous profits as they are just one step in the chain.

I was thinking about this the other day, I bought a new pair of climbing shoes recently, the shoes were on a good discount - 85 instead of the RRP of 140 and I've used the model before, liked them and know what size would be a good fit. When I got them, a not super important pull on tab immediately came away in my hand. I hadn't been sewn properly on - I suspect that one spool of thread on the sewing machine had just run out, so there was only the top half of the sewing done. I emailed the shop saying it wasn't a big thing but this had happened and they might want to check the batch to see if it was a thing across more of the shoes or just mine. I didn't say I wanted replacements or send them back though as it seemed a waste the money on posting them back but even more so, it just felt like some delivery truck burning more petrol, when I could re sew the tab on by hand in 10 minutes.  I got a great email back the next day from the shop (kudos Joe Brown/Climber's Shop) saying they were really sorry, had checked others but hadn't found the same problem and they'd pay for me to ship them back and they'd replace them with a new pair, or I could keep them and they'd sell them to me for cost price. The latter option was perfect, I got them 33 quid back and I sewed the tab on in about 10 minutes by hand. So the cost price for a pair of rock shoes, seems to still be about the same proportion of the full price as it was when I worked in outdoor shops in the 90s. Outdoor equipment has never seemed to have been a big profit industry. So a shop selling these trouser will buying them in at around half of what the RRP, and will pay VAT and other fixed costs out of their half of the RRP. Rab with their half of the RRP has to pay all their fixed costs, manufacturers, employees etc. so take some profit out of that. Their manufacturing partner in China (IIRC) needs to make some profit whilst paying their employees and fixed costs and for the materials used. The nylon and fleece mills, the same - and on it goes back to the oil company bringing the crude out of the ground. 

They are really nice trousers for their intended purpose but having said that, if you can't afford them I reckon you'd do pretty well with some Decathlon more basic soft shells and some Decathlon (or Aldi or Lidl) wool long johns underneath at maybe a third of the price. Many ways to skin a cat and all that (NB. no cats were skinned in the making of this analogy or these trousers).

The prices on UKC articles are the RRP, pretty much every item reviewed you can normally get at least 10 and often 20% cheaper at many retailers. The price of everything has gone up in recent years so outdoor kit is not going to be anywhere different. 

I've got a Rab vapour rise top from 2017 still in perfectly useable condition (only real signs of wear are a bit of hobbling), I've used it hundreds and hundreds of times for hillwalking, mountaineering, biking, winter running, dog walking ; expensive yes, very good value also yes. 

Good to hear. I did get a message from Luca Celano, a WMCI, who reckons he has done over 500 days in different iterations of these trousers. He loves them for Scottish winter but did note that you can sometimes wear out the fleece lining in the crotch area somewhat after he thinks 40-50 days of use. No problem with mine so far but, having a boring job through the week, I haven't had chance to use them that much yet! I can imagine little difference in fit could cause or avoid wear issues for different folk though.

So, a less tech/detailed version of the legendary Patagonia Mixmaster?

Neither in the the review nor on Rab's own site are there photos of the lining.

You used to be a proper country.

Yeah I think cost per use should be considered and also things like safety kit (I'd include spare clothing in that) can literally be priceless if you're heading into unforgiving environments. I'm definitely not a kit snob though and absolutely have kit from Lidl and budget sportswear companies but in my experience the customer service with regards to replacements, repairs, refunds, kit advice (not to mention the general longevity of products given tough use) etc from the established 'mountain specific' brands often makes the cost more bearable/justifiable.