Altrec.com

Full review
BACKGROUND:

I was looking for a good price on North Face, short sleeved, high-tech fabric for travel, golf and general purpose wear.  Typically, I would have to shop at TravelSmith, REI, EMS, Campmor or Columbia Sportswear for these kinds of items.

I read Jetbluefan1's review of this website and was impressed enough to give it a try.  I'm glad I did as I did find several items that I purchased on two different occasions. 

THE SHOPPING EXPERIENCE:

Altrec is a catalog operation for merchandise aimed at ourdoor, travel and casual living activities.  It is a bit like REI, EMS and TravelSmith all rolled into one.  They carry a wide selection of shoes, clothing, camping gear, GPS and compass units, personal multi-tools, lights/lanterns, ect.   None is private branded.

The home web page is laid out well and easy to find the links to the various parts of their web site.  Registering was very straightforward and easy to do.  Once I was in, it was easy to navigate around to the various departments.  A nice touch is the left side margin lists all the various categories so if you want to abandon looking for one item, you can easily and seamlessly go to another category to shop.

While I did not find a good buy for a high-tech shirt, I did find some items that were worthy of buying.  The prices on these items were excellent because they were in the Outlet/Sale section of the site.

Checkout is, again, very easy and fast to use.  It is, of course, a secured site when providing the payment and shipping information required.

I found the whole site easy to use and the depth of inventory and range of items was quite good.  Regular priced merchandise was just OK without a big savings.  But their Sale or Outlet areas had plenty of merchandise to choose from and those prices were outstanding.

I found 3 items I ended up buying - a pair of Keen Sport Sandals, a camp lantern/light and a pocket multi-tool.  Two of the items were on one order and the third on a separate transaction.

Shipping was fast in each case.  The first order of 2 items were shipped complete the next day.  I was sent an e-mail advising me of this action and the message contained a link to them for the purpose of tracking the transit of the package.  The last order for just one item went exactly the same as the first order - smoothly, quickly and easily.

Packaging on both shipments was excellent.

SUMMARY:

This is an excellent shopping site for outdoor, casual and sports clothing and equipment.  If you have a need for such items, I would recommend that you give them a try.

Jim