For those of you that have been following us since we started in April, you’ve probably noticed my name on several of the articles and product reviews. Myself and Erik Meisner, after leaving the Loadout Room, decided to start up The Gear Bunker out of our passion for the outdoor industry, adventure and the gear that goes along with it.
I grew up and currently reside in Northeastern Ohio with my wife and two daughters. I enlisted into the Marine Corps right out of high school in January of 1993 and served active duty for four years, getting out in February of 1997. I spent the majority of my time in the Marine Corps as an Infantry Mortarman with an 81mm mortar platoon. During that time I had the privilege of attending multiple military tactical courses to include the Mountain Warfare Training Center in Bridgeport, CA, Desert Warfare training in 29 Palms, CA, The South Korean Mountain Warfare school, and Jungle Warfare training in Okinawa, Japan.
Between attending all those specialized schools and other training deployments, I had the unique opportunity to use a lot of gear and see how it holds up in multiple environments for extended periods of time. Some of that gear you’ll see here on The Gear Bunker, such as the multi-tool and knives I used and still trust to this day. I’ll also cover other footwear and gear I recommend based on my military service, personal experience and industry knowledge.
Fast forward several years outside of the Marine Corps and I was in a comfortable corporate job that paid well, but it wasn’t something I was necessarily passionate about which eventually led to burnout. During that time my mom had been diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer and eventually passed away because of it. After her passing, I began looking for an outlet to express myself in and honestly, to keep my mind busy. At that time I frequented the Loadout Room website daily, absorbing all the gear reviews and recommendations. On a whim, I decided what the hell, I’ll email them and see if they need any dudes to evaluate products. To my surprise, they responded within a few days and I ended up starting as a pro-bono writer. I quickly went from pro-bono to a paid freelance writer position within the first year.
During that time I had the opportunity to train with Kyle Defoor during one of his two-day pistol courses. During that course he also covered medical, low vis EDC carry and his personal gear recommendations based on his experience as a member of a Naval SEAL Team DEVGRU squadron. No his courses aren’t cheap, but the amount of information you get and the skills you learn make it worth it. Hell, knowing now what I learned from his course, the price of admission would still be worth it even if it was only one day. Because of training opportunities like this, we are able to see the evolution of gear in the industry and gain first-hand knowledge and experience with it.
When asked to fill in for the Loadout Room Editor at the time, I took the opportunity which eventually led to me taking that position full-time. Although the full-time position only lasted two years, it enabled me to leave my corporate job to pursue something I was truly passionate about, a dream job if you want to call it that. Over the course of those four years we attended multiple SHOT Show and Outdoor Retailer conferences allowing us to develop quite an extensive list of partnerships.
Wanting to keep our passion going, Erik and I decided to spin up our own site, The Gear Bunker, and continue working with the partnerships we had developed over the 4 years we spent at the Loadout Room.
While Erik focuses his content on Overlanding and outdoor adventure, you’ll see my content leaning more towards Men’s Lifestyle, EDC and technology. Being in control of our own site allows us to freely publish content in our lanes of expertise and experience.
Stay tuned to The Gear Bunker and be a part of this all veteran-owned website. And be sure to subscribe to our Facebook, Instagram and YouTube channels. Sign up to be notified on YouTube ensuring you’ll know immediately when new content is uploaded.
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