San Carlos-based Industrial Designer Matt Bettman shares the backstory how he created the All Good Equipment Teardrop Trailer.
Two years ago, I founded the All Good Equipment Company. A lifetime of fascination for small efficient spaces, and nearly a decade of owning and living on various boats, gave me an itch that I couldn’t scratch while working my day job as an SF-based industrial designer. This teardrop trailer started as a passion project that occupied many of my evenings and weekends for 4 years before All Good Equipment was officially formed and I left my studio job, taking the leap from steady employment into entrepreneurship.
“In this day and age of relentless innovation and planned obsolescence, this product is radically practical.”
When setting out to design the first All Good Equipment Teardrop Trailer, I had the luxury of doing it for myself and my family without any obligation to a boss, a client, or a group of shareholders. I didn’t have to show deference to trends, or the latest new features, or odd profiles, distorted for manufacturing expedience. My trailer could be shaped by its intended purpose, and sketching it out with this in mind, I could give its curves a little more grace, its materials and finish a bit more consideration, and its build a longer service life.
Rather than working towards superlatives, I sought an elegant balance between competing constraints: low weight but without the quality problems that beset many trailers with light construction. Comforts, even luxuries, but not at the expense of my time or enjoyment of the outdoors and my overall experience of owning (and maintaining) a camper. In this day and age of relentless innovation and planned obsolescence, this product is radically practical.
I believe “All Good things” must come to an end. With due consideration to our habitat, I sought to minimize our use of plastics, eliminating them wherever practical. Instead, I’ve opted for renewable and biodegradable materials that will perform as well or better than plastic and feel good, look good, and wear beautifully.
My goal with the All Good Equipment teardrop trailer is to provide the busy weekender and the seasoned road-tripper with an exceptionally high quality, radically practical shelter which will travel light and easy between camps, and which will remind us that while the camper itself should be one of the pleasures of the trip, a good time in the great outdoors is the real reward.
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