Courtesy / PacBak Inc.
The product last year won two “bests" for sportfishing coolers. One model was named Outdoor Canada Best Cooler this year.
Updated: October 6, 2023
Maine investor teams with Alaska inventor of ‘best in show’ cooler
Courtesy / PacBak Inc.
Jac Arbour, right, provided Brian McKinnon with angel funding to develop a roto-molded cooler with features like insulated compartments and a battery-operated vacuum sealer.
A Maine investor has partnered with an Alaska inventor to launch a rugged cooler that received two “best” awards while in presales last year, is gaining orders from two or three stores a day, and is now the subject of contract negotiations that could result in distribution to 475 stores.
“I was the first investor in PacBak and financed the angel round,” said Jac Arbour. “Then we raised additional capital from accredited investors.”
PacBak is a rotomolded cooler that comes in different sizes, it has insulated compartments, a removable processing table with foldout legs and a battery-operated vacuum sealer.
Arbour declined to cite his investment to date.
The product is now in sporting goods retailers Bass Pro Shops and Cabela’s stores in Alaska.
Big Rock Sports, one of the largest outdoor sporting goods distributors in North America, has started taking the product. Outdoor goods retailer Public Lands, a subsidiary of Dick's Sporting Goods, has also shown interest.
“Smaller chains, and non-chain stores from Florida to New Jersey, are starting to offer the product,” Arbour said.
Arbour, a certified financial planner, founded private wealth management firm J.M. Arbour, with offices in Maine and Arizona, in 2007. Its headquarters recently relocated from Hallowell to a larger location in Gardiner to accommodate the company’s growth.
As an entrepreneur, he serves as a consultant to startups and as an executive to PacBak Inc. As a consultant and investor, his area of focus is with companies in the fintech and outdoor equipment industries.
He co-founded PacBak with Brian McKinnon of Wasilla, Alaska.
How it started
Arbour met McKinnon through a friend who recommended that Arbour check out the cooler that McKinnon was getting ready to launch.
Arbour was impressed and became a partner in the startup, providing resources to build out the product and the company, with production and warehousing facilities initially in Alaska and Colorado.
McKinnon is an inveterate builder, according to the startup’s website.
He and a friend were working on PacBak together when in October 2017 they traveled to Las Vegas for a country music festival. There a gunman opened fire, killing 58 people and wounding more than 400. His friend was killed, and McKinnon had to fight through tremendous grief to move forward.
Courtesy / Jillian Blum, PacBak Inc.
The PacBak is seen here in use in Alaska.
After the festival, McKinnon worked his way back from nothing, progressing through various jobs until he had enough money to fund the development and patents for a battery-powered vacuum sealer that became one of the features of the cooler.
PacBak is marketed as an innovative solution that allows fishermen to clean, cut and seal fish immediately after catching them, rather than tossing them into a conventional cooler for processing at home. In addition, PacBak has become popular in the overlanding, tailgating, meat smoking, hunting and various other outdoor lifestyle communities, said Arbour.
A better cooler
Coolers have come a long way from their Igloo and Coleman ancestors. Yeti Holdings (NYSE: YETI), which was founded in 2006, has changed the cooler market and shown that consumers are willing to pay premium prices for coolers that can keep food and beverages cold for days rather than hours at a time. Today, Yeti has a market capitalization of $3.4 billion.
In this case, PacBak's rotomolded cooler has two separate insulated compartments that isolate wet from dry or cold from hot, a removable processing table with foldout legs, and a fitted compartment for the sealer. The cooler lid doubles as work surface and large cutting board and the sealer compartment’s lid doubles as slide-out cutting board.
There’s a top-mounted additional work surface with fold-down legs that can be attached to either side of cooler for extended workspace, serving area or cutting surface. There’s also a rechargeable vacuum sealer with replaceable heat strips.
The rotomolded build passed “a 24-hour real-life test against a 1,250-pound Alaskan Kodiak Brown Bear,” according to the website.
Last year, the product won “best in category” for soft and hard coolers and “best in show” overall at the American Sportfishing Association’s International Convention of Allied Sportfishing Trades.
The product competed for “best in show” with big hitters in the sportfishing industry such as Raymarine and Garmin, said Arbour.
This year, one of the models was named Outdoor Canada Best Cooler.
Parts production and assembly currently take place in China. Arbour said PacBak is working with companies in the U.S. and Mexico to bring assembly to North America.
Courtesy / PacBak Inc.
McKinnon is on a year-long nationwide marketing tour.
Current monthly production is in the thousands with multiple sizes and eight colors.
The PacBak team numbers 11. The product began presales in 2022 and began shipping this year.
The marketing strategy includes McKinnon traveling the East Coast in a new pickup truck, towing a trailer, that sports a full branding wrap. The trip began mid-July and has been generating orders at a rate of two to three stores per day, Arbour said.
From the East Coast, the plan is to drive to the West Coast, then to southern California this winter, followed by a trip back east with the goal of picking up orders in Texas and elsewhere through the South.
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