What to wear

In about a month, everyone with a skater or potential skater is going to be hitting the stores, looking for holiday gifts. And one of the main things they'll be getting is clothes, because man do they have cute stuff for skaters these days. Here's a guide on what you should be wearing, whether gift-giving, or just to know.

Tots
The biggest thing that tots need is comfort. It's cold, slippery, and mom is inaccessible. They don't need need pads or elbow pads or giant mittens. The little stretchy mittens, a long sleeve shirt and a light sweater, plus jeans or sweats and snowpants, is a good outfit for a beginner in the 3 to 5 year old range. Don't put them in big bulky jackets as it's too hard to move. Don't tell them they are cold, or that they are going to be cold. It's not that cold in an ice rink if you're properly dressed.

Yes, I like to see tots in well-fitting, flat-back helmets (skateboarding helmets are the best).

Older Beginners
Long sleeve shirt plus sweatshirt or warm sweater, pants in two layers--tights plus sweats or jeans, or leggings plus sweats. Again, light gloves, not bulky mittens (mittens are too warm, and it's hard to hold hands). Younger children are fine in helmets or a soft or padded hat. Please don't put your 6-year-old or younger in low rise jeans (whoever came up with this concept was an idiot). You would not believe the number of baby-butts I see in a week.

Learn to Skate levels, especially tweens
You're going to start getting agitation for the cute skating clothes at this level, and your degree of indulgence is entirely up to you. I like to see kids deliver the goods before they start dressing like skaters, i.e. mastering the first jump is plenty of time for the Chloe Noel pants. In the meantime, your upper body and gloves are the same as the prior two levels--long sleeve shirt plus sweatshirt (a zipper one is good at this level, for easy removal if they get warm), and stretchy gloves. Tights plus workout pants are great; you can get perfectly adorable yoga pants in any size at Target, for a fifth the price of the ones at the skating shops. Personally, it makes me insane to see some Delta or even low freestyle skater in $150 worth of skating clothes, especially when parents then turn around and complain about the cost of lessons. That's 5 privates or two 10-week class sessions that kid is wearing.

Freestyle
At this point, your skater is committed and needs to start dressing the part. Hair combed neatly and pulled into a high ponytail. Yoga or skating pants, or skating tights and dress (you can get inexpensive ones at resale or a Big Box store, or specialty ones at a specialty skating store). Skating pants are usually a little longer than ordinary yoga pants, or come with stirrups or other skate-specific details. Let your budget and frou-frou tolerance guide you. But at freestyle the coach needs to be able to see the line of the skater's body, so body-skimming styles are best.

Some places to get nice specialty skating clothes are Rainbo Sport Shop, Chloe Noel, and Seku Skatewear (my favorite, but oy, the prices).

Years ago at one of the rinks I work at there was an unspoken rule that only freestyle girls wore skating skirts. As time went on, younger and younger, and lower and lower level girls started wearing skating skirts. Low and behold, the high level girls all started wearing pants instead. Now everyone's in pants. I'm waiting for the high level girls to reassert their preeminence and switch back to skirts any day now.

What do you like to wear, or to put your kids in for skating? What are some places to go for good skatewear?

Mind wandering

I got recruited to be a skate guard today, when two of the scheduled kids didn't show up. And no wonder. This is a very boring job when there's no one to talk to.

So, in between telling the dads that no it's NOT okay to skate with the baby when you can barely stand up yourself, explaining to the hockey boys why six of them linking arms and then skating forward as fast as they can is not nearly the universal amusement it seems to them, and convincing the mothers of assorted 7 year olds that the reason their kids can't stand up is not "weak ankles" but rather "untied skates," I came up with some marketing ideas. The chance of these getting a hearing, let alone implemented, at my home rink is just about zero, so feel free to steal them.

Extended public skate
A few times a year, add a half hour or 40 minutes to public skate, so you can fit in an ice cut and an exhibition between the first and second hours. Invite local skating champions, the rink's own Nationals qualifiers, the synchro team (and the synchro team from the local college), skating "names" who are home for the holidays, groups/soloists from an upcoming rink ice show or competition, and even the top hockey team to do performances or demonstrations for 15 to 20 minutes.

Best time to do this would be before the ice show or before whichever session has historically poor enrollment. Everyone who watches the exhibition gets a 10% off coupon for whatever program you're trying to enhance. You could make this a regular thing--say the first Sunday of every month, so that people start anticipating it. If the coupon thing gets out of hand, make it first 50 people to come get a coupon, to limit your exposure.

But frankly, freebie coupons pay for themselves in the long run, through new customers, increased use by existing customers, and the goodwill they create.

What, more discount coupons?
Every year, so many rinks start their winter session the second or third week of December, hold one or two classes, and then immediately take a one or two week break for the holidays. Not to put too fine a point on it, this is stupid. People don't realize classes are starting; they're all waiting for January, or they know classes are starting but wait until January to sign up anyway. So why not make those two beginning weeks free drop in classes (or you only have to pay for skates if you don't have your own). Everyone who comes to those, gets a 10% off coupon (or whatever, basically one free class) for the upcoming session.

If you're afraid of regular customers abusing this, make it just for the tot and beginning classes, or just for people who have never taken classes at your facility before. Maybe for the freestyle levels, you do one-off clinics; figure out some sort of rink-enhancing freebie you could do for them too. (After all, they're your best customers. Or just make it free to any FS skater who's signed up for the last 2 sessions, to reward them for all the money they spend there the rest of the year.) You might need to do a couple of 8 or 9 week sessions to make the calendar work, instead of 10 week sessions, but classes would be bursting at the seams.

Still more freebies
I love giving away other people's stuff.

Everyone who comes to any public skating session during Christmas break and last two weeks of August gets a 10% off coupon (basically one free class) to the next session. You do this at Christmas because there are tons of new skaters using your public ice at that time of year, and you do it in August to encourage people to sign up for skating instead of soccer. We lose more kids to soccer every fall. I find it absolutely incredible that the only thing at the rink advertising classes this week was a densely covered schedule stuck away in an upright file in a dark corner. Nowhere is there a big bright sign saying SIGN UP FOR CLASS!

Folks, "if you build it they will come" only works in the movies.

Introductory private lessons on public skate
I don't know about other coaches, but it makes me completely insane to watch the skating guards and random kids "teaching" on public sessions (especially on those selected public sessions where the pros are not allowed to teach). Why not hire your pro staff to do private mini-lessons during public skating? You'd purchase a coupon for, say $10 for 15 minutes (with the specific time noted on the coupon), and hand it to one of the pros for a short lesson. The pro would turn in all the coupons and get paid one class fee for each half hour (i.e. two mini-lessons).

I'm not done giving stuff away yet
The week before the class test, everyone in class gets a free public skate pass. This will pay for itself, because the kids will bring their parents, their friends, their sibs, spend money at the concession stand and will start working public skating into their regular activities, so they'll come back and spend again.

Skate with a friend day
Last day of the session kids should be allowed to bring a buddy-- anyone from little sis to BFF to grandpa. You could put age restrictions on it, and make it one friend per skater. Then (wait for it) give every one of those friends a 10% off coupon for the next session.

What's your marketing idea for your rink?

What to get the coach for Christmas

For some reason that escapes me, a lot of parents are hell-bent on giving gifts to their skating coaches. And it fills them with anxiety. It's a weird sort of relationship-- this is your employee, but on the other hand the coach is kind of the boss. Plus, she's your friend? Or not? Personally, I love getting those clumsy hand-made pictures from the little kids, or a "certificate" promising no back talk for a month from the teenagers. But parents persist-- they want to give presents.

So what do you get your skating coach?

A bonus.

That's right. Give your coach a bonus. Your coach is your employee. I do understand that he or she is also your friend, and that you entrust her with your precious child (I mean that in the best way, no sarcasm intended), but in general, this is not someone you would otherwise have much of a connection to.

Now, because of the intimate nature of the relationship, sometimes parents are uncomfortable with handing over extra cash. It seems so cold. So make it a gift card to a local department store like Target or Macy's, or a pre-paid Visa card that can be used anywhere. If there's a concession stand at your rink, see if you can set up an "account" for your coach with a set amount of money in it.

If you really insist on an item, make it coaching related: the latest hard cover "tell all" book about skating scandals, or a pair of gloves or a scarf. I wear those little trading pins all over my coaching jackets, and I had a student once get me a collection of Olympic figure skating ones. A very thoughtful gift. (I confess, while I personally don't care if you get me a gift, I do like swag as much as the next person.)

I had a conversation with a coaching friend recently that just made me shudder: she actually steers her kids toward a certain store that she likes, and tells everyone to get her a gift card from there. I guess there's a certain practicality to that, but my grandmother would be rolling in her grave.

A Tweep asks: is there a formula for how much to give? And you'll be happy to hear that, yes, there is. A week's lesson fee. If you take one lesson per week, then Christmas or Hanukkah week, double the check, with a notation in the memo line "holiday bonus." This might seem like a lot if you're doing multiple lessons, for instance national qualifiers will be paying upwards of $500 per week for multiple lessons approaching unlimited. This seems like a big bonus, yes? On the other hand that coach got your skater to Nationals. Or helped her land her triple salchow. Or doubled her component score in a season. Or just spent a lot of time nurturing your child. Work it into the budget.

If your coach is only working with you once a week, then I think it's fine to just send a card, or yes, that $10 Starbucks gift card. (I confess, the $5 cards drive me crazy-- so, I spent a year with your kid, and you're, um, buying me a cup of coffee? I have gotten $2 cards, which doesn't EVEN pay for a cup of coffee. Really, folks, think about this. Better to do nothing but "Happy Holidays" and a hug.) The more lessons you're getting, the more progress your skater is making, the more you really should be considering this not as a Christmas present, but as a bonus for a job well done.

P.S. to my parents reading this: I like unmarked, non-sequential bills in small denominations and condo timeshares in Aruba. No no no, just kidding. Adorable pictures and hugs are fine.

What do you get your coach for the holidays?