The story behind the gun glove!

Here is my story about how the gun glove and Haga Hunting came about

After a cold and wet December hunt in 2022, where I (Emil) stood post and a pheasant flew within shooting range, I experienced a problem. I aimed for the pheasant, but my cold hands made it impossible to get the safety on my rifle. The frustration I felt at that moment became the starting point for the idea that is today the gun glove

I returned home from the hunt and began searching the market for solutions, but was disappointed to find that most gloves with heating elements were both expensive and difficult to handle. I knew that my father, who gets white fingers after 10 minutes, also thought it was a big problem. I therefore decided to carry out a survey in a hunting group where over 400 hunters participated. The results spoke for themselves: 54% of the participating hunters confirmed that they also experienced unpleasant cold problems with their hands while hunting.

It was at that point I thought there must be something to this. I started devising solutions and exploring different ideas. A thought about a gun glove sitting on the gun kept popping into my head. I started to draw ideas that were far from anything that had previously been on the market, but also far from what the rifle glove is today. I showed my early drawings to my father, Hans-Henrik, who is an experienced hunter, but he couldn't quite see my idea. I still think there was some potential, and after sewing an early prototype himself, he began to see the potential in my idea.

On our annual hunting trip to Bornholm, I presented the first prototype to our friends. Even though we were in the middle of a nice dinner and the atmosphere was high, my glove was met with interest and enthusiasm. There were corrections and feedback, of course, but the general reaction was positive and encouraging. Motivated by their support and the many good ideas I got, I decided to continue the work. After that evening, I asked my father if he would like to go on the trip as a salesman for "HeatHunter" as it was called at the time, because I showed that he could be ideal for that role, and fortunately he was happy to do so.

Although I had a sewing machine driver's license from the 4th grade, I quickly realized that I needed professional help to realize my idea. I therefore contacted an experienced tailor and purchased different types of fabric that I thought would be suitable for the purpose. After explaining my visions and requirements to her, we began work on the first prototype.

The first prototype was close, but I felt it lacked the important elements of wind and water resistance as well as a comfortable fit. We made a number of changes and moved on to the next iteration. Unfortunately, the next prototype turned out to be a regression from the first.

After this disappointing experience, I put the project on the shelf, doubting whether it was even possible to achieve success. However, after a few months I returned to the project, driven by the belief in its potential. I chose to contact another tailor to get a new perspective and this time we managed to achieve a breakthrough.

After three more prototypes, we finally managed to develop a product that I was happy with. However, there were still some minor details that needed to be fine-tuned before it was ready for production. After changing some fabric materials and taking precise measurements, I received the sixth prototype on November 9, 2023, just a few hours before our annual hunting trip to Bornholm.

This time I felt very satisfied with the result and I was eager to show it off on our trip to Bornholm again. I got a lot of positive feedback and people came up with some things for it and the final tweaks were made and we were just a few steps away from putting the product into production.

And now here we are. We finally have products that we are ready to share with the world and we hope that our gun gloves will make a difference for hunters everywhere. In any case, we are very proud of the work we have put into the development of these products, and we look forward to seeing how they will be received by our customers.

Thank you for taking the time to read our story. :)

Here you can see the development through the different gun gloves

Written 25.04.24 - Emil Viborg