In reply to Mungo Shuntobox:
> Well mocked chaps - it is indeed marketing bollox, and I'd challenge any of the salesbeings from these types of companies to define what is a technical pair of pants. It's one of the most overused words in the outdoor clothing industry, and usually means jackshit.
>
Maybe to a certain extent, but generally seems to suggest more specialist fabrics, and/or more specific thought going into the design, rather than just stitching two tubes together
> I'd also challenge them to say what makes their £100 badged product 10 times as good as the £10 supermarket or GoOutdoors sales rail bargain.
Doesn't necessarily mean ten times as good - just that more has probably gone into making them, somehow, at various stages along the line, in terms of design, materials, construction etc. Often it's worth looking at things the other way and wondering why the bargain clothing
isn't £100 (or whatever) - as was mentioned above, somebody has to pay at some stage. If it's us, then we pay at the tills, if it's the person making the goods they may well pay in time, effort, low wages and crappy conditions.
Obviously no-one
needs swanky trousers to climb, and it's certainly reasonable to discourage the notion that one absolutely has to have them, but if they fit well and feel good and one has the money to spare then why not get them, and help support the climbing shops and manufacturers.
And the economy as a whole, of course. Indulgent trousers = more teachers and nurses, in the long run