The Functional Craft of ParaPulls

Last winter when local Whitefish skier Stephen Keimach took an avalanche course, he noticed a few ski patrollers with handmade paracord zipper pulls that replaced broken zippers on their worn jackets, and he asked John Loubier, the creator of the zipper pulls, if he had any spares to sell him.

Loubier didn’t have any in stock, but he directed Keimach to a YouTube tutorial to learn a monkey’s fist knot, which is used in sailing and as an anchor in rock climbing, but also as an ornamental knot that happens to work as a functional zipper pull.

Keimach started tying the paracord zipper pull for his own personal use and he gave them away to friends and family as gifts. They soon gained popularity and he started trading them, which provided him a few free nights at the bar.

“I first started selling them for beer,” Keimach said. “I had an ebb and flow with the stock. It would flow more when I was at home bored and it would ebb when I’d go to the bar and give them all away.”

Soon after Keimach learned how to make the paracord zipper pulls, ParaPulls was born.

In between coaching for the mountain’s freestyle ski team and cooking at Jersey Boys, the 27-year-old says he’s probably made close to 1,000 ParaPulls since last winter, but he doesn’t keep track. He has since learned multiple knots, including the fisherman’s and snake knots, and he uses a variety of colors while incorporating thinner cords like Kevlar and micro cords.

Keimach stores all of his supplies in a shoebox, including 900 feet of paracord in 15 different colors. First, he measures the length of his forearm and ties a loop around his finger while threading the rest of the cord through the hole and tightens the knot by hand multiple times. He uses needle nose pliers to finish tightening, ties the knot, and burns the end with a lighter to ensure it stays intact.

“They are rock solid,” Keimach said.

While working on the Flathead Area Mountain Bikers (FAMB) trail crew this summer, Keimach found a plethora of paracord treasures on the trails, which he brought home, cleaned and transformed into ParaPulls. He also salvaged Kevlar cord from an old hang-gliding wing, which he has used for nearly all of his pulls.

Keimach now has ParaPulls on display in KALICO Art Center and he trades them at Rocky Mountain Outfitter (RMO) for store credit.

“It was really RMO that started getting me to make more,” Keimach said. “I was getting a whole bunch of store credit and I didn’t want that to stop … I got a backcountry radio already and I got half-off new boots this season. I’m really stoked.”

Keimach has explored selling ParaPulls in other shops around the valley, but he’s content with his current setup at RMO, sales through Etsy and direct through Instagram. He’s also not sure he wants to handle a larger workload.

“I only have so much time,” Keimach said. “None of my friends will help me either. I say ‘I’ll teach you how to tie knots and I’ll pay you and they’re just like no I’m good man, that’s your thing.’”

Even though Keimach is a one-man-show, he doesn’t mind because he can ensure the quality control and he offers a lifetime warranty.

Keimach now accepts cash as a form of payment, $5 for the monkey fist pulls and $3 for the rest with slightly higher prices at RMO and Etsy. He carries them around while skiing at Whitefish Mountain Resort, happy to trade a beer for a pull and he still brings a pile with him when he goes to the bar. He says they are getting wide recognition around town.

“I’ll go into a bar and do an order and someone will turn around and say, ‘You’re ParaPulls?’”

For more information, visit ParaPulls on Instagram and at www.etsy.com/shop/ParaPulls.