Our Story

Emergence.  Peak Bamboo emerged from mere concept to importing multiple containers of premium bamboo in less than a year. The first container arrived in port in late 2016; the second arrived in March of 2017.  We can proudly say our Tonkin is USDA inspected and approved!  Now we’re lining up our shipments from the 2017 harvest which will arrive in late 2017 & early 2018.  Graded bamboo of the highest quality is now available in the United States and around the world.

Founding Partner.  Russ Gooding, founding partner, knew that many of his component clients at Golden Witch were seeking a reliable source of top shelf Tonkin and he saw the opportunity to get back into bamboo sales.  Years before he partnered with Andy Royer, The Bamboo Broker, and personally sorted and sold thousands of culms.  Bamboo is a product Russ knows well; with the help of a team of investors and active partners, direct bamboo imports became a possibility… and then a reality.

Director of Marketing.  Matt West, of West Bamboo (rods) and Groove180 (graphics), is Peak’s Director of Marketing.  Matt brings to Peak his workaday expertise in graphic arts, plus an intense love for making split-cane rods and fishing them in the Rocky Mountains of his home state, Colorado.  Matt also worked closely with Andy Royer and the team who created the acclaimed film, Trout Grass.

Friends & Associates.  Russ is fortunate to have a good friend in China whose multilingual fluency opened the doors necessary to put together a working partnership with the many people who became Peak Bamboo’s team in China.  Peak’s U.S. partners were able to share their needs and high expectations, training the team in China prior to the 2016 harvest.  That was only the start.  In March of 2017, the gentleman who runs Peak Bamboo’s operation in China flew over to spend a week with Russ and his family.  Together they opened and graded culms that arrived with the first and second loads of the 2016 harvest.  As Russ pointed out the pros and cons of stick after stick, his Chinese partner created videos, translating Russ’s words into Cantonese.  Together, they built an enhanced educational system to further train the staff in China who process the culms and do the initial grading.  We believe this investment will continue to improve the quality of bamboo imported by Peak Bamboo.

Terroir.  We’re making other investments, too.  We’re investing in the bamboo farmers from the best growing regions and paying them to harvest to our specifications.  You may know the word terroir from the world of wine, but it applies to bamboo as well.  Micro-climate has a profound effect on the phenotype of plants.  The hectares of bamboo under contract to Peak Bamboo were chosen precisely because they’re producing better rodmaking Tonkin.  We’re seeking, and finding, larger diameter culms, thicker walls, and deeper power fibers.  The terroir has a marked influence on these qualities. Compare ten of our sticks to ten sticks imported from another growing region and you will see and feel the difference.  Our culms tend to be larger and they’re definitely heavier.  Then cut into the culms and compare the cross sections.  Yeah, we’ve got the power.  We’ve got it because we know terroir matters and we made the effort to seek out the best bamboo groves.