Tribevine.com has signed a tentaitive agreement with the International Federation of Mountain Guide Associations (IFMGA) in a bid to get pro mountain guides to contribute content to its sites, which crowdsources product reviews.


If consummated, the partnershiop will enable IFMGA to help improve guiding standards and training in emerging countries while Tribevine strengthens its position as a leading source of expertise on mountain gear.

Tribevine is a crowdsourcing web service that is focused on sports and outdoor product information. The site is designed to enable end-users to single out the best possible outdoor and sports product for themselves faster. The service functions on a crowd sourcing principle; the combined information from sources, such as brand owners and web stores, is refined by the expert community. The goal of the service is to combine the experiences of the most knowledgeable individuals around the globe and bring it to millions of users worldwide, thus helping the end-users to select the exactly right products for themselves.


”For us it is extremely important that our partners share our values. Tribevine does that,” said Hermann Biner, President of IFMGA. “In addition to valuable resources, the co-operation provides, several other benefits, for instance visibility for our qualified guides.” 

In total, the partnership is potentially worth of up to €210 000 for IFMGA and will last up to three years. In addition to financial resources the parties aim to organize mountain safety focused events twice a year. Furthermore the partnership will secure special visibility for qualified mountain guides within Tribevine system, thus enforcing the guiding quality standards related goals of IFMGA.


”IFMGA is the head organization of the most prestigious outdoor professionals in the world,” said Juho Risku, CEO of Tribevine, Inc. “It’s a perfect match. The co-operation will bring the accumulated gear knowledge of these people to the fingertips of rest of the world while improving the mountain safety, as well as helping the current and future guides especially in developing parts of the world,” he added.


Tribevine expects that the co-operation will bring in a significant portion of the world’s’ mountain guides into service, thus improving the quality and quantity of information in the service. This will help Tribevine users to find and select better, safer and higher quality gear for them and will advance Tribevine further ahead of the competition in the area.


The final partnership agreement is still subject to official decision making processes of both organizations. It is expected to be signed in next few months.


The International Federation of Mountain Guide Associations (IFMGA) is a world-wide association, founded by guides from Austria, France, Switzerland and Italy in 1965. It currently brings together the mountain guide associations from more than 20 countries in Europe, Asia, Oceania as well as North and South America, representing a total of almost 6000 guides. The aim of the association is to maintain close ties between the guides and to harmonize the work regulations which govern the profession; to ensure better safety for clients; and to facilitate the ability of mountain guides to work abroad, on mountains all over the globe. IFMGA is also known as Internationale Vereinigung Der Bergführerverbände (IVBV) and Union Internationale Des Associations De Guide De Montagne (UIAGM).