Looking to buy skis for my 7 year old kid. I just want to order something and have it delivered. Any recommendations?
Rent, kid will likely outgrow a pair a season.
Find a place away from the slopes for best prices.
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Who’s going to set up the bindings with the correct tension for your child? Get it wrong and you could end up with a child with a broken leg rather than a ski falling off.
We used to just rent skis and boots while little feet were still growing. You can rent for a full season if you go somewhere like Ochsner Sport of similar.
Best to get down there smart-ish before people start getting them for the upcoming Sportferien.
Maybe we were just lucky but we mostly got new-out-of-the box kit as kiddie rentals but we always went early to rent.
If you do buy online, you can pop into most sport shops, especially at ski resorts and they’ll fit/set them up for you. My most recent pair were bought online and the guys at Ochsner Sport set them up for me.
Luckily a neighbour was getting rid of a pair so I bought it for 50 Fr. While my son will probably only get one season’s worth of skiing from it, next year, his sister will be able to use them once too. It probably works out cheaper than renting 2 seasons worth of skis.
Well, this has to be adjusted anyway each season. It’s pretty simple so I just do it myself. But you can always get someone at ski service or other ski shops/places to adjust for you.
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Glisshop. It’s an online discount store, delvers as promised, no extra customs fees to ch (you order from a .ch domain) and usually about half the price of a walk-in shop.
Edit: it’s not actually a .ch domain, it seems, but in any case we’ve had at least two pairs of skis from them paid in chf and delivered to us here with no hassle whatsoever. If necessary they will ask enough questions to mount the bindings in the correct place.
It’s not rocket science. There’s plenty of online calculators, like this one
https://www.mechanicsofsport.com/skiing/equipment/bindings/din-calculator.html
But fiundamentally for that age you’re going to want to set them on about, err, 1.
Important to get the setup correctly for the boots though, but I’m sure Phil has enough experience by now to do so, having been skiing what, 15 years? since we were teaching him in Engelberg.
No, I appreciate that but not wanting to make any assumptions about Phil’s knowledge (or more to the point, any one else thinking of doing the same), I was pointing out that it was important to do.
The person who rents you skis.
Quite so. Having taught Phil to ski perhaps gives me a reason to believe that he knows enough about what he’s doing to ensure it’s done correctly, but of course in a more general scenario your point is well made.
As happened to our son who spent close on three months with his leg in plaster, two of them plastered from thigh to toe.
In theory everything was set correctly by a very experienced person who did it for hundreds of kids every year but in his case one of his skis didn’t detach and he ended up with a very nasty spiral fracture of his tibia and several months treatment.
Accidents happen, injuries can still occur even if everything is set correctly. Witness the number of ACL or similar knee injuries that happen every day in every ski resort. Children are more likely to fracture a bone, but in many ways that’s a less serious injury that will completely heal, unlike snapped ligaments which will need surgery in an adult.
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Please, I brought my skis to service last week. I want to go in January when it’s calmer. This is not motivating at all 
Complex tibial fractures in teens can require surgery too and recovery is by no means an easy process.
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To elaborate a little further: I always rent directly from the ski resort. Usually, there is always a ski shop at the bottom station that offers exactly that. This has several advantages:
- I only go skiing once a year. Renting is cheaper for me than buying
- The ski bindings are adjusted when the rental skis are issued (always up to date)
- I save on storage and transport costs / effort
- I can try out a different model every year
- I don’t have to worry about service / repair
Normally, you don’t need to make an appointment for this. But it’s worth arriving at the ski resort 15-30 minutes early, depending on how big the ski shop is and how crowded the ski resort is.
Yet many have rented chalets or apartments for the season or own second residences in the resort. Buying your gear would be a fraction of the cost and far less hassle of renting.
YMMV!
Are you going to notice (appreciate) any subtle differences if you only go once a year?
Ah, maybe I should phrase that differently. Last year I tried shorter skis than the ones I had before, and I liked them a lot better. If I hadn’t rented them, I probably would’ve never tried different skis, since I wouldn’t be able to switch every year (every year, because I only go skiing once a year. If you go several times, you can of course rent different skis within a year.)
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You can, if you want to, try different skis through the week. It’s a fairly standard thing for people wanting to buy, up to three days demo charges will be discounted off the price of new skis, by arrangement of course, as long as they have the skis you want to test. Or of course if you know you can get them cheaper at Glisshop or wherever then just pay the demo fee and buy online.
The problem is over time you end up with a dozen sets of skis!
SL/GS/Carving/88 All mountain/96 All mountain/ 104 All mountain/Touring in good condition then the older set 5-15 years old to use when its rocky.