The Arrivals co-founder Jeff Johnson on the silver lining behind lowered sales

If much of the retail industry is feeling squeezed by the coronavirus pandemic, outdoor apparel may be especially hard hit.

"It's been kind of a mix," Jeff Johnson, co-founder of outerwear brand The Arrivals, said on the Glossy Podcast. "Sales, even traffic, has been lower."

Johnson still manages to find positives. The company's main sales season runs from August to January or February -- this year, that was before the pandemic was declared. And while the average order value has gone down, he said, order numbers are up. In other words, within a smaller group of online visitors, more people are making actual purchases.

"For the last two weeks, we've seen a 2x spike in conversion," Johnson said.

He talked about how the company is crowd-sourcing the apparel design process, how it's changing its communications and why he's thankful that The Arrivals didn't end up opening a flagship store just before the pandemic.