Today, Sheri Tingey, who is age 60, runs a family business called Alpacka Raft, which has created and built a series of ultra light, packable rafts for use in long distance backpacking and wilderness racing.

Sometimes, a "new" business opportunity can begin with a challenge or a question from a friend or a loved one. And, that’s exactly what happened when Sheri’s son, Thor, asked his Mom to come up with a light-weight raft that could stand up to some of the most demanding parts of Alaska’s wilderness in a sport, where he was an enthusiast.

In the first year, Sheri Tingey’s Alpacka Raft sold 200 carefully crafted units, but had demand beginning to pick up outside of her Alaska base. In other words, if the rafts were strong enough to withstand Alaska’s wilderness, then challenges from the Lower 48 would be easily surmountable, many potential buyers must have thought. In the process, sales have inched up from 200 to 300 to 400 and, this year, Tingey estimates that her sales will top 700 units from her whole product line with approximately $500 thousand in sales.

So, how did she wind up in Alaska so far away from her Arizona roots? After graduation from the University of Oregon with a degree in Physical Education, Sheri headed to Jackson Hole, Wyoming to ski for just "one season" before getting on with the real world. But, while she was there, she fell in love with skiing and tried to figure out a way to make a living besides waitressing. That is how she happened to start her first business, which involved making custom ski wear. Her one-piece snow gear for skiers at the time was sold through six retail shops around the US including Sun Valley, Idaho, Aspen and Vail, Colorado, Alta and Snowbird, Utah, Jackson Hole, Wyoming and Lake Placid, New York. In that chapter of her life, Sheri would ski all day and, then, she sewed late in the evening every night.

After selling her "Design by Sheri" business, which she ran from 1967 to 1982 and which was based in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, she and her husband together with their two children moved to Alaska primarily because of a job offer for her husband. But, Sheri had also wanted to sell her business, in part, due to a series of health-related challenges she was experiencing, including chronic fatigue syndrome.

After moving to Alaska, Tingey again tried to sew, but the effort simply drained her. She desperately wanted her old energy level back and, as a consequence, felt rotten because it just wasn't coming back. At the time, her children were small and there were no programs available for them in the Alaska Bush. So, she wound up starting both a swimming and a gymnastics program for rural Alaska kids. Further, since Sheri was able to control the hours, she could also closely monitor how much energy she put out. Doing those morning or afternoon only programs, she could work these job assignments into the three good hours she had each day, where she functioned somewhat normally.

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