Courtesy photo Towing a sled of fishing gear across a frozen lake using a Jay Rope is Dave Walters of Battle Creek, one of the people who help produce the product.

EDITOR NOTE: The Daily Press will be featuring a series of articles on local businesses, highlighting their history and what makes them unique. The series will run on a regular basis in the Daily Press.

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ESCANABA — Necessity was the mother of invention in the case of Jay Rope, the defining product of Jay Outdoor Gear. Mike Jarusiewic, an avid ice fisherman, developed the concept — a harness to make towing gear long distances more comfortable — based on personal experiences coupled with collaborative brainstorming with his fellow military service members.

When ice fishing in his spare time, “I would go out on the Great Lakes and go really long distances on foot,” said Jarusiewic, who lives in Tipp City, Ohio. “Some days I would (walk) ten miles over the course of the day.”

Other hardwater anglers can relate to some of the challenges he was facing, and even those who don’t ice fish can surely imagine the conditions: in below or near freezing temperatures, bundled up in enough layers to keep the body warm — but with room to store those layers if they work up a sweat on the trek — a person heading onto the ice needs to also carry a lot of specialized gear. Between augers, rods, reels, line, tip-ups, tools, lures, bait, navigating and tracking devices like sonar and GPS, and/or whatever assortment of supplies one prefers, the weight and bulk add up.

Many drive trucks, four-wheelers or snowmobiles out onto the frozen lakes, but a lot are like Jarusiewic, trekking miles offshore, pulling all the gear behind them in sleds. About six or seven years ago, our protagonist decided to get creative.

“I created a harness that I could pull my gear with, and it just kind of evolved,” Jarusiewic said. “I kept, you know, thinking of things that I wanted my harness to do for me … I would get tired from pulling one way, and I would want to switch it up and use some different muscle groups, that way I wouldn’t be as tired anymore.” With the ideal harness, he said, “I could switch it up from a shoulder pull point to a waist pull point.”

Now a First Sergeant in the Air National Guard, Jarusiewic brought his concepts and hurdles to some other military service members while they worked third shift.

“I worked with quite a few guys that had experience in like, special operations and Army Rangers, and also firefighters and different types of specialties in the military,” he explained.

They workshopped ideas for what the harness could and should do, suggested different types of knots to achieve the desired objectives and tried them out.

“Then we’d go and test it out and change a thing here or there, and it eventually became what it is now,” Jarusiewic said.

In 2018, he started using the creation for himself. Not long after, a couple buddies he fished with started using the system, too.

“And then next thing you knew, it was on Facebook, and there was like 300 people that wanted these things that first winter,” said Jarusiewic.

The product went on the market in the fall of 2020. Noting that many people know him as “Mike J.,” the founder named the creation Jay Rope and the business Jay Outdoor Gear.

Besides a harness and line just for pulling a sled, with the detachment of a single carabiner, what is usually an eight-foot-long braided tow rope converts into an emergency safety line 30 feet in length, ideal for throwing from a safe distance to rescue someone who has fallen through the ice.

Noting that other straight rescue ropes can be difficult for victims to grab when struggling in icy water and losing functions, with a Jay Rope, “You’re actually throwing the harness side to the person in the water so that they can hold on a lot better,” Jarusiewic said.

After the product has been used in this way and is partially disassembled, a customer can ship it back to the company, where it’ll be inspected for quality assurance, rebraided, and shipped back to them for free.

Jarusiewic said Jay Ropes have been used in two known successful ice rescues by customers in real emergency situations.

In the early days of developing his own harness, Jarusiewic used basic utility rope and carabiners. Now, he said, Jay Ropes are made with certified safety rope and carabiners of aircraft-grade aluminum.

A couple other people help Jarusiewic make the contraptions. One is based not far from him in Ohio, and the other is located in Battle Creek, Michigan.

“We’re all military guys, and we tie them in our free time, usually in the off-season, and then when the season comes, we put them into packages and send them to stores and ship them out for online orders,” the founder said.

In addition to being sold on the website at jayoutdoorgear.com, the Jay Rope is in stores in ten different states. In the Upper Peninsula, Blade’s Bait and Tackle in Kipling and Wind Rose North in Menominee carry the product.

There’s a lightweight and a heavy-duty version of Jay Rope. While the tow capacity is comparable, the heavy-duty one is more durable but weighs more, while the “ultralight” one may be better suited to hunters, who find it useful for towing a deer when every ounce counts.

There’s a noticeable uptick in sales during the fall and winter season, which begins earlier in Canada. This year saw the earliest kickoff, Jarusiewic shared, with orders flowing in from September.

“We try to prepare well ahead of time — try to keep a good inventory so we don’t get low,” Jarusiewic said of his small crew. “But, you know, we can always continue tying them into the season — it just might cut into our own fishing time,” he chuckled.

Overall, despite a few challenges that all entrepreneurs have to overcome, Jarusiewic said that the creation of his own business has been a rewarding experience. Hearing from the people who actually needed to use the Jay Rope in life-saving situations, he said, “just solidifies it … that we’re doing the right thing here in making these products for people.”