Shooting on Location with Fjällräven: Permits, Fog, and Horse-Obsessed Crew Members

When the lifestyle giant responsible for that hipster backpack on every college campus (calling ourselves out) comes to you and says, “Hey, let’s do something cool on location,” you clear your calendar. You prepare your soul for paperwork, scouting, and enough logistics to make a wedding planner weep.

Fjällräven sent us a deck with potential concepts: something beachy or hiking-focused, something woodworking-adjacent, and something farmer/rancher-ish. Classic outdoors-meets-craftsmanship-meets-I-swear-this-will-look-authentic content.

We took those ideas, looked at what we could source, what we had access to, and what wouldn’t get us arrested for trespassing. Out of that came three on-location vignettes:

• A farm scene featuring a professional equestrian (also my girlfriend—producing is easier when your partner owns livestock)

• A woodworking scene at a San Diego craft collective

• A hike at Torrey Pines Gliderport, a place locals ignore and global audiences drool over

  
  

Two days, three locations, multiple talents, wardrobe, and a sun schedule that bows to no one. Easy.

Let’s break it down.

Step 1: The Wireframe

Before anything else, we create our wireframe. This is where we list:

• Creative direction

• Potential locations

• Talent needs

• Crew needs

• Baseline logistics

  
  

Think of it as a giant list of potential failures we’d like to avoid. Then we have an internal creative call to discuss what could be cool and what could be possible—emphasis on could. This is where dreams go to be resized into “shootable within budget and legal frameworks.”

Step 2: Sourcing (Or, Googling Until Something Acceptable Appears)

Permits? Oh yes. Everyone loves permits.

• Beach permits → San Diego requires them. Torrey Pines is a park, so hello, Special Division. Make sure you give yourself enough time for these as there's a literal dude named "Guy" who handles it for our area.

• Woodworking shop → After hours of searching platforms that should’ve helped but didn’t, good old Google saved the day.

• Farm → Conveniently, I have a girlfriend with a horse barn. Highly recommend adding this to your list of production assets.

Then comes COIs (certificates of insurance) for every location. Usage fees. Negotiations. Emails. So many emails.

Step 3: Location Scouting (The Fuji Point-and-Shoot Olympics)

Now we have locations. Great. Next step: making sure they actually match the creative.

This is where I usually go out solo with my Fuji point and shoot and scout, frame, and check where the sun hits. The Sunseeker app will be your best friend for these missions. Reviewing the footage we ask ourselves:

• Is this high-key and bright?

• Is this cinematic and backlit?

• Will we be fighting the marine layer again?

• Is this going to look “Swedish enough” for Fjällräven?

  
  

Then we start storyboarding. We mix the client’s deck with our ideas to create a coherent vision that will hopefully survive weather and real life.

Step 4: Pre-Production: The Six-to-Eight-Week “Hurry Up and Wait”

We typically get 6–8 weeks to prep. Sounds luxurious, but when you need:

• A believable woodworker

• Natural, real hikers

• An equestrian (nearly impossible unless you’re dating one)

• Wardrobe that fits everyone

…it goes fast.

Wardrobe is always a beast. Fjällräven pulled samples from everywhere (salespeople, warehouses, global inventory) just to get them to us on time. Meanwhile, talent was driving in from LA. We relied on measurements, crossed fingers, and portable steamers.

Multiple locations × multiple talent × multiple outfits = math our right brained folk were born for.

Also: no generators at San Diego beaches or parks. Great. EcoFlows it is. Add changing tents, clothing racks, power needs, pack lists, crew gear, lunch, water...

Step 5: The Shoot: Why Studios Exist

Location shoots are humbling. In studio you control the light, the temperature, and you know where the bathrooms are.

On location, bathrooms become philosophical concepts. Your crew forgets how to get out of the shot when beautiful horses are present, and the marine layer laughs at your optimism.

We set up monitors and hotspot rigs so clients (and sometimes their global teams) can watch live feeds. Ideally, decision-makers are at the shoot so approvals sound like:

“Yep, that one", instead of waiting for someone in a different time zone to respond to a Slack message. Both happen, and you need the tech to work with both versions of client feedback.

Step 6: The Weather Tries to Ruin Everything

We sold Fjällräven on Torrey Pines: sun, ocean, iconic bluffs. We arrived to: Oregon. Fog thick enough that we could barely see ten feet ahead.

For the big seven-figure productions, you block out a week within an ideal weather window and keep full crews, talent, and locations on hold.

For anything less, you pivot. You flip angles. You lean into greenery instead of ocean. You pretend this was the plan all along and scream into the abyss when no one's looking. We were lucky and within an hour the fog pushed back to the ocean and we could see again.

Step 7: The Final Truth About On-Location Production

It’s more:

• Time

• Logistics

• Crew

• Planning

• Risk

…and about 90% less control than a studio.

But it’s also more:

• Texture

• Authenticity

• Magic

• Happy clients

Location shoots are monsters, but they’re the kind creatives and brands dream of.

Fjällräven trusted us with the chaos. Together we made something real, beautiful, and worth all the fog, distractions, and paperwork.

The full video breakdown in our latest episode of Lacroixs With Kirk is on our Instagram, and our DMs are always open to chat all things productions.