The Big Gear Show will combine with the (e)revolution e-bike trade show in June 2023 for the outdoor industry’s first-ever business-to-business-to-consumer event
Outdoor Retailer
Posted inNews, Outdoors
Outdoor Retailer is leaving Denver for Salt Lake City, industry leaders promise to boycott
Outdoor Retailer is moving its twice-a-year trade shows out of Denver and back to Salt Lake City. The national outdoor trade show with a $45 million annual impact left Utah in 2017 after industry heavyweights blasted the state’s leaders for supporting the reduction of federally-protected national monuments. It will return to its 20-year home in […]
Posted inBusiness, News, Outdoors
Patagonia, REI, others threaten to boycott Outdoor Retailer if it moves back to Salt Lake City
An environmental conservation group and two dozen outdoor recreation companies, including Patagonia, REI and The North Face, announced Monday they would boycott the Outdoor Retailer trade show if it’s moved from Denver back to Salt Lake City, accusing Utah’s leaders of trying to chip away at protections for national monuments and public lands. The Conservation […]
Posted inBusiness, COVID, Economy, News, Outdoors
Blending politics and business threatens the future of Outdoor Retailer and the unified outdoor community
The owner of a ski company leans against a wall of his skis, arranged just so to dazzle passersby. “What am I doing? I feel like I’m wasting my time,” said Ted Eynon, the owner of Meier Skis. “Man, this ain’t what it used to be.” The Outdoor Retailer Snow Show was a shadow of […]
Posted inNews, Outdoors
Colorado’s outdoor industry rallies to keep Outdoor Retailer trade show in Denver
The outdoor industry flexed its newfound political muscle five years ago by leaving Utah and taking its twice-a-year Outdoor Retailer trade shows to Colorado. Outdoor brands and advocates, irked over Utah’s push to dismantle protections for Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments, moved their annual gatherings — which draw 85,000 visitors and stir an […]
Posted inCrime and Courts, Environment, Equity, Growth, News, Outdoors
What happens when the lure of outdoor rec starts to pull people onto tribal lands?
INDIAN WELLS, ARIZONA — When the FBI suspected someone was illegally digging artifacts from the Navajo Nation, an agent called Jonathan Dover for help. Dover was working as a Navajo Ranger who specialized in archaeological crimes. He drove with the FBI agent out into a search area that spanned hundreds of square miles. They were […]
Posted inBusiness, Economy, Environment, News, Outdoors
Utah has landed two outdoor industry trade shows in the past year. Is it vying to reclaim Denver’s Outdoor Retailer, too?
PARK CITY, UTAH — Stepping off the free bus and hustling over to the temporary tent city in one of Deer Valley Resort’s parking lots, Cameron Wenzel had only one thing on his mind: bikes. “I went straight to the Pinarello booth, got a $12,000 road bike and rode up to the top of one […]
Posted inBusiness, News, Outdoors
Wins, challenges and Colorado’s national role in the growing clout of outdoor recreation
As the executive director of the Outdoor Recreation Roundtable — a diverse coalition of 30 national outdoor trade associations that represent biking, fishing, hiking, park concessionaires and all forms of mechanized recreation — Jessica Wahl is the voice of the growing outdoor recreation industry. Representing more than 100,000 businesses in the recreation economy, the ORR […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment, News, Outdoors, Politics and Government
Mountain athletes push progress over perfection in climate fight
Caroline Gleich remembers a decade ago when advocating for climate policy became an essential part of her career as a professional ski mountaineer. As she reported the impacts of climate change from far-flung corners she explored for her work, she was besieged. “Told to shut up, called a glacier killer, a hypocritical ecoterrorist, a polluter. […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment, Health, News, Outdoors
Nearly half of Americans didn’t go outside to recreate in 2018. That has the outdoor industry worried.
For the glass-half-full crowd that makes up the outdoor industry, the results of the latest outdoor participation survey are sobering. Outdoor businesses need people to get outside, but almost half of Americans don’t venture outdoors to play. The steady decline in participation threatens not just the bottom line but the outdoor industry’s mission to collectively […]