special feature like - Amazon Web Servicesstatic-snews.s3.amazonaws.com/.../Winter08_special_feature.pdf · While growing up, she had other ... would go on ski trips,” said Julia,

hen Malcolm and Lewis Jones opened their outdoor specialty

store, The Backpacker, in Columbia, S.C., 35 years ago, the brothers

imagined that one of them might have a son who would someday

lead the family business. It was only natural. In the business world,

there has been a long-standing tradition of the son succeeding

the father. Indeed, Malcolm eventually had a son (named

Lewis) who worked full-time at The Backpacker and seemed

invested in its future. But fate intervened.

Two years ago, Lewis died at the age of 22 while climbing. There wouldbe no son to take the lead. However, there were two daughters—Courtneylove Gowans, daughter of the elder Lewis, and Lauren J. Pope-Corbett, Malcolm’s daughter. As it turns out, these two women, Lewis

said, are now “the future of The Backpacker.”Having worked at the Columbia store

since 1985, Gowans, 44, is positioningherself to be a part-owner when her fatherretires, while Pope-Corbett is now managingThe Backpacker’s new store in Charleston,S.C. Of course, they have not achieved theirleadership positions merely by default. Theyhave earned them with hard work, savvybusiness skills and determination. In fact,they represent a growing number of

women—many of them daughtersof outdoor industry veterans—

who are emerging as themarket’s future leaders.

Ironically, many ofthese women did notplan to have careers inthe outdoors. Theymoved in other direc-tions, but childhooddays spent with their

families in the moun-tains called to them. Now,

they are not only partici-pating in the outdoor industry,

but also reshaping what has beena traditionally male-dominated market. Thistakes courage. And these women will tellyou that their drive and determination aredue in large part to their influentialparents—particularly their fathers.

BUILDING CONFIDENCESometimes, Julia Blumenfeld still feelsbutterflies in her stomach when she setsher ski tips at the edge of a double-diamondrun. But she takes the plunge anyway.

“I know I can get down and have theskills to do it. And when you get down,there’s a great feeling of accomplishment,”said Julia, the 22-year-old daughter of Jeff

» W W W . G E A R T R E N D S . C O M3 8 » O U T D O O R » W I N T E R 2 0 0 8

B Y M A R C U S W O O L F

Thedaughters of

outdoor industry veterans are EMERGING

as future leaders.

likelike

FATHER...

DAUGHTERW

» Ken and Rebecca Hurd (on his right) with sisters(left to right) Gretchen, Kimberly and Connie.

s p e c i a l f e a t u r e

» Bill and Allison Sweasy

36-45_Advisory_Dads_WG.qxd 12/19/07 1:57 AM Page 38



self-assurance from outdoor trips shetook with her father. One experiencethat made a big impression occurredwhen she was 12 years old.

“I was with dad at YellowstoneLake,” she recalled. “We had finishedpaddling for the day, but I really wantedto go out on my own. It was reallywindy and the current was strong, butmy dad let me go. The wind swept meacross the lake, and I was scared todeath, and he had to come rescue me.But it was cool that he letme do it.”

“My job was to makesure she was safe, butallow the opportunity totake on acceptable riskand experience life forherself,” said Michael.

“He encouraged meto push limits andfigure things out on myown,” said Nikki. “Withsports like that youreally have to face your fear, andthere are not a lot of situations in daily lifewhere you really get to experience that.I’m much more willing to go out and dothings because of it.”

While courage is a driving force forJulia and Nikki, there is somethingelse propelling these women wespoke to—a real love of theoutdoors—a love that women ofprevious generations weren’t as fortu-nate to have had nurtured. They feellucky indeed to have the opportunityto combine their vocation with some-thing so close to their hearts. Whilethey value their fathers’ efforts to buildtheir confidence, they are equallythankful that their fathers simply tookthe time to introduce them to theoutdoor world.

THE BEST TRIP I’VE EVER TAKEN For 33-year-old Rebecca Hurd, an inde-pendent rep in North Carolina, eachmoment outdoors with her father wasspecial. “I was always kind of a part-timedad,” admitted Ken Hurd, a longtime repand the owner of the Earth Traverse repcompany, which has employed Rebecca thepast four years. When Rebecca and hersiblings were growing up, Ken was oftenaway from home, traveling or training as acompetitive paddler. But whenever hereturned, he arranged family outings to sailor do other activities outdoors.

But Rebecca’s favorite memory is of theseven-week road trip she and her father

took when she was in college.“We drove from Texas toWashington,” said Rebecca.“We rode in a pickup truck thathad a camper on it, and weloaded it up with kayaks andmountain bikes. We woke upeach day with no definite plans.”

The two kindred spirits, both easygoingand adventurous, got along great, andRebecca remembers fondly sitting in thepassenger seat talking with her dad,mapping out adventures for the roadahead and writing postcards.

At the end of the drive, Rebecca had tofly back to the East Coast to complete hersenior year. “It was just an amazing expe-rience,” said Rebecca. “Before I got on theplane, I was crying so hard I couldn’t thankhim. He looked me in the eyes and said itwas the best trip he’d ever taken.” Oneoddity that stuck in her mind was thatduring the whole journey she hadn’t seenher father send out a single postcard; shegathered that it just wasn’t his thing. “WhenI returned to school, I looked in the mail…Iget a little emotional just talking aboutit…I looked in the mail, and sitting therewas a postcard from my father. I’m notsure how much I thought about it at thetime, but looking back, that trip was thefoundation of the incredibly close rela-tionship we have now.”

Rebecca said she really enjoys her life asa rep, especially since she now speaks withher father several times a day. But shedidn’t originally plan to join her father’scompany. While growing up, she had otherdreams and attended North Carolina StateUniversity in Raleigh, N.C., to major inpsychology and minor in zoology. LikeRebecca, many of the women we inter-viewed did not originally set a course tofollow in their fathers’ footsteps.

Blumenfeld, owner of Blumenfeld &Associates public relations firm.

She said that her skills as a skier—andmore important, her willingness to takerisks—came as a result of her father’s influ-ence. “When I was in college, Dad and Iwould go on ski trips,” said Julia, addingthat her father was frequently by her sideon the slopes of Killington in Vermont,offering words of encouragement. Overtime, she learned to conquer any self-doubt, and this has paid dividends on andoff the slopes.

This past year, Julia took a job workingas a marketing assistant for the CW-Xapparel company. This is her debut in theworking world, and like any young personstarting out, she faces new decisions andchallenges nearly every day. But Julia saidthe confidence she built while skiing steadiesher in uncertain times. “With skiing, youreally have to work over years to be confi-dent in doing it. When you combine some-thing physical with the mental, it reallybuilds confidence,” she said.

Like Julia, the other women we spoke torealized that they benefited greatly byhaving fathers who worked in the outdoor

realm. Long before anyonedreamed

of publishing “The Daring Book for Girls,”these fathers understood the value of intro-ducing their daughters to nature, wherethings wild and unpredictable would teachimportant lessons about resolve. And onthat unique proving ground, the girlslearned things they might not have discov-ered elsewhere.

Nikki Hodgson, the 24-year-old daughterof GearTrends® and SNEWS® co-ownerMichael Hodgson, also derives much of her


» Courtneylove Gowans and Lewis Jones

» Left: Malcolm Jones and Lauren Pope-Corbett

» Julia and Jeff Blumenfeld


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Gowans said that in the 1980s severalpeople outside the Jones family expressedinterest in opening franchise stores forThe Backpacker, but her father and unclerefused to do it. “It had to be somebodywho would care as much as the familywould,” she said.

After Pope-Corbett’s brother died whileclimbing, she urged her father and uncleto help her open a store in Charlestonwhere she lived. Pope-Corbett, 26, hadgraduated from the College of Charlestonwith a teaching degree, but she determinedquickly that she didn’t want to be a teacherand took a job managing a restaurant. Thefamily knew this had provided her theexperience and skills to manage a store,and in the fall of 2007—for the first timein 35 years—The Backpacker expanded.Now, not just one daughter, but two wouldcarry on the family tradition.

Pope-Corbett and the other womendrifted toward the outdoor industry partlybecause of a desire to carry on what theirfamilies had built, and partly because oftheir own passion for adventure. But manyof them also said that they reconnectedwith the industry because it felt like home:It was something that was always a part oftheir lives. For Malcolm and Lewis Jones,industry colleagues were friends whomthey would visit regularly and travel with inthe mountains. “I have fond memories of

sales reps who would stay at thehouse,” said Gowans. “I would

be in my room as theystayed up late, but I could

hear their voices—hearthem telling stories.”

Rebecca Hurd saidthat some of herfa ther ’s indus t ryc o l l e a g u e s h a v eknown her since she

was 18 months old. “Alot of the people I work

with now seem likeextended family. Paul Marsh

(of the Road Dogs rep agency) ismy Uncle Paulie. One of the best things

is getting to work with these people thatI love,” she said.

Naturally, children sometimes want tobreak their own trail, and for this reason,Nikki Hodgson said there was a time thatshe didn’t want to work in the outdoorindustry—she’s worked at retail as well asin customer service at Kokatat—or considerbecoming a writer like her father. “I just feltthat if I followed that path I couldn’t neces-sarily live up to what my dad had done,” shesaid. In college, she originally intended topursue a wildlife biology degree. Then, after

A SEPARATE PATH “It never occurred to me that I would be apart of this business,” said The Backpacker’sGowans. Like many of her cousins, sheworked at The Backpacker when she wasyoung, but she didn’t exactly love theoutdoors as a child. “Before I was a teenager,my Dad made me go on a four-day back-packing trip in the Smokies, and I spentmost of the trip crying,” she said. As a teenshe didn’t backpack much, and incollege she

did not follow a track that would lead to anoutdoor job. Rather, she got a financedegree. After school, Gowans took variousjobs and was actually working in an eyedoctor’s office in Maryland in 1985 whenshe got the notion that she wanted to workfor The Backpacker. The plan was for her tostart at the bottom of the totem pole as asalesperson. As preparation, Lewis Jonessent her on a NOLS trip to Alaska, which puther in tune with technical gear and theoutdoor lifestyle.

“That NOLS course really changed herattitude about the (outdoor) business,”said Jones. “I was hoping it would get herhead into the technical side of this busi-ness. I was hoping it would be a life-changing experience for her, and it was.”

Gowans became a real outdoor enthu-siast, and she now does a substantial partof the buying for The Backpacker, managesthe store in Columbia, and is one of its mostknowledgeable staff members when itcomes to technical gear and apparel.

Similar to Gowans, there was a timethat Allison Sweasy was not expected toparticipate in the family business. Despitethe fact that three generations of herfamily had worked at the Red Wing ShoeCo., Sweasy had no intention of following

suit. Her father, Bill Sweasy, chairman andCEO of Red Wing, said that as hisdaughter and son were growing up, “I gotthe feeling neither one of them would haveany interest in the business at all.”

Allison studied psychology at St. OlafCollege in Northfield, Minn. “Until thesecond semester of my senior year, I wasgoing to be a neuropsychologist,” she said.“Then I did an intense research study where

I spent four hours everyday bymyself in a lab in the basementof a psychology building. I hadthis realization that it wasn’t thepath for me and really struggledwith what I wanted to do.” Shethought about Red Wing andhow it had provided so manygreat opportunities for her totravel and be outdoors whenshe was young. Throughfrequent family outings, Billhad shared with his daughterhis love of nature and adven-ture, and it lay resting some-where in her heart.

“Then one day out of theblue, Allison says, ‘Hey,what would you think if Iworked at the shoe

company?’ And it just flabbergasted me,”said Bill. “I got so excited I don’t think Islept for two days.” In 2006, Allisonworked as a project leader for theRed Wing Casual division, andnow, at the age of 24, sheworks as a product devel-oper for Vasque.

It is no small thing torepresent a family’sfourth generation in acompany. And it is nosmall thing for a fatherto realize that his childhas embraced some-thing that he too holdsso dear.

FAMILY TRADITION“Passing the business down through familyis very important to my dad and uncle,”said Gowans. The Backpacker is morethan a store to Lewis and Malcolm Jones;it is a tie that binds their family.

“We’ve had this store full of familymembers for as long as we’ve been in busi-ness,” said Lewis. “I have a granddaughterrunning around the shop floor now, andmaybe someday she’ll be part of some ofthis.” He trusts the family to run the oper-ation correctly, and he has been wary ofhanding over the reigns to outsiders.



“Passing the business down

through FAMILY isvery important to my

dad and uncle.”—Courtneylove Gowans of

The Backpacker

» Steve and Jen Barker (on right) with sister Emily



hire Julia. Everyone was comfortablebecause Julia’s sales and marketing posi-tion would not require her to interact withher father. Plus, it was understood thatthe company’s relationship with Jeffwould not influence Julia’s treatmentwithin CW-X. “They have to have theability to reprimand her or praise her,”said Blumenfeld. He added that it’s alsounderstood that should CW-X decide toswitch PR companies, it could do sowithout any hard feelings.

FACING THE CHALLENGESThe fathers and daughters we spoke withsaid they have encountered few or noproblems concerning favoritism or nepo-tism. In fact, parents saw overwhelmingadvantages in connecting their childrenwith outdoor business opportunities. Forone thing, the outdoor industry has

matured into something that’s stableand not nearly the role of the dice

that industry founders faced.Perhaps most important is

the fact that the industrythese days is morewelcoming towardwomen and sees theadvantage of usingtheir skills.

Jen Barker, thedaughter of Eagle

Creek President andCEO Steve Barker, is

attending the BainbridgeGraduate Institute in Seattle,

which offers degrees that focus onsustainable business and entrepreneur-ship. “I’m hoping to help Eagle Creekapproach sustainability in an innovativeway,” said 28-year-old Jen, who has beenwith Eagle Creek four years and works asa product line manager.

Young women are seizing opportuni-ties to push the growing trend towardsustainable business, as well as sparkgreater interest in all types of conserva-tion issues. “Last year at a ConservationAlliance breakfast, Terry Tempest Williamschallenged everyone under the age of 35to participate more in the industry’sconservation efforts,” said Jen. “Aboutseven of us have been working the lastyear to put together a sub group of theAlliance called Conservation Next, and allof us are women. (Executive Director)John Sterling told us how inspirational itwas for such a strong group of women inour late 20s and early 30s to be steppingit up in the industry.”

Jen credits her parents for instilling in

her the notion that she should do morethan just be concerned with her job, butalso participate in solving issues thatconcern outdoor recreation. “My fatherhas always been extremely involved withthe Outdoor Industry Association, theConservation Alliance and lobbying,” shesaid. “Playing a role in that communityand taking it to the next level is what keepsme in the outdoor industry.”

And other challenges await. As Gowanstransitions to be a co-owner of TheBackpacker, she will have to find a way tobalance family time with her 4-year-oldchild and the demands of running acompany. Many women involved in afamily business may simply drop out ofit, at least for a while, when they have chil-dren. “I’m an independent woman wholikes having a job,” said Gowans, addingthat, financially, she doesn’t have theluxury of putting the job on the backburner. “So, this will be an interesting tran-sition,” she noted.

One thing is certain—as she finds herway, she will be able to draw from a deepwell of experience. She will have thelessons taught by her father. And the voiceof Lewis Jones is thick with pride whenhe talks about passing ownership to hisdaughter. “I was willing to go the extramile in teaching her everything I could,”he said, “because she and her first cousin(Lauren) are the future of this business.”

But he devoted time to his daughter notonly out of a sense of responsibility—something else guided him. Somethingyou don’t read about much in a businessmagazine. It’s called love.

That’s the thing that inspires a man tostand with his daughter at the edge of asteep drop, to ride with her across theWest, or set her free to paddle alone on awindy lake. It’s just love.

» Listen to SNEWS® Live interviews withathletes, explorers, innovators, differencemakers and more at www.snewsnet.com/podcasts.

a difficult freshman year, she went on anOutward Bound trip that opened her eyes tothe fact that her true desire was to not onlyhave a career in the outdoor industry, butto also explore her writing talent.

“I realized that I was much more at homein the outdoor industry,” said Nikki. “Thethings I valued and were important in ourhousehold—the sense of adventure, andhaving a passion for being outside—arerefreshing, familiar and comfortable to me.”

Not only did Nikki get past her trepi-dation, but also she has been introducedto her father’s friends in the industry, whoare like extended family. “What my daddoes is not just a job for him, because heloves the people so much. And not under-standing that or being a part of it wouldbe a huge part of my dad I would bemissing out on,” she said.

It’s not surprising that a young womanwould want to set a separate course, and itwouldn’t be shocking if she feltuncomfortable with her fatherbeing so connected to herprofessional life. After all,fathers feel an urge toprotect their daughters—maybe more so thantheir sons—and inter-ject themselves intosituations to fix prob-lems. But all of thewomen we interviewedhad a common threadrunning through their lives—their fathers offered advice, butlet them solve their own issues.

“He’s pretty hands-off when it comes tomy development with the company,” AllisonSweasy said regarding her father. “He willbe my mentor, and if I have problems orquestions, I can go to him. But as far asmy training and my development withinthe organization, he thinks there are otherpeople in the organization more suited tohelp me in the specifics of my job.”

Some situations dictate that a parentand child not discuss specific businessissues outside of the work environment.Jeff Blumenfeld does independent publicrelations work for CW-X, where hisdaughter works. To avoid conflicts, thetwo avoid conversations about specificcompany matters.

Another concern is perceived favoritism.When Julia expressed interest in workingin the outdoor industry, her father intro-duced her to people at CW-X, but he wascareful not to campaign for her to be hired.In fact, Jeff and company leaders met totalk about possible concerns should CW-X


“I realizedthat I was muchmore AT HOMEin the outdoor

industry.”

» Nikki and Michael Hodgson

—Nikki Hodgson


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38-45_Advisory_Dads_WG.qxd 12/19/07 4:07 PM Page 43


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special feature like - Amazon Web Servicesstatic-snews.s3.amazonaws.com/.../Winter08_special_feature.pdf · While growing up, she had other ... would go on ski trips,” said Julia,