Outdoor Retailer - Winter 2016 - 72

How I Got Here: w/ Timmy O'Neill
EACH ONE OF US IS A HUMAN
SPECIALTY RETAILER. BELIEVING
IN YOUR PRODUCT, BE IT ITEM OR
ISM, IS CRITICAL TO THE SALE.
took note of my congenial disposition and assigned me the job of clerk at the Old Faithful
Lodge gift shop. Still clothed in earth-tone
polyesters after a work day spent finding the
right size t-shirt or proper ISO of film and
explaining the lustrous quality of the BlackHills-gold figurines, I'd hike miles into distant, person-less geyser basins.
The humdrum predictability of punching
clocks and chasing GPAs became the transcendent combination of wildness expressed
in wilderness. I found the rocks the following
year when I was working as a grocery clerk in
Yosemite National Park. The path less traveled eventually became no path at all-I disappeared into boulder fields and mountain
chasms. I lost the burnish of the comfortable
and replaced it with the stains, scabs and joy of
the voluntary adventure nomad.
I became a dirtbag climber.

Born Salesman
For this pro climber, entertainer, advocate and one-time outdoorspecialty-shop employee, selling product was just the first,
interlinked step to selling the sheer passion of the outdoors.
I WAS BORN A SALESMAN. MY FIRST DEAL
was that plaintive pitch for the nipple. Later,
as the fifth child of seven, savvy of sibling rivalry, I crafted a daily spiel to get fed. I also created distinctive, winning campaigns based on
breakfast cereal selection and the TV channel.
At 10 years old with ink-blackened hands and
rubber bands around my wrists, I went door
to door with newspapers. Later, I'd peddle the

72 OUTDOOR RETAILER

/ Winter 2016

seasonal needs of cut grass and shoveled snow
to those same neighborhood doors.
At 19, disillusioned with higher education's
13th grade and bored with the grind of manual
labor, I bought into the promise of Western
horizons and the images of rivers pouring
forth from forested peaks. I took a $69 oneway Greyhound ride from Philadelphia to
Yellowstone National Park. Human resources

AFTER SEVEN YEARS OF BACKPACK,
bus and thumb, I emerged from the wilderness and followed a girl to Telluride.
Aesthetically tucked into a stunning deadend canyon, it's the quintessential Colorado
mountain town: a former 1800s mining
enclave evolved into a ski resort and real estate bonanza. I fell doubly in love. (I remain
devoted to the town.) Places like this attract
the danger-polymaths, those devoted to encyclopedic learning and living on the edge.
Whether by boat, rope, ski, wing or wheel, the
key when you move to a town like this is to connect with the natural world. And to that end,
it's critical to have the correct fastener. The
requisite formula is to get a job, get the funds
and then get the gear.
Soon, I met the Jagged Edge Mountain
Gear twins Margaret and Paula, and I landed
my first position in the outdoor industry,

Photograph by Alex Ekins

Outdoor Retailer - Winter 2016

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