Driving Momentum in Arkansas' Climbing Economy with Dennis Nelms

Dennis Nelms: 00:00:00

And when you look at the central US, and you look

Dennis Nelms: 00:00:04

at what climbing availability there is, if you go from Chicago

Dennis Nelms: 00:00:09

to Houston, and then out to Oklahoma City, and over to

Dennis Nelms: 00:00:14

Memphis say 85% of the climbing in that whole area is here in

Dennis Nelms: 00:00:18

the Ozarks.

Brent Williams: 00:00:19

Welcome to the Be Epic podcast brought to you

Brent Williams: 00:00:21

by the Sam M. Walton College of Business at the University of

Brent Williams: 00:00:25

Arkansas. I'm your host Brent Williams. Together, we'll

Brent Williams: 00:00:29

explore the dynamic landscape of business and uncover the

Brent Williams: 00:00:33

strategies, insights, and stories that drive business

Brent Williams: 00:00:36

today. Well, today, I have with me, Dennis Nelms and Dennis owns

Brent Williams: 00:00:44

Climb Solutions LLC, based out of Northwest Arkansas. So

Brent Williams: 00:00:48

Dennis, thanks for joining me today.

Dennis Nelms: 00:00:50

You're welcome. Thanks for having me here.

Brent Williams: 00:00:52

Well, excited to have you here. And talk about

Brent Williams: 00:00:57

outdoor recreation. We're going to talk about climbing more

Brent Williams: 00:01:00

specifically. But maybe I need to start with you. Tell me a

Brent Williams: 00:01:06

little bit about you. Tell me about your background. And then

Brent Williams: 00:01:09

we'll kind of get into how you got into climbing.

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:11

Ok. So we don't have that much time. So I'll

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:15

keep it short as I can. But I grew up here in Fayetteville,

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:19

went to the U of A and was introduced climbing and when I

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:23

was 20. I was going to a fraternity and just I was a lost

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:27

ex football player that had no direction and just got hooked

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:32

and just fell in love with it and decided that's what I wanted

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:36

to do with my time. And so I've over a period of time learned as

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:41

much as I could here in Northwest Arkansas and then set

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:45

off for a 10 year journey and lived out of my truck and

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:49

traveled all over the country to different climbing areas and

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:53

destinations and worked around outdoor education in the summer

Dennis Nelms: 00:01:58

times where I the focus was climbing. But it was a lot of

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:02

backpacking and soul searching for kids. And then in the

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:06

wintertime I worked around the ski industry as a ski technician

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:10

working on skis because I grew up working on cars as a kid. And

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:15

that was kind of the beginning of my journey. Fast forward

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:19

three decades later. Here we are. Back in Arkansas. I had

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:23

worked with my dad on on development of of Adventure

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:27

Subaru and worked really hard on that. And then in 2013, I

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:31

decided I want to get back to climbing and spend more time on

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:36

that. So started looking at other business ventures that

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:40

would incorporate climbing and kind of stumbled across climbing

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:44

gyms I didn't do a lot of climbing in gyms, actually been

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:49

maybe half a dozen times before deciding that was where I was

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:53

going to spend some energy. And partnered with some guys out of

Dennis Nelms: 00:02:58

Nashville and we built Climb Bentonville. And in that I've

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:02

since kind of stepped back and I'm not involved in operations,

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:06

and still kind of twiddling my thumbs thinking what am I gonna

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:11

do next. And then mer met the guys at Ropeswing in the

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:15

process. Got got to really know Gary Vernon. And he kept asking

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:19

me questions about climbing. And so I was like, look, just,

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:24

let's, let's just start doing this consulting and I'll help

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:28

you kind of formulate a plan. And so over the last three years

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:32

I've been working pretty, pretty much full time on, you know, the

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:37

strategy for accessibility for climbing in the state and what

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:41

does that really look like? You know, what we're trying to

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:46

achieve is make this the most accessible, accessible and

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:50

easiest place to learn to climbing in this in the country.

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:54

You know, when you look at climbing areas across country,

Dennis Nelms: 00:03:58

there's the Yosemite valleys and the Grand Tetons and these

Dennis Nelms: 00:04:02

amazing iconic places. Arkansas is never going to be that but

Dennis Nelms: 00:04:07

what they what we do have is a massive amount of moderate or

Dennis Nelms: 00:04:11

easier to middle easy climbing compared to most places in the

Dennis Nelms: 00:04:16

country. So we've kind of brought it down to the idea that

Dennis Nelms: 00:04:20

we're really going to focus on what we have as an asset and

Dennis Nelms: 00:04:24

we're going to spend our time promoting that and going forward

Brent Williams: 00:04:29

Well, Dennis as a as a native Arkansan, you

Brent Williams: 00:04:29

with that.

Brent Williams: 00:04:32

know, having grown up here and spent the majority of my life

Brent Williams: 00:04:36

here you know, I've I've always thought you know, what an

Brent Williams: 00:04:40

amazing set of assets this state has in the outdoors, you know,

Brent Williams: 00:04:45

and, and you go across the state and you know, Northwest Arkansas

Brent Williams: 00:04:50

is beautiful, the, the delta is beautiful in a different way,

Brent Williams: 00:04:54

you know, and and then you go to South Arkansas and yet in

Brent Williams: 00:04:58

another way. So there's this diversity. But what's what I

Brent Williams: 00:05:02

think is really cool is how as a state we're really kind of

Brent Williams: 00:05:07

embracing outdoor recreation and growing that economy. And across

Brent Williams: 00:05:11

the state, I just kind of wondered like, you know, how do

Brent Williams: 00:05:16

you see that? What are you seeing happening throughout the state?

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:20

Well, I think for me to really understand and

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:24

appreciate how much we really had, I did need to leave and go

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:28

to these most these amazing and iconic places. I mean, I was

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:32

backpacking in Sequoia and Kings Canyon with kids, or spending my

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:37

time climbing walls in Yosemite, or or going up and climbing

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:41

Mount Rainier in Washington, and they are all so amazing. But I,

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:46

I kept coming back to how amazing Arkansas is and nobody

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:50

knows it. I mean, I would get questions like, oh, you know how

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:54

to tie your shoes? You're from Arkansas Oh. You mean you can

Dennis Nelms: 00:05:59

you can read? You know, which I barely can. But it's like,

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:03

people really underestimate what we have here. And to your point,

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:07

you look at the Delta, my wife's from Dumas, Southeast Arkansas,

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:12

and I never spent any time down there. But the beauty there is

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:17

phenomenal. Just those, those big Cottonwood bottoms and just

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:21

amazing terrain. And then you come up here and it's just

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:25

these, the relief when you go into the Buffalo area is 1000

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:29

feet. And that's big. And that's I mean, it's really big compared

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:34

to a lot of places. And those, the terrain there is just

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:38

incredibly rugged. And there's so much diversity in these these

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:42

different areas. And then you go to the Ouachitas and they're

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:47

proper mountains. I was just climbing down there about three

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:51

months ago, and it felt like I was in the Sierras. And I just,

Dennis Nelms: 00:06:56

I never realized what we had before I left. And then when I

Dennis Nelms: 00:07:00

came back, I was like, oh my gosh, there's just so much here.

Dennis Nelms: 00:07:04

And we were just tipping into it and and what has been done with

Dennis Nelms: 00:07:09

the cycling, it's just like opened the door. And I think

Dennis Nelms: 00:07:13

that there's when you look at the diversity of the terrain and

Dennis Nelms: 00:07:17

the people that are coming here, it's just, it's just blowing up

Dennis Nelms: 00:07:22

in a lot of ways and it's just now starting.

Brent Williams: 00:07:25

You know, as I was telling you earlier, you

Brent Williams: 00:07:30

know, when I've had a chance to talk with Gary Vernon, I felt

Brent Williams: 00:07:33

very comfortable because, you know, I love to ride bicycles.

Brent Williams: 00:07:37

And I don't probably wouldn't have had I not been living here,

Brent Williams: 00:07:42

but amazing accessibility, to be able to ride a bicycle, whether

Brent Williams: 00:07:48

that's on the Razorback Greenway, or a world class

Brent Williams: 00:07:51

mountain biking trail, I don't have any experience as a

Brent Williams: 00:07:55

climber. And so I guess a key part of the strategy of what you

Brent Williams: 00:07:59

said that that was interesting to me is that you're really

Brent Williams: 00:08:04

trying to focus on you know, I guess the ability for someone to

Brent Williams: 00:08:08

get started into and easier to moderate climbs if I heard that

Brent Williams: 00:08:12

correctly.

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:13

And in there's been a huge uptick since the,

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:17

over the last decade, with climbing gyms becoming more and

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:20

more prevalent, the accessibility of climbing is, is

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:24

increasing more and more. And when you look at the central US,

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:30

and you look at what climbing availability there is, if you go

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:34

from Chicago to Houston, and then out to Oklahoma City, and

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:38

over to Memphis say 85% of the climate in that whole area is

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:44

here in the Ozarks. It is a huge density of really good high

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:49

quality rock. And so as those gyms pop up in those different

Dennis Nelms: 00:08:56

Metro flexes and regions, people start getting more and more

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:00

curious. And so the availability of what does that really mean

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:05

accessibility? And I've really been thinking a lot about that

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:09

it's accessible to culture, you know, the different cultures, is

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:15

it accessible to just general population? What does that

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:18

really look like? And how do you learn? I mean, you go to a

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:24

YouTube video and trust your life with it. I mean, that's a

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:28

little scary. And then you go to a gym and, you know, the gyms

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:33

are about the environment inside those walls. And so part of this

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:41

is about how do we transition people from those gyms to more

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:46

outdoor climbing and and the adventurous side of climbing.

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:52

You know, rightly so, if you're new to climbing and you have no

Dennis Nelms: 00:09:56

one to show you what's what to do. It can be very dangerous.

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:00

There's that's the reality of it. But with some education with

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:04

some understanding, it becomes very safe. In fact, I would

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:08

argue, I've been hurt more on mountain bikes than I have

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:11

climbing in three decades.

Brent Williams: 00:10:13

Well maybe I might kind of build off of that

Brent Williams: 00:10:16

point and ask you a question. You know, when you think about a

Brent Williams: 00:10:19

University of Arkansas student, so, you know, roughly 32,000,

Brent Williams: 00:10:25

you know, ish students on this campus, we in the Walton College

Brent Williams: 00:10:29

are going to have between eight and 9000, you know, at a given

Brent Williams: 00:10:34

time, and many have grown up here, many have not, you know,

Brent Williams: 00:10:38

the other parts of Arkansas, other states. And, you know, so

Brent Williams: 00:10:41

I think they're, they're an interesting audience here. Maybe

Brent Williams: 00:10:45

they haven't ever been climb, or they haven't grown up doing it.

Brent Williams: 00:10:49

What do you suggest is the like, alright, first step, is this?

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:53

Yeah, get your toes wet.

Brent Williams: 00:10:55

Yeah, exactly.

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:56

Start with the Rec Center. There's a bouldering

Dennis Nelms: 00:10:59

wall at the record center, and there is a climbing wall, at the

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:02

HPER, you know, go there, get a little bit of instruction from

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:06

them and get a sense of what it's like. It's not going to

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:10

speak to everyone. But those that it does speak to, they seem

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:15

to be very passionate about it.

Brent Williams: 00:11:17

Yeah.

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:17

So you know, that's a good place to start.

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:20

Then when you you know, if you feel that that itch, then it's

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:25

time to start looking at local gyms. Currently, there's about

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:29

three local gyms that you can start looking at and dabbling

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:33

into climbing. And then there's a plethora of, of resources out

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:38

there to kind of look for areas to climb. The big disconnect

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:43

right now is that mentor to mentorship. So when I started

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:47

climbing, there was probably for one really seasoned climber,

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:51

there were 10 other climbers that wanted to get that

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:54

mentorship. And it was an easy conversion, it wasn't so hard to

Dennis Nelms: 00:11:58

find those people. Today, it's like one in 150 and 200, who

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:03

knows, there's not a ton of old turds like me running around

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:08

that are, you know, excited about instruction. So it's,

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:12

it's, there is kind of this disconnect right now. But there

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:15

are a lot of organizations out there that you can get good

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:18

information from NOLS is where I went National Outdoor Leadership

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:23

School, they're based out of Lander, Wyoming, American Alpine

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:27

Club, another great organization, the access fund,

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:30

these are that's a conservation. They, they preserve for debt

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:35

climbing for, for climbers getting involved in and then

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:40

locally, there's a great organization called the Arkansas

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:42

climbers coalition,

Brent Williams: 00:12:43

Okay.

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:44

And this is made up of climbers, it's all

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:46

volunteer, they do. They go out and they work on trying to make

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:50

sure things are safe for climbers, they rebolt old

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:53

equipment that's, that's out there, and they try to update

Dennis Nelms: 00:12:56

it. And so there's a lot of education involved in that. They

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:02

put on a huge thing every spring, Arkansas Climbers

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:06

Festival, and that's another incredible resources for people

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:10

to learn how to do it.

Brent Williams: 00:13:12

Interesting. Well, I get this question comes

Brent Williams: 00:13:16

to mind. You know, I mean, of course, I've known climbing

Brent Williams: 00:13:20

existed. And like I said, I haven't really haven't really

Brent Williams: 00:13:23

done it. But the movie free solo or the documentary free solo

Brent Williams: 00:13:27

came out. Right. And that's been a few years ago. I assume that

Brent Williams: 00:13:32

is that a wonder if it's a blessing or a curse to climbing?

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:36

It's a blessing in a lot of ways. Yeah. Now, I will

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:39

tell you I know Alex,

Brent Williams: 00:13:40

Okay.

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:40

I've met him before and we've actually

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:42

climbed together. He is a very calculated, smart individual.

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:48

They make him out as this kind of quirky dude, he's not

Brent Williams: 00:13:50

Okay.

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:51

He's, he's, he very much knows what he's doing

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:54

when he does it. And, you know, it was an incredible feat what

Dennis Nelms: 00:13:59

he did, and before him, Kevin Jorgensen and Tommy Caldwell

Dennis Nelms: 00:14:04

doing the Dawn Wall, there was a seven year endeavor for them to

Dennis Nelms: 00:14:08

do that, that route. And those things kind of perpetuate

Dennis Nelms: 00:14:12

climbing to the front line. Whereas it's always been on the

Dennis Nelms: 00:14:16

fringe. But, you know, that kind of climbing is, is on the upper

Dennis Nelms: 00:14:24

upper upper upper end.

Dennis Nelms: 00:14:25

And, you know, so it's not the everyday

Brent Williams: 00:14:25

Yeah.

Brent Williams: 00:14:30

experience. You know, the everyday experience is, you and

Brent Williams: 00:14:35

me going out and I lead up and set up the ropes and you go up

Brent Williams: 00:14:40

and you're comfortably there. And if you fall you just stop

Brent Williams: 00:14:44

and nothing happens. You give it a second, then you get your

Brent Williams: 00:14:48

hands back on and keep keep climbing. And the equipment that

Brent Williams: 00:14:53

we use is incredibly redundant. It's like the the amount of

Brent Williams: 00:14:58

force it takes to break the equipment is about 10 times what

Brent Williams: 00:15:03

the body could withstand.

Brent Williams: 00:15:04

Okay.

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:04

So it's not going to give, it's only human error.

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:09

And that goes back to the education piece. Where you find

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:12

that mentor? What how do you get educated to do this? So, yeah

Brent Williams: 00:15:19

Well, I know that I knew that I had to at

Brent Williams: 00:15:22

least have create a increased interest. Uh, you know, over

Brent Williams: 00:15:24

time

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:25

It did. The accident numbers haven't

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:28

changed. You know, the, the amount of people coming to the

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:32

sport has not, like ticked up dramatically, it already is

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:36

going 10 fold every year. Well, 10%, over year over year, okay,

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:41

for the last decade. You know, I think it did spark that, like

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:48

that adventurous side and climbers. Yeah, and get them

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:52

kind of excited about what's new. And what's exciting in

Dennis Nelms: 00:15:57

climbing.

Brent Williams: 00:15:58

Well, let's maybe talk about climbing and

Brent Williams: 00:16:01

how it relates to the economy. So, you know, I would say, when

Brent Williams: 00:16:06

I think about the connection between outdoor recreation, our

Brent Williams: 00:16:10

economy, I guess I think about it in a couple of ways, we'd

Brent Williams: 00:16:13

love to get your thoughts, and I'm sure you're thinking about

Brent Williams: 00:16:17

it. Even more in depth, but but one, these experiences add

Brent Williams: 00:16:24

quality of life, or, you know, and as, as people choose to

Brent Williams: 00:16:30

found businesses, and grow their businesses here, and or relocate

Brent Williams: 00:16:36

their businesses here, I think this is an important part of the

Brent Williams: 00:16:38

economic development story of our state. And then I believe

Brent Williams: 00:16:43

that anytime, you know, you see, you see an industry start to pop

Brent Williams: 00:16:47

up. Well, now there's economic development around that

Brent Williams: 00:16:50

industry, the different businesses to support it. So how

Brent Williams: 00:16:53

are you thinking about that?

Dennis Nelms: 00:16:54

Well, I think as a business owner, and I look at,

Dennis Nelms: 00:16:58

like places that I would want to be and the places that I've

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:01

been, you know, we really have a good here. I mean, we, we really

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:05

have an amazing community. And then on top of that, all of a

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:10

sudden, we actually have better recreation than most places in

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:13

the country. And people are just not realizing it. Now, we as

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:17

native Arkansans, probably you already knew this, right? I

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:21

mean, I did. But I just knew that it had not been tapped into

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:25

like it is today. And so that narrative of you mean, you wear

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:32

shoes, or, you know, what's going on in Arkansas? Where is

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:37

that exactly That narrative is shifting. And so, you know, when

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:44

I look at living spaces for a business, if I think about what

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:49

is it that's really going to attract people to my business,

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:54

it's what we do in our, in our time, what we choose to do is

Dennis Nelms: 00:17:59

the most important time of our lives, we choose to go to work.

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:05

But we have to, we choose to drive a car, but we have to, we

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:11

choose to ride a bike, because we want to

Brent Williams: 00:18:13

Yeah,

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:14

We choose the fish, because that's our, that's

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:17

what really pushes us, we choose to climb because that is what

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:22

really gets us excited to live. And when you have a place that

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:26

gives you so many options like we have here, it's a no brainer.

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:32

I mean, if I want to recruit good quality staff, if I'm

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:35

looking to really perpetuate a good quality company, I know

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:40

that inevitably, it comes down to how happy those people really

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:44

are. And if they are live in a space, that gives them the

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:49

opportunity to have happiness, you're gonna hit a homerun, you

Dennis Nelms: 00:18:54

know.

Brent Williams: 00:18:54

Yeah, I mean, it's a key part of the value

Brent Williams: 00:18:58

proposition of living in this state. And I think why people

Brent Williams: 00:19:01

are seeing this state as a place that they want to move to, and

Brent Williams: 00:19:05

that clearly has been the case, it was the case pre pandemic,

Brent Williams: 00:19:08

but that certainly accelerated to some degree and it's, as you

Brent Williams: 00:19:13

know, still growing

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:14

You I'm a great example of it. I was an Arkansan

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:18

that was just like, you know, I got what I got, but I'm gonna go

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:22

really see the big world. And I went and did it. And I lived in

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:25

some most some of the most iconic places in the country

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:29

lives in Santa Cruz, California and jet and Jackson Hole,

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:32

Wyoming, and Portland, Oregon. You know, these places are

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:35

amazing in their own right. But every place I went, I was like,

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:38

yeah, it's not as good as just like, it's cool. You know, it's

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:45

amazing in its own way, but it's like when you try to put the

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:48

whole package together when I think about when I thought about

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:52

raising a family. I immediately thought about coming back here

Dennis Nelms: 00:19:57

is just the this how much we have here. It's all there, it's

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:04

just not really seen as much as those other places. And it kind

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:10

of goes back to what we have, you know, as far as like the

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:15

terrain and things like that it can be the capital of the world

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:19

in a lot of ways. But it can also be the best place to grow.

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:23

And to have growth as an individual, in a lot of ways,

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:26

too.

Brent Williams: 00:20:27

Yeah, it's just a wonderful place to grow a

Brent Williams: 00:20:30

business. And, you know, as you think about what opportunities

Brent Williams: 00:20:35

you see around climbing, coming, you know, over the next, and I

Brent Williams: 00:20:39

don't know how far you're thinking out three 5, 10 years,

Brent Williams: 00:20:43

you know, but how do you see that economy specifically around

Brent Williams: 00:20:47

climbing, needing to develop maybe is the right question?

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:50

Yeah, well, I think that as businesses

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:53

continue to develop, you know, and as employees age over time,

Dennis Nelms: 00:20:59

you know, you're not going to always be able to push yourself

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:02

to the hardest levels, especially into my age. You

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:08

know, it's more the accessibility of those things.

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:11

And, you know, when you start looking at, I can see me climb

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:15

till I'm 90, it just as long as I don't fall off my bike.

Brent Williams: 00:21:23

Not fall off the side of a mountain, I see.

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:26

You know, I can see that here. Yeah, it's not,

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:30

it's not out of the realm. And so that accessibility here is

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:36

just like, I mean, I got climbing 10 minutes outdoors,

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:39

ten minutes from my house. And there's not a lot of places in

Dennis Nelms: 00:21:43

the country, you can do that.

Brent Williams: 00:21:44

You know, when I, when I talked with Gary, that

Brent Williams: 00:21:47

was a key learning about the cycling strategy, in in our

Brent Williams: 00:21:52

state was having it in about accessibility, but proximity to

Brent Williams: 00:21:57

where people live. And so you see that same thing in climbing?

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:00

Well, Gary's a really smart dude. And, you

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:07

know, it really he keyed me into this very early on is like,

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:10

realizing how important that is, that is really turning

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:16

development of climbing on its head. Because what it's always

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:20

been is go out and do your hard project, like the Dawn Wall,

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:24

and, you know, or we're, you know, you go to that project,

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:28

and you do it well, what we're doing here is we're we're taking

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:31

the cues from the cycling and saying, no, we're going to

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:34

develop the local areas first. And then you, then you get

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:39

interested in your projects. And so we're really turning it

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:43

upside down in the climbing community. And it's really, you

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:50

know, when, when, when Gary and all those guys started working

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:52

on this, people were like, this isn't gonna work. This is, this

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:55

is crazy. Now they're coming here going, how did you do this?

Dennis Nelms: 00:22:58

We want to do it. You know, and I, I foresee, this being the

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:05

conduit for shockwaves, across the climate community across the

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:09

country, the way we're approaching this, this overall

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:12

strategy for the state. You know, it's just really different

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:17

the way it's ever been approached.

Brent Williams: 00:23:19

And do you see, you know, for the different

Brent Williams: 00:23:21

areas of focus in Northwest Arkansas, and Arkansas, more

Brent Williams: 00:23:26

broadly, around cycling, and climbing and paddling? I assume

Brent Williams: 00:23:31

you're seeing synergies across those different ones,

Brent Williams: 00:23:34

particularly from a tourism standpoint?

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:36

That's right. And I think the big takeaway there

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:40

is, the big takeaway for me is, take the assets that you have

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:46

and look at those things and how can you maximize them here in

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:49

Arkansas, and draw from that? If you've got a rock outcropping

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:54

close to your downtown center, focus on that, if you've got a

Dennis Nelms: 00:23:58

river or stream, focus on that, if you've got these amazing

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:02

deltas, focus on that, but really look at the natural

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:06

resources and figure out how to promote those things. Because

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:10

right now, you go down in areas and those are kind of in the

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:14

ditches. But the reality is, that's the gold for these

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:19

communities. That's where they can really revitalize these

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:25

these rural areas that are they're losing every day.

Brent Williams: 00:24:29

But that is a natural asset that really can be

Brent Williams: 00:24:32

leveraged in a strong way. I agree with you.

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:34

That is your gold. To me, it's like that's exactly

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:39

what we're doing with the cycling. We are taking the

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:41

terrain and turning it into gold. I mean, Bella Vista is a

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:45

great example. I mean, that terrain has been sitting there

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:49

for eons and no one knew what to do with it. And all they had to

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:54

do was say yes, and now they got 80 miles a trail that is

Dennis Nelms: 00:24:58

phenomenal.

Brent Williams: 00:24:59

Phenomenal trails. That's exactly right.

Brent Williams: 00:25:02

Well, as you sort of look back at your journey, I'm interested

Brent Williams: 00:25:07

in some of your learnings, and particularly maybe, you know,

Brent Williams: 00:25:10

you were a U of A student that at one time, so if you were, if

Brent Williams: 00:25:14

you were looking back and you know, getting one to pursue this

Brent Williams: 00:25:18

passion of climbing, and I know, you know, you spent many years

Brent Williams: 00:25:22

working in the automotive industry and your family's

Brent Williams: 00:25:26

business that was very customer service focused, just you know,

Brent Williams: 00:25:30

you're kind of talking to that student what's, what's some key

Brent Williams: 00:25:34

learnings and advice?

Dennis Nelms: 00:25:35

I think, you know, doing the work, you know, being

Dennis Nelms: 00:25:39

willing to put the time in, but the only way to do that, and

Dennis Nelms: 00:25:43

this may sound cliche, but follow your passion, whatever

Dennis Nelms: 00:25:47

that is. My dad loved drag racing when he was 10 years old.

Dennis Nelms: 00:25:53

His dad was a mechanic. And so what did he do? He followed his

Dennis Nelms: 00:25:57

passion, became one of the most prominent car dealers in

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:00

Northwest Arkansas. He was the dealer of the year last year for

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:06

Subaru, you know, after almost five decades, in that business,

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:12

follow your passion. You know, and this is, it's hard to

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:18

separate that when you are struggling to make ends meet,

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:22

paying off those loans doing what you do, and you commit

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:26

yourself to something. But at the end of the day, if you

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:30

follow that passion, you're going to spend that extra mot

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:34

minute you're going to, you're going to wake up in the middle,

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:36

like that's the answer. That's it. Because it's in you. It's

Dennis Nelms: 00:26:43

no, it's not external to you.

Brent Williams: 00:26:46

Yeah, yeah. I love that notion of something

Brent Williams: 00:26:50

you said about one being present and working hard, I continue to

Brent Williams: 00:26:54

hear that, you know, in just about everybody I talked to,

Brent Williams: 00:26:59

like, just do great at what you're doing. Love it, you know,

Brent Williams: 00:27:02

and pursue what you really enjoy. And there's a lot of

Brent Williams: 00:27:06

passion, a lot, a lot of joy in that.

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:08

The only other thing I'd say there is there's

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:10

no job underneath anyone. And the reason I say that is because

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:19

I mean, at one point, I was picking food out of dumpsters to

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:23

make ends meet to go climb. That was my passion. And sometimes

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:30

you just have to pick up the mop and mop the floor no matter what

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:35

happens, because that's what has to happen. And I think that

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:40

there's a disconnect there with a lot of people, it's like, oh,

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:43

if I can't do that job, I'm not going to do a job, then that's

Dennis Nelms: 00:27:46

just not the way success works.

Brent Williams: 00:27:51

You know, I think I think that's a great

Brent Williams: 00:27:52

characteristic of many of the great leaders that we know, that

Brent Williams: 00:27:58

have always been willing to do to do any job, you know, and

Brent Williams: 00:28:02

whatever it takes to get that job done.

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:05

Well my dad when I was a kid, he told me this, he

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:07

probably didn't remember saying this. He's like, son, you can

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:09

run a business, taking care of the coffeemaker. You know, you,

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:14

you do the work, you put the time in, and you will figure out

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:18

how to make things work.

Brent Williams: 00:28:20

Well, Dennis, thank you for what you're doing

Brent Williams: 00:28:23

in our region and in our state to advance outdoor recreation

Brent Williams: 00:28:28

and the economy around it. Thanks for being willing to come

Brent Williams: 00:28:32

back and spend some time with us today.

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:34

Awesome. Yeah. It's great to be back at the

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:36

university.

Brent Williams: 00:28:37

Wonderful. Well, thank you so much.

Dennis Nelms: 00:28:39

Thank you.

Brent Williams: 00:28:41

On behalf of the Walton College thank you for

Brent Williams: 00:28:43

joining us for this captivating conversation. To stay connected

Brent Williams: 00:28:47

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