Evan Maynard: Gearhouse Seattle Your Outdoor Recreation Third Place for Community and Gear

Evan Maynard is our guest for this episode.  Evan is the founder of Gearhouse a outdoor gear rental company based in Seattle.

Have you ever rented outdoor equipment? Did you find the experience to be enjoyable? Was the gear what you were hoping it would be? Were you shown how to use the equipment? If you answered no to any of the above Gearhouse is here to help change your opinion.

Evan Maynard opened Gearhouse to help provide everyone looking to experience the outdoors the best possible experience when it comes to renting gear. For one fixed monthly fee you can rent the gear you need as many times as you need it.  No need to buy gear that you may only use once or twice. No need to store the gear using valuable space in your house. Gearhouse has you covered.

When you rent gear from Gearhouse they walk you through how to use the equipment, how to be safe, and how to have fun!

We talk about the vision for Gearhouse and how Evan wants Gearhouse to become the third place for outdoor enthusiasts in the greater Seattle area. They are even working on getting their beer license so you can have a pint of local beer while you are chatting with other outdoor fans.

Gearhouse has a very full calendar of fun events you can attend. From watching the Olympics, to ski waxing and much more.  Make sure you check out their calendar.

Evan is so passionate about the outdoors it is simply impossible to ignore.  If you want to try Gearhouse visit the website here.  Make sure you say hello to Evan when you visit.  It looks like Gearhouse is going to be making a huge impact on how we all get out and explore our amazing region.

Evan Maynard Gearhouse Episode Transcript

Scott Cowan [00:00:00]:

How often do you run

Evan Maynard [00:00:02]:

That’s a one off event.

Scott Cowan [00:00:02]:

A dating service for dogs, I guess. How’s that? Welcome to the Exploring Washington State podcast. Here’s your host, Scott Cowan. Alright. Welcome to this episode of the Exploring Washington State podcast. This is gonna be take two, folks. Technical difficulties, but you didn’t need to know that. But, anyway, Evan Maynard with Gearhouse is my guest.

Scott Cowan [00:00:43]:

Evan, please reintroduce yourself. I mean, I I kid. You know? We’re very transparent here. Welcome welcome back, Evan.

Evan Maynard [00:00:52]:

Thanks. Yeah. It’s good to be here. I don’t know if I should just repeat all the same jokes since the first time we did this. But,

Scott Cowan [00:00:59]:

So what’s your backstory? Tell us let’s let’s let’s let me let me put you on point here. How did you end up in Seattle? Because you’re not a native of Washington.

Evan Maynard [00:01:07]:

That’s right. I moved to Seattle in 02/2014. So getting up in the years to where I have to do the math with the year on the date. And I’m I moved so let’s see. I grew up in San Jose, California, went to Cleveland for four years, and everyone jokes like, why would you go from California to Cleveland? But I went for Case Western and then went to Purdue for grad school, after

Scott Cowan [00:01:32]:

that. K.

Evan Maynard [00:01:34]:

Got a real taste of what flatland life is like and decided I really didn’t like it. And you kinda learn all your hobbies revolve a mountain in the mountains when you go live in the Midwest, maybe. Mhmm. And so I looked at ways to get back home and tried to figure out, like, how I could live without having to get on two planes to get home. And after that, didn’t have any constraints. So, just kinda looked at what jobs I could get. Turns out all the jobs were either in California or Washington, and Seattle sounded a lot more appealing to me than Los Angeles, for many reasons, which probably will become obvious, and I’ve pretty much never left, pretty much like what I found here. So Alright.

Evan Maynard [00:02:18]:

For all the people that are tired of California, it’s like finding Seattle, like, I’m sorry. I tell all my friends that it rains here a lot, so they don’t move here, I guess.

Scott Cowan [00:02:28]:

Alright. Good. Thank you. That’s that’s what your that’s your job. You have to discourage more more people.

Evan Maynard [00:02:34]:

I’m a mole. I’m a Yeah. They’re

Scott Cowan [00:02:36]:

well, let me let me ask you something. Is Case Western University

Evan Maynard [00:02:42]:

Uh-huh.

Scott Cowan [00:02:43]:

Not a university. I’ve heard the name, but I know nothing about it. And you grew up in California. What drew you out? Why there? How’s let let me ask you that question. I mean, seriously, why Cleveland? But, no, why Case Western?

Evan Maynard [00:02:58]:

Yeah. For people that don’t know Case Western, it’s about 4,000 undergrads and 8,000 graduate students in the heart of Downtown Cleveland. Well, kind of like how U Dub is in Downtown Seattle. So a little bit outside, it’s got a university district and all. And how I end up there, I don’t maybe know. I was looking at really large colleges, and that one’s on the small side. And I was looking for an engineering program and also maybe some business, even though I didn’t end up pursuing any of the business side, in college. But I did stick to to the engineering side.

Evan Maynard [00:03:35]:

And I wanted to live in a city because I kinda had lived in suburbs, which is now kinda interesting that I’m into the outdoors as much as I am. But I’m also still living in the heart of a city, so that still rings true. So and then it was a strong school, but I think really the, the the real why is we went and visited and just hooked us for some reason that no one really explains.

Scott Cowan [00:03:58]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:03:59]:

And I wouldn’t trade that experience for the world. And then I went to Purdue and had a great time there. You know, heads down in the middle of cornfields, like, nothing better. You know, the only fun thing to do is is golf because you either have a cornfield or you have a golf course.

Scott Cowan [00:04:16]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:04:17]:

And I can’t say that I’ve golfed since, so maybe that shows. But when that was all the all my friends did is, like, well, you either were working at the lab or we were playing golf, and golf was a way to kinda get outside in the middle of the day instead of go drinking at the bars. I was like, oh, well, we’ll go drinking in the middle of the day. Sounds better.

Scott Cowan [00:04:34]:

Okay. Alright.

Evan Maynard [00:04:37]:

So

Scott Cowan [00:04:38]:

Well, Well, yeah. It’s just because it’s always interesting, you know, when you when you hear somebody like, oh, I grew up in place x, and then I went to school somewhere not I’ll call case question off the beaten path a little bit.

Evan Maynard [00:04:50]:

You know,

Scott Cowan [00:04:50]:

you didn’t you didn’t go to Purdue to start, if you will. You didn’t go to, you know, Notre Dame, Duke, USC, whatever, you know, big names that you hear about all the time. So I

Evan Maynard [00:05:00]:

mean, totally strange. Yeah. My it was fairly it was pretty normal in my on my graduating class to leave the state or to to leave town especially, even though it looks like Stanford and Berkeley right there. I mean, there’s phenomenal institutions.

Scott Cowan [00:05:14]:

Sure.

Evan Maynard [00:05:14]:

And still, everyone kind of scatters all over The US. And then it what’s also been true as we kind of see the grow up and see the results of that is almost everyone’s trying to get back to California except for me. But it’s a nice way to, like, go tour the country college, you know. Like, it’s a good way to go live somewhere. I don’t have to commit to living in the Midwest. Get to see

Scott Cowan [00:05:35]:

a whole new type of, you

Evan Maynard [00:05:36]:

know, politics and social culture and, you know, what what it means to be friendly.

Scott Cowan [00:05:42]:

Okay. So yeah. Alright. But you you went okay. So you grew up in kind of the Bay Area. You don’t have mountains in the backyard in the Bay Area. I mean, they’re the Sierra Nevadas were there. I mean, they’re not, you know, you can get to them in the day and all that.

Scott Cowan [00:05:56]:

What drew you because we had talked on the phone. You know, you’d mentioned you weren’t always the way you are, the hiking and and backpacking type of person that you are now. What what got how’d you get started? What was the where was the the genesis of this?

Evan Maynard [00:06:13]:

Genesis is interesting. I’d I’d argue there’s almost two of them, and maybe I don’t know if you had similar experience. I mean, you grew up here and you say you’re not outdoorsy, so I don’t know if you have a similar experience like this. Like, you grow up and you kind of like, I don’t know. My hobbies growing up were my parents’ hobbies. Okay. So my dad liked sailing, and he liked wrenching on cars, and he liked motorboats. And so we figured out all interesting ways to use those things.

Scott Cowan [00:06:37]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:06:37]:

And that’s why, I mean, I became a mechanical engineer because I was really interested in race cars and engines and combustion. And so I did all that. But I we did a lot about doors.

Scott Cowan [00:06:49]:

Let me interrupt you. I wanna ask you.

Evan Maynard [00:06:50]:

Yeah. Let

Scott Cowan [00:06:50]:

me interrupt you. What type of race cars? What were you what were you into?

Evan Maynard [00:06:55]:

Formula Fords. So, like, little like, a Formula Ford. They take, like, a Mini Cooper engine or, like, a four cylinder engine, and you stick it in an open wheel race car like what you see a Formula one car where the wheels are exposed, one person in a cockpit. And my dad decided that he wanted, my dad’s a character maybe is what the result of this podcast will be, but, he decided he wanted me to know, like and my brother too, I guess, how to, like, control a car in all situations, whether you’re out fooling around with your friends in a way you shouldn’t be or, you know, in ice and snow. And he figured the best way to do that was to put us in racing school.

Scott Cowan [00:07:37]:

Oh, okay. Alright.

Evan Maynard [00:07:41]:

And so that’s what we did. And so we did

Scott Cowan [00:07:43]:

How old were you

Evan Maynard [00:07:44]:

when we

Scott Cowan [00:07:44]:

put you in racing school?

Evan Maynard [00:07:46]:

15.

Scott Cowan [00:07:47]:

15. Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:07:47]:

Alright. And, and then we kind of, like, decided that was a really expensive way to do things. And so we went to, like, a much cheaper version, which is, like, you go to a parking lot with your car and they set out a bunch of cones and you drive it around and try not hit the cones. Okay. Okay. It would just can that either sounds fun or boring. And it turns out it’s a tremendous amount of fun, and it costs you, I don’t know, $50 for the day. Right.

Evan Maynard [00:08:11]:

And so that’s how I kinda got into cars and the whole culture on cars. And so I went to school and built race cars in college.

Scott Cowan [00:08:19]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:08:19]:

And then kinda was teasing this through and kinda was like, well, it seems like cars are dead or at least a dead end. Turns out to be colossally wrong. Like, ten years later, we’re still making amazing strides in combustion internal combustion engines. But, and that led me to the aerospace side. I got to work on a jet engine and, you know, they stood me in front of the jet engine for an internship, and that was the most amazing thing I’d you know, you’re sitting there and, you know, the thing is shaking your chest and you’re, you know, a hundred feet away from it and it’s bigger than you are and and you just say I’m in control of that thing and that that’s a pretty addictive thing to tell a, you know, a 19 year old.

Scott Cowan [00:08:59]:

Okay. Alright.

Evan Maynard [00:09:01]:

And so I went into aerospace, engineering, and that’s what brought me out here.

Scott Cowan [00:09:06]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:09:07]:

And and, you know, that’s an engine, a form of combustion, a form of, you know, power and and and impressive machines and all that.

Scott Cowan [00:09:15]:

Right. Right. Still okay. But so we I I sidetracked you because I was we’re trying to get to what got you into the outdoors the way you are now.

Evan Maynard [00:09:23]:

That’s right.

Scott Cowan [00:09:23]:

But we we went down the the jet engine rabbit hole. So pull you back. What what got you into the outdoors? What was that genesis?

Evan Maynard [00:09:31]:

So, yeah, we had a cabin in the mountains, which was good, and dad liked to do all sort of weird stuff. And so one summer, he decided to do, like, the summer of survival. And so he went bought, like, an SOS, you know, military survival guide thing that teaches you how to catch rabbits and build lean twos and stuff like that you’re supposed to keep in your pocket. And so in our mountain cabin, we spent all summer, like, trying to create, you know, like, fishing lure fishing line out of, you know, the grass straw and start fires with our bare hands. So, like, that was maybe, like and we were just outside a lot. You know, dad was always, like, go play outside, and outside was this this mountain habitat in the Sierra Nevadas that was fun. You know? But dad’s hobbies were all, like, motorsport driven. So I moved to Seattle, get here, realized, like, oh, I don’t have all my parents’ toys.

Evan Maynard [00:10:18]:

I don’t have the money to afford all my parents’ toys. I better find some new hobbies. Okay. And so that combined with maybe, like, I, you know, I was in a corporate environment and everyone here loves to be outside, and a lot of people had moved to Seattle for this, like, for the job. And so they also didn’t have their outdoorsy hobbies. And so they or they had gotten started because someone had said, hey, throw this stuff in a

Scott Cowan [00:10:48]:

backpack and come come with me

Evan Maynard [00:10:49]:

for the weekend. And you suffer through that. And that friend was kind enough to suffer. Let you suffer along with him and not say, like, oh, you’re gonna slow us down. And and you just do that. And for for ten years, and you become outdoorsy, I guess.

Scott Cowan [00:11:05]:

Okay. Alright.

Evan Maynard [00:11:08]:

And, like, yeah. I I don’t consider myself outdoorsy compared to, like, the next level of outdoorsy person, which I think maybe I don’t know if you you like. I’m not outdoorsy because you like bedroom service. Right? But

Scott Cowan [00:11:18]:

maybe right. I’m bedroom service is camping. Exactly.

Evan Maynard [00:11:21]:

That’s right. But maybe you’re outdoorsy compared to, like, someone who lives in New York City, and they’re like, wow. I can never do what you do. Right?

Scott Cowan [00:11:27]:

Probably not to be fair. To be fair, probably not. But I I, yeah, I understand what you’re trying to say.

Evan Maynard [00:11:32]:

And so I have, yeah, next level. But then now with Gearhouse, what I’m realizing is, like, oh, I’m on a different level that could be intimidating to people new. Right? Sure. I think that’s I don’t recognize that because you don’t look at yourself that way. So I guess the summary is a bunch of people dragged me along on their trips and allowed me to slow them down and learn how to do it while they tried to keep along. And, you know, you end up in uncomfortable situations. You go on those trips that your friend says is easy and it’s the worst thing you’ve ever done. And then you’re, like, think I’m never doing this again while you’re out there.

Evan Maynard [00:12:07]:

And then you get home and think about a little more and you can’t stick to thinking about it and you’re like, wow, that was amazing and let’s do that again. Or maybe the engineer in me is like, well, I can make that a lot better by doing this. And I’m like, well, how you know it’s gonna work? Better try it. And you’re like, oh, suddenly, you’re on another backpacking trip. So Alright.

Scott Cowan [00:12:28]:

Well, there’s there’s a big jump between being outdoorsy and going on backpack backpacking trips and launching a company.

Evan Maynard [00:12:36]:

We got a long way to go down this path.

Scott Cowan [00:12:39]:

Yeah. I mean so so alright. So you moved to Seattle. You don’t have your parents’ toys. You you you you you tag along with some friends. We have you ever before this, did you ever think of yourself as entrepreneurial?

Evan Maynard [00:12:56]:

No. Okay. So my dad is an entrepreneur. Like, ran his own business the whole nines. Turns out after starting a company or two of them, I guess, and then looking at my family history, I realized that every one of my my dad’s one of six, I think. Six. And every one of them none of them have corporate jobs except for one’s a a lawyer. And even then, he’s, like, not a corporate lawyer.

Evan Maynard [00:13:18]:

He’s like a family practice. So Okay. I guess it runs in the blood. If if you believe that kind of thing, I don’t really.

Scott Cowan [00:13:24]:

But You you well, whether it runs in the blood or not, family gatherings were full of entrepreneurial people. Yeah. So you were just exposed to their their you were exposed to it versus exposed to a family of, you know, corporate executives, if you will. You know?

Evan Maynard [00:13:41]:

True. I think the thing that’s most into like, attractive, I guess, like, if you why did I decide to I had an awesome career. I was having fun with it. It was like I grew up playing a lot of high school sports, which I don’t know. I think about high school sports is the strangest situation I can imagine. It’s like all these people are fought working so hard for this thing that everyone knows, not everyone, a lot of people know isn’t gonna matter. Right? No one like, I don’t know how I don’t know how many people think that they’re gonna end up pro. My dad very made it clear that you’re not ending up pro.

Evan Maynard [00:14:19]:

Like, we’re gonna work very hard at this. No no idea why, but it was very I I played baseball in college a little bit. Okay. It was, like, a d three school. I was playing just a year. It’s nothing special. I had a great experience when trading for the world. Maybe that’s how I ended up at Case Western, also, I wanted to play baseball.

Scott Cowan [00:14:36]:

Okay. Alright.

Evan Maynard [00:14:37]:

But, it’s sports are interesting. Right? It’s like, everybody shows up to practice. They work really hard, and, like, everyone’s also working hard at school or maybe you’re not. And then it just ends. Right? And then you go into the workplace after. You work really hard in college. You go get a job, and you work really hard for a few years, and then people start having other priorities in life. Right? Some people get families.

Evan Maynard [00:15:03]:

Some people just want hobbies on the side. Right? Some people want to get that promotion. Some people just want to build something cool. And it suddenly feels like everyone’s pulling for a different team, and there’s not this big, like, cohesive team or effort that everyone’s pulling for the same thing.

Scott Cowan [00:15:20]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:15:20]:

And so for me, if I’m missing that competitive and you can go play, like, intramural sports, but, like, that’s more about having fun and blowing off some steam than it is about winning, which is great. And that took some getting used to being in the super competitive side. And so the adult version of high school sports, I would say, is business. You have to work really hard. Everything’s against you. It’s unclear why you’re doing it. Well, except for you’re doing it for money, maybe, or you’re just doing it for just not to die. Right? Entrepreneurally die.

Evan Maynard [00:15:55]:

And so that was kind of my mindset there. It was like, well, if I want this, like, challenge, it’s I I started to listen to, how I how I built this Mhmm. Which is a podcast business podcast. Amazing. First one I ever listened to was, Yvon Chouinard, which is the founder of Patagonia. Just buy it because that was what my friends did and they’re like, oh, you gotta listen to this guy. He’s crazy. He just wanted to, like, go stick some pitons in Iraq and he built a whole business.

Evan Maynard [00:16:22]:

And I was like, oh, this is cool. And so I just felt like the lesson there is always, like, the chip it’s something will always happen where you think you’re just gonna die, and the story is mostly about successes. So everyone always prevails for the most part. But it just sounds kinda awesome that everything’s on the line. You have no idea how you’re gonna get out of it. Your back’s in your corner, and then you overcome it whether someone helps you or you get some insight or you just get lucky. I mean, you’re always getting lucky in some way. And that sounded like the most fun that you could have for that money couldn’t buy.

Evan Maynard [00:16:55]:

And I was like, oh, maybe we gotta try that. Or I was, like, addicted to that idea.

Scott Cowan [00:17:00]:

I love that, man. Yeah. I I love the comparison of saying business is like, you know, I’ll call it grown up version of high school sports. I I love that idea. That’s a great comparison. It really is.

Evan Maynard [00:17:13]:

So I was maybe I was frustrated at work, and I was and then the only question is, like, what do you wanna spend way too what do you wanna, like, stress too hard about, work too hard about? What is important to you enough that you’re gonna trade almost everything else for it? And for me, I woke up one day, and that was climate change. Okay. Which is interesting coming from this guy that’s, like, grew up on motorsports and, you know, one you know, jet engines and these things that burn colossal amounts of fuel. And I just, you know, I was watching a Greta Tunaberg press conference, and I and I just looked around. I was like, what am I doing for the about this problem?

Scott Cowan [00:17:49]:

K.

Evan Maynard [00:17:50]:

And so that that planted a seed, and over time, you get to come up with a solution that you think is no one else has tried before, and you’re like, well, I’ve been given this, you know, a fastball down the middle. Maybe I better try and hit it. Right? And, and so that’s that’s that’s how it started.

Scott Cowan [00:18:07]:

That’s how it started. Okay. Alright. Well, how long have you how long is how wow. Words can be hard for me sometimes. How long ago did you start Gearhouse? When did it when did you launch?

Evan Maynard [00:18:25]:

Gearhouse, this is a answer question I never really like, what is the beginning? It’s like almost like

Scott Cowan [00:18:31]:

What’s the origin of Gearhouse?

Evan Maynard [00:18:33]:

A philosophical question. You could put that on anything. You know, it’s it’s like, okay. First, let’s well, maybe the so I I I left my corporate job for a different company. I spent about a year doing that, launched that into the teeth of the pandemic, and it was a bid to be product. So it had its fair share of problems for because it was trying to help small businesses. And I didn’t know anything about entrepreneurship, so I made every mistake in the book, even though I even people had told me not to make these mistakes, and you still make them. You know? So that business was struggling a lot, and I was running out of money.

Evan Maynard [00:19:09]:

And that business was about sustainability. And so we were trying to the the initial thought question was how can we get people to stop buying stuff. Okay. And then through a lot of different things, looking at my gear closet and realizing, like, you know, it’s what’s kinda interesting about your house is it’s almost four products. And the more that I look at it, the more use cases I see for it. Mhmm. And so those things all came to light in different ways. You know? I was thinking, like, oh, I would like to go paddle boarding this summer and but I have too much stuff, and I live in an apartment, and I’m gonna use it a couple times a year.

Evan Maynard [00:19:54]:

And where am I gonna store it? And it’s $300. And I don’t I just I want it, but I don’t. Mhmm. And then I look at opened up my storage closet one day to reorganize it and realize, hey. There’s $10,000 worth of equipment in here that sits in here for, you know, 49 weekends of the 52 a year, which also I think a lot of, like, in the outdoor gear space, a lot of companies have seen this problem and tried to solve it in a lot of ways, you know, peer to peer sharing and things like that that, you know, obviously haven’t worked. That doesn’t mean they won’t work. So that was interest. And then thinking back to that story of, like, okay.

Evan Maynard [00:20:35]:

I moved to Seattle, and I got lucky. Like, I was like, how does someone that works not in a corporate environment with these adventurous types get into the outdoors? Like, how does how do they do that? Right? And I look at all the gear that I own, and I was like, well, I would buy that all completely differently if I had to do it again. And I was thinking back to living in Truckee, and, like, the whole community either thrives there around being outside, and that community lives and breathes at, you know, the outdoor shops. Right? And there’s community hubs that you just see. Like, you oh, you wanna know something about mountain biking? You go over there. Right? Or you wanna know something about rock climbing? You go over there. Mhmm. But in Seattle, you go to

Scott Cowan [00:21:19]:

the climbing gym if you wanna know about climbing. But if you wanna know about backpacking,

Evan Maynard [00:21:23]:

I don’t know where you’d go. If you wanted to know about sailing, I know where you’d go. If you wanna know about paddle boarding, I don’t know where you’d go. Bikepacking?

Scott Cowan [00:21:31]:

I don’t know. And so

Evan Maynard [00:21:32]:

we just found this kinda, like, hole of, like, there’s no social scene around the outdoors for the majority of outdoor sports, and there’s a better way to buy gear and own gear. Right? There must be a better way. You know? Like and so that was kind of like what the seed that planted Gear House are the four seeds that, you know, the seed that planted Gear House and then that’s a year of thought. You know? So we started Gear House in that thought. First thought was December of twenty, math, 2019. Yeah. Didn’t stop working the sustainability thing until, like, March of twenty one. Learned how to do experiments on the business and test ideas through that, like, March to June to July phase, decided to commit to a lease and signed a lease and moved in in September.

Evan Maynard [00:22:27]:

And that’s when I say Gearhouse started. That’s when real money was being spent. Real customers were signing up and seeing the place. Real time and effort was being put into it.

Scott Cowan [00:22:39]:

So how has it been received?

Evan Maynard [00:22:41]:

It’s received really well in some cases and really poorly in others. And that’s really interesting. We have some and that’s maybe the highlight of my day is, like, when we get a customer that just gets it and sees it and sees the entire path without having Evan lay out the vision and me stumble through a sales pitch or whatever it takes to talk to them of, like, okay. Who is this person? What do they care about? What are we gonna tell them? What features would I should I start with? Mhmm. When we get the like, there’s some people there that are just like, I can’t believe this hasn’t been done. Like, this is awesome. This is exactly what I want. And we have other people that are like, I don’t understand why I’d ever do this.

Evan Maynard [00:23:20]:

I’m just gonna go buy the gear, including, like, my own aunt and uncle. They’re like, I don’t understand your business at all. And that’s awesome. And it’s like, great. Like

Scott Cowan [00:23:30]:

So Alright. I’m gonna put you on the spot. I I want you to give me the sales pitch. Stumble through your sales pitch, man. What Oh, well I walk yeah. Let’s let’s what is it you’re delivering? Just let’s walk through the

Evan Maynard [00:23:42]:

the

Scott Cowan [00:23:42]:

deliverable here.

Evan Maynard [00:23:44]:

There’s bay there’s two basic sales pitches depending on whether you’re I think you’re outdoorsy already or whether I think you’re not.

Scott Cowan [00:23:52]:

Where I’m gonna fall.

Evan Maynard [00:23:56]:

For you, that maybe you wanna go outside every once in a while. Right? You want you’re on a camping trip with bad room service or you’re at a new beautiful lake and you wanna go kayaking. Right?

Scott Cowan [00:24:08]:

Mhmm.

Evan Maynard [00:24:08]:

That’s easy accessible thing to go do. Yeah? Right. And and you say, okay. I’m gonna go kayaking, and you’re like, oh, I don’t have any of this stuff. What am I gonna do? And so you go maybe you go to a a rental place. Like, have you done this?

Scott Cowan [00:24:21]:

I have. Yeah.

Evan Maynard [00:24:22]:

Yeah. Do you do you like rental places?

Scott Cowan [00:24:24]:

Not particularly.

Evan Maynard [00:24:25]:

Like, why?

Scott Cowan [00:24:28]:

I never felt like I knew the right questions to ask.

Evan Maynard [00:24:32]:

Interesting. Cool.

Scott Cowan [00:24:34]:

So it was always like, I I I don’t know anything about kayaking. I think I wanna go out and try it, but I don’t know what to ask.

Evan Maynard [00:24:44]:

See, outdoors, like, kind of intimidating thing, like, where you don’t Yeah. Wanna look like, and it so we look at similarly, you know, other when we ask that question, we get a few responses. That’s a great one. We get other ones like, oh, it’s really why is this so expensive? It’s really expensive. Mhmm. The gear isn’t very nice. You know, it’s been beat up. It’s all, like, over, you know, used poorly.

Scott Cowan [00:25:09]:

Right.

Evan Maynard [00:25:10]:

And most people will do that mental math, and then they’ll be like, if they’re really into it, I was like, well, I don’t wanna use crappy gear, and I don’t wanna know nothing about it. I don’t wanna go pick it up and drop it off all the time. I’m just gonna buy. Right? Because rental is often, like, 30 to 40% of the cost of buying. You’re like, okay. If I do this three times, then it would be better for me to buy it.

Scott Cowan [00:25:30]:

Right.

Evan Maynard [00:25:31]:

And that was something that I never understood. And so I just wanted to see if I could do a better rental model. So Gearhouse is rentals reinvented. We struggle on go on convenience, and there’s no gate kept knowledge. We’re just gonna help you. Our entire goal is to make rental so convenient that you don’t wanna buy because we don’t sell a product.

Scott Cowan [00:25:53]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:25:53]:

If we if you want to buy, then we lose a customer. And so our goal is to make rental the best thing that’s ever happened to you. And we do that with, like, customization. We focus on high end gear. We’ll spend the time to teach you how to use it because that’s in our interest because our gear is not designed to be, like, beat on. You know, it has to be used properly or it will break. And so we spend, you know, sometimes up to an hour with folks of, like, here’s how this gear works. Like, here’s how it use.

Evan Maynard [00:26:20]:

Here’s how you use it. Here’s put it together with you in the store. And then you go have to create actually gonna

Scott Cowan [00:26:24]:

help me not feel like a complete idiot, if you will.

Evan Maynard [00:26:28]:

Exactly. Wherever you’re coming from. You can be starting from zero. You could be starting from 50. You could be starting from 98. Right? And if you’re starting from 98, then I’m gonna talk to you and be like, you have all your gear, and now you have two problems. One is, like, you just want a place to hang out with other people that like hanging out. Right? And so Gear House is a bar, really, is what it is.

Evan Maynard [00:26:49]:

And so you come in with your friends to go back back on Thursday. You’re working a crazy week. You You wanna go back back this weekend, but you have four to five hours of planning to do to get it done. Mhmm.

Scott Cowan [00:26:59]:

Then

Evan Maynard [00:26:59]:

you gotta figure out who has what gear. You know, like, oh, does anyone have a cooler? Who has a cooler? Oh, John’s got a cooler. I was like, oh, I heard Scott has a tent. Well, maybe Scott can loan us a tent. And I was like, well, what if you were just in one spot, and you could just have everybody bring what they had, and you could lay it all out. And then instead of wondering, like, oh, Jeff didn’t show up right now, and he has the stove. Hey, Evan. Gearhouse.

Evan Maynard [00:27:24]:

You guys got a stove? And there. You’re done. Right? And you’re like, oh, we wanna go backpacking this weekend. Like, we’ve been to these parks. We’ve never been to the North Cascades. You got any cool place to go? And you’re sitting next to somebody right there, and they’re like, oh, let me tell you about the cool place that I love in the North Cascades. Right? And your job is done in an hour. You have all the gear.

Evan Maynard [00:27:44]:

You’re packed. You’re ready to go, and off you go. And you’ll be going outside more often with people you like. Maybe Jeff that loaned you the stove wants to come with, and now you’ve got a new friend, and you had a great time. Like, WTA is awesome. Right? I love WTA. Mhmm. It’s the last thing I wanna do on a Friday night trying to plan a backpacking trip for Saturday.

Scott Cowan [00:28:06]:

Mhmm.

Evan Maynard [00:28:07]:

And so we can just, like, help to parse all that information, for the people that already are outdoorsy.

Scott Cowan [00:28:14]:

And and people are you’re finding people are are kinda getting this now. They’re you’re starting to I mean, you like, you said, there’s two two folks, but the people that get it get it.

Evan Maynard [00:28:23]:

So we don’t have the beer license yet, and so we’re struggling to that part of the product to take some vision for people to see. Okay. Sometimes. Right? And so sometimes the outdoors are people like, oh, I don’t know. But what we do then is, like, we do a ski waxing night every Thursday. Bring your skis in. We have all the tools. It makes a mess.

Evan Maynard [00:28:43]:

If you’ve never done it, it’s really messy. And your dog’s eating the wax, and it’s you’re stepping in it, and it’s like this like, if you do it once, then you basically probably decide this isn’t worth it. It was fun, but I’m not gonna do that again. If you have a garage, maybe you keep doing it. Right? So for people like that, we are like that’s how we operate as a social space. It’s like when we’re operating ski waxing night, like, tonight, we’ll go. So that part of the business, like, some people see, some people don’t. And the outdoorsy people will say, like, oh, I have all the gear I need.

Evan Maynard [00:29:18]:

Right?

Scott Cowan [00:29:19]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:29:20]:

Well, if we hang out with with them for long enough, what often happens, not always, but often, is they’ll see some they’ll realize they have something that would be better. Right? So, like, I have all my own gear, and there are ways that I would upgrade it if I knew how to or, like, if I was willing to spend another $200, but I have one. It’s good enough. It’s fine. But, like, sometimes you have a three person tent and you want a one person tent, but you’re not gonna go buy a one person tent. Right? And so that use case. Or you need a bear canister. Right? You’re like, oh, I have the small one, but we’re going on a big trip.

Evan Maynard [00:29:53]:

It’d be nice to have the bigger one. So that kind of customization and tailoring of your gear, is when we kind of so but that isn’t how people think right away. And my theory is that you just have to not think about all the things you want. Otherwise, you just go buy them. Right? So you convince yourself that you don’t need it. But

Scott Cowan [00:30:15]:

I’m on your website Uh-huh. And I’m looking at all your events. Cool. And I I got a couple of, you know, questions. So you’re offering on Mondays, you’re doing you have you’re kind of opening up for coworking?

Evan Maynard [00:30:28]:

Yep. That’s cool.

Scott Cowan [00:30:30]:

Yep. We got That’s community building.

Evan Maynard [00:30:32]:

Yeah. It’s good. We are there working all the time. You can join us.

Scott Cowan [00:30:38]:

Okay. Now I I’m about to open one I haven’t read yet, so I’m gonna click on it. Meet the canine love of your life. Alright. How often do you run

Evan Maynard [00:30:52]:

That’s a one off event.

Scott Cowan [00:30:54]:

A dating service for dogs, I guess. How’s that?

Evan Maynard [00:30:57]:

Yeah. But to be fair, it’s not the dogs that are dating each other. It’s humans and dogs. Well, that that also happens next Monday on February fourteenth and also known as Valentine’s Day too. People that haven’t realized that’s coming up yet.

Scott Cowan [00:31:13]:

And This will be published after that. So, hey, if you haven’t realized it, it’s it’s way too much. You’re you’re kinda blown it. You you kinda blown it. That’s true.

Evan Maynard [00:31:22]:

Yeah. That’s a one off event. That was something fun that we came up with, and we thought, oh, yeah. That’d be fun. Like, we love dogs in the space. We know that dogs are a big part of being outdoors for a lot of people. Okay. And shelters are always looking for ways to meet new people.

Evan Maynard [00:31:37]:

And so it was kind of a way that we could use our space, which we love doing. So, like Right. For groups that don’t have a way to get spaces or organize events, we love hosting them. And, like, come through your event at our space. Like, we’re an event space for other outdoor groups, marginalized or not. Whatever your story is, like, let’s talk.

Scott Cowan [00:31:55]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:31:56]:

And so we do all sorts of stuff like that.

Scott Cowan [00:31:59]:

Yeah. I mean, you’ve got a full calendar here, man. You’re doing something literally every day.

Evan Maynard [00:32:02]:

And we would multiple times. Also love Gearhouse to be, kind of have that random interaction too. Right? And k. So, like, we would love for people to just, like, stop in, and there would be other people also hanging out that you would then get to meet them. Right? Mhmm. And it’s tough to do that when we’re not running an event and we’re running an event. Sometimes it’s tough to meet other people because the event is happening. So we wanna run the events in addition to just, like, you wanna come in, look at the maps, have a beer after work, as well.

Evan Maynard [00:32:32]:

So that part of the product is, like, still coming in.

Scott Cowan [00:32:35]:

So how big is your space?

Evan Maynard [00:32:37]:

It’s 1,800 square feet

Scott Cowan [00:32:39]:

k.

Evan Maynard [00:32:40]:

Which is both big and small at the same time. And I didn’t know what that looked like until because I was thinking, like, house prices and, you know, or house sizes. And I was like,

Scott Cowan [00:32:52]:

oh, yeah.

Evan Maynard [00:32:53]:

That’s a nice sized house. Like, what does that mean for a business? Turns out it’s probably one of the smaller businesses you’ve been in. You know, it wasn’t like an ice cream shop. But,

Scott Cowan [00:33:01]:

Right. But it’s not you’re you’re not rattling around in 60,000 square foot warehouse space.

Evan Maynard [00:33:05]:

No. And so what’s cool is we just, like, we fill it up with gear, and then it’s it’s full. And then it’s outdoor gear, so we figure out a new way to pack it, and it’s all quite condensed. So then it you know, the first time we opened up and people come in and be like, is this all the gear you have? I’d be like, hey, man. This is, like, $10,000 worth of gear. It just doesn’t look like much because it’s designed to fit in a backpack. Right. Now we don’t have that problem.

Evan Maynard [00:33:33]:

But initially, it was definitely, like, a little bit of a a shock.

Scott Cowan [00:33:38]:

So what type of activities, you know okay. I’m looking here. First of all, what’s a split board?

Evan Maynard [00:33:45]:

A split board. Great question. It is what it sounds like. It’s a snowboard that splits into two pieces. And So skis? Yep. I’m sorry. Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:33:55]:

Exactly. Non outdoor guy you’re No. Sorry. You gotta put

Evan Maynard [00:33:57]:

up with the That’s great.

Scott Cowan [00:33:58]:

I’m on the zero on your scale now. You gotta help me out.

Evan Maynard [00:34:00]:

No. There’s that’s there’s no dumb questions. We think it’s just

Scott Cowan [00:34:04]:

I can make dumb questions.

Evan Maynard [00:34:06]:

No. No. No. No. Not possible. Not in the outdoor space at least.

Scott Cowan [00:34:10]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:34:11]:

They’re a split board is a a snowboard that turns into skis so that you can walk uphill on them. Mhmm. Because you need you need to be able to, like, move your legs independently to go uphill instead of hopping on a snowboard. So it splits into two pieces. You put a piece of carpet you glue a piece of carpet to the bottom, and then you set up your snowboard bindings more like ski bindings, more like cross country ski bindings. So the toe is attached and the heel isn’t, so it lifts. And you can then slide the carpet on the bottom makes it so this the ski doesn’t slide backwards. It only goes forwards on snow.

Scott Cowan [00:34:48]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:34:49]:

You’ll use that to go uphill to wherever you wanna go, and you’ll get to the top and you take the carpet off called skins. You take the bindings off, snap the board back together, snap the bindings onto the board like a snowboard, and you ride all the way down. And that’s called backcountry touring, backcountry skiing for the skiers and splitboarding for the snowboarders. And it’s a way for you to get the most amazing powder run of your life. It’s a way for you to another analogy to, like, everyone cares and the reason isn’t like, everyone’s pulling on the same weight is backcountry skiing. Another like, one of my favorite hobbies of all time. And you are out in snow country. You are managing your own risk and choosing your own routes and managing avalanche risk.

Evan Maynard [00:35:35]:

Right? So avalanches are a forecasted thing. They sound scary. They are a thing that you can manage, but they are deadly if you get it wrong. Mhmm. And Washington is quite an amazing place to do this sport and activity because the snowpack is quite stable. And if you’re educated and smart about it, you can manage that risk very well. But some of the most rewarding days is you go out and you talk with you never go alone because you can’t dig yourself out of an avalanche if you do have one happen. So you always go in a team, and you’re having a discussion throughout the day of, like, here’s what we’re seeing.

Evan Maynard [00:36:07]:

Here’s what we think the forecast is. Here’s where we think avalanches might happen. Here’s where they not. And some person says, hey. I’m no longer comfortable with this. And you’re like, okay. We’re gonna do something different, or we’re gonna turn around. And everyone’s gonna get back to the parking lot whether you had an amazing run or whether you just got out for a hike.

Evan Maynard [00:36:23]:

You get back to the end of the day, and everyone’s alive, and everyone goes back to their families. And that is success. It doesn’t matter whether you got a ski run or not. It’s and so I describe backcountry skiing to people of, like, if we’re gonna take somebody out, I was like, this is a day of hiking

Scott Cowan [00:36:39]:

Mhmm.

Evan Maynard [00:36:39]:

Followed by one ski run. And it’s not a day of skiing. And if you come and do it with a day of skiing expectation, you’re gonna

Scott Cowan [00:36:46]:

be disappointed. If you come out

Evan Maynard [00:36:47]:

with, like, hiking expectation, it’d be the best hike you’ve ever done. Gotcha. And you’ll there’s no lawyer telling you where to go and saying, like, hey. This is safe. We designed this for you. You have to manage yourself. And so everyone wants to go home alive, and so everyone’s, like, on board with that. And I think that’s the biggest high you can get in a day, and I am % into it.

Evan Maynard [00:37:12]:

Okay. So that’s what a split board is. So maybe to your point, like, you’re looking at a list of thousands of items, right, of sports.

Scott Cowan [00:37:20]:

Yeah. There’s a lot of stuff here, man.

Evan Maynard [00:37:22]:

So the other part of, like, what is Gearhouse and what are the products is we have a variety of everything. We specialize in variety. We specialize in high performance gear so that you can have the nicest of anything, and you will know whether you like a sport. Not because you will never think you don’t like a sport because you didn’t have the right gear for it. Right? We’re gonna start somebody at the expert level of whatever they’re trying to do. And so, like, when you’re backpacking, if you’re new and you go have bad gear, that gear is three times heavier than if you have really great gear. Right?

Scott Cowan [00:37:54]:

Right.

Evan Maynard [00:37:54]:

But it costs you $2,000. No one wants to spend $2,000 before they know if they like it. Mhmm. And there’s a lot of choices you have to make along that way to of, like, different preferences. And so Gearhouse has almost one of each preference, and we’ll help you set up the kit for what you’re doing so that it’s perfect. If we our backpacking kits are nine pounds, for example. Like, an Okay. A standard backpacking kit, the first time you put them together will be, like, 30 pounds.

Evan Maynard [00:38:20]:

Right? Wow. And then you have to add food and water and and some things on top of that. And so nine pound pack is what people carry around all day. You can hike all day. Right. But, 30 pound pack, you’re like, you know, it hurts your shoulders. You’re gonna be a little miserable. You’ll be sore.

Evan Maynard [00:38:35]:

Some people like that, and some people hate that. Right?

Scott Cowan [00:38:39]:

Yeah. I I didn’t I hate that crowd.

Evan Maynard [00:38:41]:

Right. And so, like, why why do we have

Scott Cowan [00:38:43]:

to add that in if it’s gonna eliminate half

Evan Maynard [00:38:45]:

of the people that might like it anyways, before it even got a fair chance?

Scott Cowan [00:38:51]:

One of the thing is I’m scrolling through here and I’m looking at at what you guys are offering. And now remember, you know, I’ll just remind you yet again that I am an indoors guy.

Evan Maynard [00:39:02]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:39:03]:

And I am seeing I am seeing some things here that just I think are cool. And and those things are like trail running kit comes with trail snacks. I like food. Your backpacking comes with, a wine bag. Okay. We’re you’re making it fun here. We’ve got stoves. We’ve but you’re coming you’re you’re sending people with coffee.

Evan Maynard [00:39:32]:

Yeah. Gotta

Scott Cowan [00:39:33]:

have coffee. Company. You’re a great company. You you you should be celebrated for sending people out in the wild with coffee. I just applaud you for that.

Evan Maynard [00:39:42]:

There’s a lot of bad ways to make coffee in the backcountry. I can tell you.

Scott Cowan [00:39:46]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:39:47]:

And we make sure that So

Scott Cowan [00:39:48]:

what’s your favorite way to make coffee in the backcountry?

Evan Maynard [00:39:54]:

I think my favorite way to make coffee is there is is very similar to a drip. It doesn’t work very well, but it’s kind of a cool contraption that you pull out, and everyone’s like, what is that? So it’s this like it’s this I’m gonna describe this for a podcast. It looks like a little spaceship. You know, it has, it has a a filter on the top that’s made out of metal mesh. There’s no, like, disposable filter, and you put the coffee grounds in there. And then you open up these, like, these spring legs on the side so that it sits on top of your camp cup, and then you boil water with your stove and you pour it over the top. It’s just it’s a pour over.

Scott Cowan [00:40:33]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:40:34]:

And there’s reasons why we don’t send people out with that, but I like it that way.

Scott Cowan [00:40:40]:

Have you ever taken an Aeropress out?

Evan Maynard [00:40:42]:

Are you familiar with Aeropress? We’ve I’ve never done it, but it’s lightweight plastic. It’s a little bulky, but it’s quite popular.

Scott Cowan [00:40:49]:

Yeah. Yeah. I’ve

Evan Maynard [00:40:50]:

never done it.

Scott Cowan [00:40:51]:

Well, it’s interesting because, like, you can put your coffee inside the AeroPress to to, like, save a little space, if you will. And, if you you can use a stainless steel filter or paper filters. But

Evan Maynard [00:41:00]:

Paper filters are fine. Yeah. It’s just like you’re always managing trash in the background. So it’s like the grounds are the problem. So the way we send people is with instant coffee, and everyone’s about to, like, spit their coffee out when they hear that. Right? There’s, like, 20 or 30 different types, and we have one that we found tastes we have two. We have one if you like black coffee. It’s an instant coffee.

Evan Maynard [00:41:23]:

It dissolves, and so it makes no mess. It smells the grounds smell awful. Don’t smell the grounds.

Scott Cowan [00:41:30]:

You’re selling it, man. Come on now.

Evan Maynard [00:41:31]:

And then you pour it in, and it tastes like coffee. Like

Scott Cowan [00:41:36]:

So what brand is that?

Evan Maynard [00:41:38]:

It’s called instant, Alpine Start. I think it’s called Alpine Start. And we buy it in bulk, and then we just ask you how, like, you how many days you’re going out for and how strong you like your coffee, and we give you the little packets that are the right size for that.

Scott Cowan [00:41:52]:

Okay. And so that’s if you like black coffee. What what’s

Evan Maynard [00:41:55]:

the color? Milk in your coffee,

Scott Cowan [00:41:57]:

we

Evan Maynard [00:41:58]:

give you something else, which is I don’t know the name of it off the top of my head. It’s oh, well, we can put in the show notes or something. It’s by Laird Hamilton, who’s a surfer out in, Hawaii, a big guy big surf guy.

Scott Cowan [00:42:12]:

Oh, I think I know. Yeah. Yeah. I can’t think of the maybe either, but I think I know what you’re talking about.

Evan Maynard [00:42:15]:

He has his own, like, superfood brands, which I didn’t realize when I bought it. And it’s like this, like, coconut infused instant coffee. And it is a pretty good cup of, like, hazelnut cream and coffee coffee mix, that is great for the backcountry also in LA. Make zero waste because it all ends up, through your digestive system.

Scott Cowan [00:42:37]:

So The thing the thing is I’m scrolling in what I what I’m observing though to me is I mean, car camping. You it’s got you’re you’re sending them with, you know, lots of things, but you’re sending them with bug repellent and sunscreen. You’re you’re you’re sending them out with things that will make for a better day. Yeah. Little a little more thoughtful instead of here’s your paddle board, go and burn yourself and be miserable. You’re sending them with with attention to detail. I like that

Evan Maynard [00:43:10]:

a lot. You said earlier, like, I don’t know what questions to ask. We know what questions you’re not asking.

Scott Cowan [00:43:16]:

Yeah. Yeah. See, I like that.

Evan Maynard [00:43:17]:

Yeah. And it doesn’t we we buy it in bulk. It’s like, you know, sunscreen’s $10 a tube. Like, you use maybe, like, 20¢ of it every time you use it. We just, like, fill up a tube for you and and you take it. You know? And it’s like,

Scott Cowan [00:43:29]:

why why do we have

Evan Maynard [00:43:29]:

to sell you a disposable bottle when we can just buy it in bulk? And, like, sunscreen’s weird because everyone’s got different skin, and they like different stuff. But, like, if you don’t care and you’re just looking for, like, to not get burned, then we got something for you.

Scott Cowan [00:43:42]:

It’s just something to take the edge off, if you will. I mean, you know, in that sense, you know, so I’m not out there. So So Yeah. So I’m just gonna re re you know, split boarding, trail running, backpacking, mountaineering, stand up paddle board, car camping, lawn games. And then you’ve got a lot of miscellaneous inventory here.

Evan Maynard [00:44:00]:

And, honestly, like, that inventory was probably written in November. Right? We’re three months past that, and we have a whole host of new stuff from mountaineering tents

Scott Cowan [00:44:08]:

to cram on these

Evan Maynard [00:44:09]:

ice axes, something called a whippet, which is like a an ice ax and a and a trekking pole built into one. So kind of like a it’s a mini ice ax and a and a bad trekking pole. K. But it’s incredibly useful in snow. Roof boxes, that might be you know, we do, like, a roof box, bike racks, backpacking bags, like, bikepacking bags, dry bags, like, split boards you mentioned, all the different types of beacons. And, like, our goal isn’t to not have all of one model. We wanna have a variety. Right? So, like, we give you infinite choice, and then we also take maybe, like, I don’t know if this will come up naturally.

Evan Maynard [00:44:53]:

It’s, like, we just set the prices as simply as possible. Right?

Scott Cowan [00:44:57]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:44:57]:

And so we pretty much are a flat pricing model. We are for a standard set of days, you can bring it back early, but it’s not gonna save you any money. And we just want that to be convenient. Like, come back when it suits your schedule, not because you’re worried about getting charged.

Scott Cowan [00:45:12]:

So let’s talk pricing.

Evan Maynard [00:45:13]:

Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:45:14]:

Let’s just that was you you you transitioned it, and I just made it I made it bumpy there. But let’s so, yeah, let’s talk of this the pricing model that you guys have because it’s it’s a little to me, it seems yeah. I don’t know, man. It just seems pretty interesting that how you how you have this all set up. So why don’t you go ahead and elaborate on that?

Evan Maynard [00:45:31]:

So we talked a little bit about how you go into a rental shop, and it seems like it’s gonna be cheap when you look online. And then you go in, and and by the end of it, you somehow you’ve spent way more than you thought you were gonna spend and you wish you just would have bought.

Scott Cowan [00:45:46]:

Mhmm.

Evan Maynard [00:45:46]:

And so all those little things, sunscreen, headlamps, things that don’t come with a rental, those all add up. Right? And we want you to just, like, be, like just have that mental trade of, do I wanna go backpacking? It’s gonna cost me $70. And there’s no mystery to it. That’s the price. It’s right up front. And then you’re like, the next weekend, you’re like, I want to go kayaking. Also $70. Right? That’s like, we operate under that simple for just the rental side of things.

Evan Maynard [00:46:20]:

It gets even better where the more you use it if you’re using us a lot for all of your gear needs, then the membership makes a ton of sense. And then it’s, well, fuzzy on the numbers off the top of my head. I think it’s $70 a month is, like, our top tier membership gets you exactly every piece of gear that we have in stock. It’s not per item. It’s per adventure. You’re going on adventure. We’re gonna toss all these things in the bag, ask you some question about what you’re doing, make sure you have the right stuff, and you’re gonna go out. And for members

Scott Cowan [00:46:50]:

So if I wanted to go help me out here. Let’s say I wanted to go split boarding. Yep. Wait. You’re gonna throw all those things, you know, here’s here’s what you need, Scott. And that’s 70. That that that’s no I I paid my 70 for the month. So the first weekend I go out, and I wanna go split boarding.

Scott Cowan [00:47:08]:

Boom. All the gear.

Evan Maynard [00:47:09]:

Yep. And we say, bring it back to us six within six days. Right?

Scott Cowan [00:47:13]:

Okay. Great. So I I bring it back, and I go, that was a lot of fun. I got a chance to go, you know, camping with some friends. Can you guys help me out? I need a tent, you know, blah blah blah. You once again, it’s included in that that monthly fee.

Evan Maynard [00:47:29]:

Yep. And say you came back

Scott Cowan [00:47:30]:

pretty cool.

Evan Maynard [00:47:31]:

Say say you came back split boarding and you’re like, you know, this this gear was great, Evan, but, you know, this this part was, like, rubbing on my ankle funny or, like, I didn’t like how it rode in the snow. You know? And you’re like, imagine you’ve bought that. You spent $2,000 and you find this thing that you don’t like about it. We take a little jot a note down in Scott’s file, and Scott comes back three weeks later. He went split boarding, went camping, and I must go split boarding again. We know that Scott didn’t like split board x, and we were gonna give him split board y this time.

Scott Cowan [00:48:03]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:48:03]:

And so you get a different one, and we just know that. And so the more that you come out of us, the more we know your preferences, the more and then you can just, like So

Scott Cowan [00:48:11]:

you’re building a profile of of my yeah.

Evan Maynard [00:48:13]:

At some point, maybe you decide that your life simple flies down, and you’re like, great. I’ve done all the things. I’ve experienced all of Seattle, what has to offer, and I’m moving to Denver, and all they have out there is skiing. And so I’m just gonna own a split board. Let’s say it was in Seattle. Maybe you just decide you only like split boarding. Right? Mhmm. At that point, you might decide to buy, or you might like that we have three different types of split boards for the different types of snow conditions, and you say a member.

Evan Maynard [00:48:42]:

Or you drop into the social scene, membership, which is the lower level.

Scott Cowan [00:48:46]:

There’s the social scene. Yeah. Let me ask you this question, though. I mean, so I you you you send me out with this gear, and I break something. What happens?

Evan Maynard [00:48:59]:

It doesn’t happen very often.

Scott Cowan [00:49:02]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:49:02]:

Because But

Scott Cowan [00:49:03]:

I’m I’m me, so

Evan Maynard [00:49:04]:

I’m gonna break something. Break

Scott Cowan [00:49:05]:

stuff. Yep.

Evan Maynard [00:49:06]:

Yep. Stuff breaks. We know that. Yeah. It really determines we basically try and figure out if we think you were negligent and if it was avoidable or if it was wear and tear, and that was just to be expected. Right? You know, something freak happened. You’re you know, I don’t know. There was a hard way to spoke about it.

Evan Maynard [00:49:23]:

To binding. Binding. And it’s like, well, do we think that you were, like, you know, standing on top of a car, you know, and, like, doing something, you know, doing something you shouldn’t have been doing, or were you treating the gear and that’s, like, that’s life? Right?

Scott Cowan [00:49:36]:

Right.

Evan Maynard [00:49:36]:

And we’re pretty forgiving in that case. I mean, one, we repair a lot of stuff, so we’re good at it.

Scott Cowan [00:49:41]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:49:42]:

Well, we will become good at it because it hasn’t happened to us very often. Okay. But, like, I I am an engineer, and fixing stuff is my nature. And so we fix it. And if it we have to if it degrades the performance, then, we’ll find someone that will love it in its damaged state.

Scott Cowan [00:50:04]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:50:04]:

And but it’s not ending up in the trash. And if it is broken and we do think it was your fault and you tell us about it, then usually we just say 50% of the repair cost off just because we don’t wanna send gear out with somebody broken that they’re relying on. And so we really try and make sure it’s in your best interest to tell us. Sure. And then we can repair it, and that’s just part of it goes. But small stuff, you know, Nick’s in the board. We we were at the ski waxing night. We fill boards with PTECs.

Evan Maynard [00:50:31]:

Like, that’s just part of the job. You know? Like, it’s fun, and we just do it, and it’s no big deal. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:50:39]:

Thing I the thing that I find intriguing about the model is is alright. We all let go, and not all of us, but some of us like to bike here.

Evan Maynard [00:50:47]:

Yeah. Okay.

Scott Cowan [00:50:48]:

Okay. Some of us like to buy gear. And whatever you’re into, that gear probably ends up it sounded like a great idea to buy this new digital camera, let’s say. And it ends up on my shelf, and I don’t use it very often because I take my iPhone with me everywhere. Blah blah blah. So I like the idea of not buying stuff, but still having access to it. I like the the the Airbnb nature of it, I guess. I mean, that’s a bad comparison, but I’m on the spot.

Scott Cowan [00:51:25]:

But I like the idea that I could go to you and say, hey. This weekend, I’m gonna go do x, and I don’t have to worry about if I’ve got this stuff. I can just rent it for a a reasonable fee. And I don’t have it cluttering up my closet at my house because I went out and bought it and used it once. Now if I totally get into something, split boarding, yeah, maybe I’ll go out and buy a split board. Sure. Maybe I will. But if I’m just thinking, yeah, it was fun.

Scott Cowan [00:51:51]:

I tried it a few times. I’ll be really glad I didn’t buy a board. Yeah. Yeah. So I like I like this concept because it’s it’s it’s also I think it’s there’s an environmental component to it here where, you know, we’re not all buying stuff that we pile into our closets. Just yeah. That was Unnecessary.

Evan Maynard [00:52:10]:

That’s yeah. How do you not buy stuff? The only there’s very few sustainable things you can buy. Right? Like, they’re all advertised as sustainable. But for the most part, like, our emissions in The United States are coming from power plants and heating factories and homes. Right? And so that means manufacturing is one of the biggest causes of it. And Sure. You can’t just tell people to, like, stop like, I learned this over a year. You can’t say stop buying stuff.

Evan Maynard [00:52:37]:

Right? Like, they have a need for that in some way. Either it’s like a think they have a need or they actually have the need. Right? And so the only way you’re gonna have somebody stop buying stuff is to give them a compelling alternative.

Scott Cowan [00:52:50]:

Absolutely.

Evan Maynard [00:52:51]:

And so

Scott Cowan [00:52:51]:

It’s like like cars in in the city, let’s say Seattle. Back in the day, it was Zipcar and then, you know, now it’s Uber. You don’t need to own a car because you can get you can get somebody to give you a lift from point a to point b

Evan Maynard [00:53:07]:

Yep.

Scott Cowan [00:53:08]:

Once a week. That’s what you, you know, if you’re if you live, I don’t know, Capitol Hill.

Evan Maynard [00:53:14]:

That’s where I live.

Scott Cowan [00:53:15]:

You can walk to the you can walk to the grocery store. You can walk to the coffee shop. You can walk to your your favorite your favorite bar. If you’re working from home, you don’t need a car. I you know, we love our cars. You know? I I do. But you don’t need one. But you gotta give me a compelling reason not to have one.

Evan Maynard [00:53:33]:

And then the problem with Seattle is is that everyone wants to get outside. Right? So, like, most people I know that live in the city have a car strictly for weekend adventures. Right. Gearhouse can be a solution to that too. Right? It’s like come down to Gearhouse, figure out who’s going there anyways, and and go on their trip. Now, obviously, it’s not gonna work every time, but it could work a lot of times. It’s cool.

Scott Cowan [00:53:56]:

Yeah. No. I think I think being thoughtful and and purposeful in in in how you’re presenting this stuff is is wonderful. I think it’s very cool. But let let me let me let me go back to the community building part of it. So what’s your vision for this? What what do you hope it looks like, say, a year or two from now?

Evan Maynard [00:54:17]:

We want to be, like, the go to space for knowledge and friends. You’re new to town and you like getting the outdoors? Gear House is the place you were gonna go. You need some gear and you don’t know what to buy? We’ll tell you what you need for your use case, even if you’re not gonna become a mentor member and try our stuff out. We just want to be the default option for going outside beforehand. Like, a third place for outdoorsy people is our ideal state. Like, if you need a place to go, you’re outdoorsy. You’re like, what am I gonna do tonight? Let’s go hang out at your house and see if they’re watching the Olympics tonight, or see, like, see who’s around and who wants to, like, plan a trip this weekend. Like, that is really our vision, for, like, where we end up.

Scott Cowan [00:55:03]:

Yeah. So what’s what currently are you open seven days a week? What’s the kinda what’s the availability like?

Evan Maynard [00:55:10]:

Yeah. So that’s maybe where the rubber meets the road or the stick in the mud maybe at the moment that’s about to be solved is, we’re open by appointment, and we’re open for events. So I have a full time job, which is how I fund the business. And so we have a calendar that syncs up with all my work calendars. I live four minutes from Gearhouse, and you can tell me that I need to be there in forty five minutes or less.

Scott Cowan [00:55:37]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:55:37]:

Ideally, you tell me a couple days in advance, but, you know, we’ve had all sorts of interactions in that. So that’s been fun. And then we’re open for events. And now we’re doing enough gear pickups, and we have enough members that, like, now I am there four or five times a day, maybe more, maybe less. And so now I mostly am doing my full time job from, you know, like, remotely from a laptop. Right. So I I work remotely there. From the

Scott Cowan [00:56:05]:

works from from the Gearhouse Building. That’s right.

Evan Maynard [00:56:07]:

And now, also, we’re hiring our first person, and they are starting in a couple weeks. So that will help out a ton where they will be full time on hand. So that will allow even more drop in capability. But we’re running, I think, 23 events in February. So, like, we’re also open most evenings, and it’s awesome.

Scott Cowan [00:56:28]:

That’s awesome. Yeah.

Evan Maynard [00:56:29]:

It’s great.

Scott Cowan [00:56:30]:

Yeah. That’s awesome. So What these now we’re gonna shift into some of my my my go to questions that I love I love just to love to ask people.

Evan Maynard [00:56:40]:

I can sense the I can sense the, like, sensation in your in your voice. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [00:56:45]:

What what hasn’t gone like you thought it would?

Evan Maynard [00:56:48]:

Oh, man. Yeah. Yeah. That’s the other thing of, like, you know, when you’re in high school sports, you know, a plan always seems good in your head. You know, and then and then the other team does something, you know, what’s the line of, like, every plan falls apart at the first sign of the enemy or something like that.

Scott Cowan [00:57:08]:

What did Mike Tyson say? You know, every

Evan Maynard [00:57:10]:

everyone’s got a plan

Scott Cowan [00:57:11]:

till they get punched in the face.

Evan Maynard [00:57:12]:

That’s right.

Scott Cowan [00:57:12]:

Yeah. Exactly. So so how is how have you been punched in the face with your house? How’s the

Evan Maynard [00:57:20]:

It’s we are finding it is very tough to, like everyone’s tired of subscriptions. Right? And that’s that’s a and people are not used to the idea that renting doesn’t have to suck. Okay. And so convincing people that there’s a different way to do it and that it’s gonna be awesome and that you should trust this weird guy that shows up at this weird place in this back alley is been been a journey. You know? Like, I’m so thankful for my first customer who came from a sign that we put up in SBP. And she called me, and she had signed up before even talking to me, which was only started happening again recently. And and then it’s been funny to talk to her after, and she’s like, did I just get scammed? Is this guy actually gonna do what he says he’s gonna do? And it’s been an awesome relationship the whole way through. Okay.

Evan Maynard [00:58:17]:

But finding people like her has been really tough. Finding people before they own all the gear, finding people when they’ve just before they need the gear, and they’re like, oh, I’m not gonna walk into Arya, you know, some other business. Right. And then, like, before catching you before I guess the other thing is, like, everyone like, capitalism is, like, really good at not having you feel the full cost of stuff. You know? And so, like, you’ll look at the price online. Like we said, everyone has this experience where, like, you look at the price, and then at the end of the day, you feel like you bought a different product. Right? And so when you compare us to those low prices that ex you know, maybe you have to experience the gotchas before you realize that we’re a good deal, in some ways. So that’s been kind of interesting to watch that pan out.

Evan Maynard [00:59:06]:

Finding people and and having them understand has always been tougher than I ever would have thought. I’d be like, it’s a good deal. Like, can everyone see that’s a great deal? And it turns out, like, well, no. There’s a lot of, there’s a lot that goes into that purchasing decision for people, and how they do that, and that’s been interesting to to learn. Maybe not the, like, some guy came along and, you know, stole a bunch of money from us or something like that, which everyone’s been pretty wonderful in that respect. But,

Scott Cowan [00:59:35]:

Okay. Yeah. Well, yeah. I didn’t even think about that. Yeah. Somebody checks out and then checks out.

Evan Maynard [00:59:41]:

Yep. Well, yeah, that’s never happened. Never come even come close to that. And the other yeah. And the counter of that is, like, when we get people that come in and they’re kinda skeptical and they’re kinda negotiating and and then maybe they see, like oh, I don’t know. Some people say our website’s really slick and they’re like, oh, I expect this to be some big corporation, and then it’s just some guy in a garage. And then, hopefully, they’re really thrilled at the end of it, and they said, wow. That was incredible.

Evan Maynard [01:00:08]:

Like, what did I just experience? I would like to do that again. And that’s where we really, that’s, like, the best day ever, as well. I think the other big, like, thing that we struggle with a little bit is, like, your house has so many different products to so many different people. Like, each one could be a house, and I love all of them. And so it’s like which

Scott Cowan [01:00:37]:

one Underneath that outdoor umbrella, you could just be, like, a, like, a camping rental place. It

Evan Maynard [01:00:43]:

could be a guide company. We could be, like, a social network where, you know, like, we could be so many things. And, like, do we highlight the gear aspect? Do we highlight the community aspect? What do people want in that moment when they’re trying to decide whether they should spend some money or not, or get out of their house, whatever that decision is. And so, like, figuring out whether we promote the events first on the website or to somebody or whether we highlight how much gear we have, it’s kind of been a a tricky journey for sure.

Scott Cowan [01:01:13]:

Well, the events, are they how in your are are the are the events successful in your opinion? Are you starting to see are people getting out and being social now? Is you know, given the pandemic and all of that. So how’s the how’s the events been pandemic and all of that. So how’s how’s the events being received?

Evan Maynard [01:01:33]:

That’s, again, interesting. Some events completely flop. You know, we have no one attend. In some events, we have twenty, thirty people show up. And it does we found no rhyme or reason to that. You know, it maybe it rains that night. Maybe it’s a Monday. You know? Maybe we learned, like, what most bars know about the holidays.

Evan Maynard [01:01:54]:

Right? Like, so there’s been a lot of things like that. Then there’s, like, is it an Omicron surge? Is it, you know, like, there’s so many reasons that could that are beyond our control and not our fault that then make our the data of, like, oh, should we run that event again or not? Like, I don’t know. Was it just random? Was it a fluke? Like, what? So, like, we went through a phase. We opened in September. That’s when people were kind of, like, Delta was coming up, but people weren’t totally aware of it. And we so people was clear, like, we weren’t gonna just be, like, over with it. And so we had some good events, and then we had Delta come on real strong or maybe where Delta was tapering. I don’t really remember.

Evan Maynard [01:02:35]:

And then we had the holidays. And then so, like, December, we had some amazing events, speed waxing, and we really figured out some some tricks. And we’re having an awesome time. And then the holidays hit, killed a lot of momentum. Omicron went nuts, killed even more momentum. And now we’re in mid February, and we’re still not, like are we still, like, people not showing up because of Omicron? Is it just February and it’s dreary outside? Is it, you know, people are traveling? You know? So Right. That’s what also makes the events thing hard to tell. It’s like, it’s more random than, like, the gear is a concrete need.

Evan Maynard [01:03:11]:

People have a need for it. They have friends going. That’s happening. They can’t just you know, like, that’s more of more steady thing

Scott Cowan [01:03:20]:

Right. As well. When you’re not doing your day job, when you’re not running Gear House

Evan Maynard [01:03:26]:

We’re talking about a very small slice of time now.

Scott Cowan [01:03:29]:

This so it should be an easy question. What do you do with your time?

Evan Maynard [01:03:34]:

I am a huge act of backcountry touring. Completely love it. K. Found took me four years to get started in it because the gear was so expensive. I didn’t wanna spend the money, and there’s no good way to try it. Turns out that it’s my favorite hobby of all time, and I wasted four years not doing it. So that was a big inspiration for Gear House.

Scott Cowan [01:03:53]:

Where’s a great place to go for that?

Evan Maynard [01:03:56]:

That’s what makes Washington so amazing. Right? It’s like there’s not one pass. There’s three, four, five, depending on how far you wanna drive. I think There’s a lot of them. Yeah. Mount Baker, backcountry has great variety. You can take steep stuff. You can take new people out there.

Evan Maynard [01:04:11]:

It’s no big problem. I think Rainier is also quite interesting. You know, you can go up to Camp Muir, which is base camp for the summit, which I think is kind of is like a nice entry level way to go, but it’s not something I try and do often because I just think there’s, like, more interesting things to do there, which I also didn’t discover until just last year, because someone was like, yeah. We could do that, but why don’t we do this other thing? And I was like, I never even thought there was anything else you could do. And I was like, oh, might have discovered that at your house. But I think Mount Baker, if I’m willing to make the drive, is is amazing. I think I would go backcountry skiing by myself if I could do it in a safe way, which you can’t. Backpacking is an interesting opposite in that I totally love backpacking.

Evan Maynard [01:05:00]:

Think it’s the greatest thing ever. Will never do it alone. I will do all the planning, all the work for my friends. I will put, you know, packs on your back. You just have to show up. I will do that every all day long. But going alone, I did once, and I said, yeah. That wasn’t really my style.

Scott Cowan [01:05:16]:

Alright.

Evan Maynard [01:05:16]:

And then, I really love, like, multi pitch sport climbing. And so and then I and then, like, bouldering in a gym. So I’m kind of a gym rat.

Scott Cowan [01:05:28]:

Okay.

Evan Maynard [01:05:29]:

I love the social scene of how a bouldering gym works. I think it’s, like, a great place to hang out with your friends. It’s not like a rope gym where it’s one you know, it’s a pair of people, so you get to hang out with a bunch of people. You just it’s concentrated. You’re working on the hard part of a problem. It’s super supportive. Everyone’s upbeat. No one’s, you know, smack talking you on the wall.

Evan Maynard [01:05:50]:

It’s all just, like, the most amazing experience. And then multi pitch sport, I think, is just an adventure. If you don’t know what that means, let’s see. Sport climbing means that the bolts have been put in the wall by someone else, so they they exist before you get there. Okay. You don’t have to, like, drill a hole in the rock or put put something in a crack to hold you up. And then multi pitch means you’re going in multiple legs, much like backpacking is to hiking. You know, you go up one length of rope, haul your partner up, and then go up another length.

Evan Maynard [01:06:24]:

So you’re kind of, like, leapfrogging up the wall. And I just think, like, the planning that, you know, if something goes wrong in the middle pitch, you have to know what you’re doing. Like, you get this tremendous reward because there’s nobody else up there. You know? And I think that’s just, like, heaven on earth.

Scott Cowan [01:06:42]:

So I’m noticing what I think is, like, a a common thread here is that you that engineering mindset, you like to solve problems. You like to you wanna be challenged. You’re you’re not I mean, just the way you just described that is, like, you know, very, very analytical to me that you’re, you know, so I could

Evan Maynard [01:07:04]:

to manage risk and solve problems. Right? Alright. You you can get yourself in some serious trouble in those things. You can also tow the line. You can either operate with people that like to tow the line and are always, like, in kinda sketchy situations. So you can be like me where I’m like, I never wanna be in a sketchy situation, and I work very hard to not end up there.

Scott Cowan [01:07:25]:

Mhmm.

Evan Maynard [01:07:25]:

But I know that it could happen if I don’t get the preparation right. And so I like that. And and then you have, like, another person involved, and you have to agree with that person and come to agreement. And I think, like, solving problem by yourself, sure. Okay. Solving problem with another person, Amazing. Right? I played team sports, and that’s what I’m missing. Yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:07:49]:

So we talked about instant coffee earlier. Are you a coffee fan? Oh, yeah. I you wouldn’t

Evan Maynard [01:07:55]:

you wouldn’t get by two jobs without it, I think.

Scott Cowan [01:08:00]:

Well, some people try.

Evan Maynard [01:08:01]:

I’d actually didn’t drink coffee until after grad school. Somehow I got through all of grad school, never drinking a drop.

Scott Cowan [01:08:08]:

What what?

Evan Maynard [01:08:08]:

I mean, I just had flexible schedule, and I would sleep when I needed to.

Scott Cowan [01:08:13]:

And

Evan Maynard [01:08:13]:

I’d be like, I’m tired. I’m gonna

Scott Cowan [01:08:15]:

go take a nap.

Evan Maynard [01:08:15]:

And that was part of, like, where is Evan? Oh, he’s gone. He just, like, fall asleep. You know? Like, harder to do that in the middle of office, I guess. But

Scott Cowan [01:08:24]:

It’s it’s frowned upon by management typically. Yeah.

Evan Maynard [01:08:27]:

That’s right. But when it’s your fellow grad student and they’re also, like they just I never had my heads I never slept on my desk, but that was also part of the norm. So I I arrived in, I had a rough introduction to coffee though, because I Oh. Came into the office. And my first as mechanical engineer, I spent my whole career trying to avoid electrons in any in any way, shape, or form. Programming hated it. Electrical engineering hated it. And the first thing they put me on was, testing computer software.

Scott Cowan [01:09:01]:

And they said, we need to

Evan Maynard [01:09:02]:

do this. And it was really important at the time to a manager. And so the team was working six days a week, and my boss, like, had a family. So he would get in at five in the morning and leave at six at night. And I was coming out of grad school where I didn’t wake up before nine. And so I had to be there when he was there because I didn’t know what I was doing. And so it was really helpful to have him there, and so I had to get in at five. And I was like, I better figure out this coffee thing because my body is not operating here.

Evan Maynard [01:09:32]:

So I go up to the coffee machine, and there’s two coffee pots next to each other. And I I I grab a cup, and I drink, like, I don’t know, a quarter of the cup or something. And now I’m just wired. You know, I can’t do anything. Everything’s shaking. Brain’s going a mile a minute on nothing important. And, like, how do this is, like, drunk driving. Like, how do people do anything with this stuff in their blood? And and but that’s what I had to do.

Evan Maynard [01:10:00]:

And so I kept doing it. And finally, like, day four goes by or something, and I’m up there. And and finally, somebody next to them, and they’re like, oh, going for the strong stuff. And I was like, sorry. Can you tell me a little more about that? And they’re like, oh, we got two pots. This is, like, for the people that have been drinking coffee for years, and this is, like, the stuff that most people can take. And and that’s when I saw my coffee. You know? I was like, oh, okay.

Evan Maynard [01:10:24]:

This stuff, you know, like, you know, it’s just like a tolerance, and I have none. And now I’m going for, like, the addict version of, like, you know, injecting it straight into your veins. I survived that, and I I

Scott Cowan [01:10:37]:

I still love coffee. Yeah. Where do you go, for coffee? Do you go out for coffee at all?

Evan Maynard [01:10:46]:

On occasion. I think it’s interesting. I don’t know if I am the only one that has this experience. Like, if I go to a different coffee shop, I feel like it gives me a different like, it gets it hits me harder than than if I make it at home or something or the same beans maybe. So I do that. But for the most part, I just love I have a siphon coffee maker at home, which

Scott Cowan [01:11:06]:

Those are so cool, man. Those are so cool.

Evan Maynard [01:11:08]:

My brother took me to coffee shop that did that. I was like, this is like chemistry class. It’s a little bit of a process. There’s a little bit of a routine to it. Yeah. You can’t get it super fast. There’s a lot of physics going on that make it work that are just kinda cool. And I think You you are an engineer.

Scott Cowan [01:11:25]:

I love it. You’re the only person I’ve ever talked to on the show that has brought up siphon coffee.

Evan Maynard [01:11:31]:

There you go.

Scott Cowan [01:11:31]:

Love it.

Evan Maynard [01:11:32]:

And if someone else brings it up again, they’re probably not gonna bring up the physics, I hope.

Scott Cowan [01:11:39]:

Well, probably not. But the reality is if somebody’s got a siphon coffee maker at home, they’re they they know, and they’re they’re yeah. They’re they’re It was just Yeah. They’re committed to process.

Evan Maynard [01:11:50]:

Mind blowing to me that, like, you could have coffee not turned acidic after it gets cold. And that’s, like, the whole the whole I don’t know if it’s marketing or what seems to be true of a site of a siphon coffee maker, is is that. So and it feels like chemistry class

Scott Cowan [01:12:06]:

for me.

Evan Maynard [01:12:06]:

It’s just kinda like

Scott Cowan [01:12:08]:

No. They’re they’re cool. They’re super cool. I’ve got one on my counter. I very rarely Uh-huh. It’s there. It’s there. And it’s I’m lazy.

Scott Cowan [01:12:18]:

I want coffee. I want I I primarily drink AeroPress. That’s just kinda my go to, and I, you know, make AeroPress. I’m down here in the office. I can

Evan Maynard [01:12:27]:

yeah. Yeah. I haven’t had an AeroPress, so maybe I would convert if I had one. But,

Scott Cowan [01:12:32]:

probably not. I mean, siphon’s better. I like siphon coffee coffee through a siphon better, but AeroPress is just one cup at a time, convenient. I got the process dialed down. I can do a couple other things while I’m doing you know, I got the routine. I’m locked into the routine. Yeah. So it’s a it’s the lazy man’s way of doing it.

Scott Cowan [01:12:54]:

Where do you want we’ll wrap up with this. Where do you want Gearhouse to be in the next two to five years? Like, what what what is the future road map for you?

Evan Maynard [01:13:05]:

That is is a question we are trying to answer for ourselves. You know, there’s kinda two directions it could go. Right? This could be a little, like, Seattle shop, and it would just be awesome. Right? And maybe that’s where I burn out. It could be something that we, like, really want to reinvent rentals in a lot of ways. Right? And we really want to really but so, like, that there’s certainly maybe maybe it could get to there, but step one is just to make this the one in Seattle work and figure out what makes it tick. And then maybe we figure out if it if it has if I have the mental capacity and and emotion to keep going or whether I’m like, yeah. It’s time for me to go, like, spend every week, you know, all the weekdays and everything, like, out in the mountains having a great time, you know, like the Patagonia style founder where he’s like, yeah.

Evan Maynard [01:13:52]:

Let my people go surfing. You know? Like, you have a lifestyle and you go work a lot less than you would have if you have a corporate manager, and to enable that for a lot of people, like, I think that would both of those would be tremendous successes in my mind. You know, if some other big business decides to, you know, completely change, that would be success too. Right? Like, these are people like, oh, are you worried that someone’s gonna, like, copy your business model and squash you? And it’s like, well, not really because then we’ve we’ve solved the problem too. Right?

Scott Cowan [01:14:26]:

Right. It yeah. It’s and I I’m a big believer that there’s there’s very few industries that only one one business can survive in. You know? There’s there’s things like there’s, let’s say, automobile manufacturing. There’s not a lot of small automobile carmakers there. I’ll just say car. You know? You need you need that massive infrastructure to be building a car at for market.

Evan Maynard [01:14:54]:

It’s unclear too, like, if the business would only work in Seattle because we have so much variety in our outdoors. Right? Like, if there’s only one game one hobby in town, then, like, you buy the gear for it and you’re done. Right? Seattle has a problem in that we have not a problem. Seattle has the amazing benefit that we have water, mountains, forest, desert, all of all the snow and not snow all the time.

Scott Cowan [01:15:20]:

Yeah. No. There’s you’re you’re you are in a target rich environment. So What didn’t I ask you that we should have talked about?

Evan Maynard [01:15:31]:

When we talked about why we’re here, rentals being better than not a place for people to hang out, a third place, like, not home, not work. Like, we just want we want people getting outside if that’s what they decide they wanna do. If you don’t wanna do it Mhmm. That doesn’t bother me in the slightest. Right? Everyone’s got their cup of tea. Right. But really the

Scott Cowan [01:15:53]:

I prefer to say cup of coffee. Go. Yeah.

Evan Maynard [01:15:55]:

Wrong forgot what show I was on.

Scott Cowan [01:15:58]:

Yeah. Gloves.

Evan Maynard [01:16:00]:

We so we just like, that’s really the overarching, like, mission of of Gearhouse is, like, what can we do Mhmm. To make you get outside, in a way that you’re gonna have a better time?

Scott Cowan [01:16:12]:

Right.

Evan Maynard [01:16:12]:

And so I think we covered all the ways that we think we can do that for you, but, we’d love like, if you heard this and stopped in, like, we would love to hear all the things that you’re like. Evan’s not that smart because x y z. Like, we would love to chat with you anybody about that. You just wanna come check out the space, open invite, come check it out. Like, that would be phenomenal

Scott Cowan [01:16:33]:

Well as well. Give us give us the and we’ll put these in the show notes, but where can people find you online?

Evan Maynard [01:16:39]:

Join gearhouse.com. That’s important. We’re on all the different social medias. So we’re Gearhouse Seattle, on Instagram and Facebook, and a lot of the contact streams just come to me. If you got thoughts on you know, you wanna reach out, you can do hello at join gear house dot com or evan@joingearhouse.com. Both of those will come to me, and all thoughts, and we reply to everything that comes in the door at this point. So, yeah.

Scott Cowan [01:17:12]:

And if people wanna make an appointment, they can go to joingearhouse.com and schedule that.

Evan Maynard [01:17:16]:

That’s right. Or just show up at an event. That works too. Probably in the next month or so, we’ll have real, like, regular operating hours. Hopefully, we have the beer license. So if you wanna come have a brew. We do coffee and tea as well, so, no no hard love. And then, yeah, we’re in South Lake Union Of Seattle.

Evan Maynard [01:17:35]:

So we are Yep. Two or three blocks north of the REI at Flagship and Feathered Friends, kinda along that East Lake corridor right next to I 90 and I 5.

Scott Cowan [01:17:44]:

How’s parking?

Evan Maynard [01:17:45]:

Parking is surprisingly good. There’s a lot of street parking around, and it’s not as tight as Capitol Hill or something like that. It depends on time of day, but no one’s complained about parking. If they complain, they complain that we’re hard to find because you have to walk down an alley to find us. And my other favorite fact is, for every one person that complains we’re hard to find, nine out of 10 people kinda like that we’re hard to find. They think of that as like, oh, this is kinda, like, weird down this back alley, and there’s this door that I would never look at, and then there’s this really cool gear space in the back.

Scott Cowan [01:18:21]:

Kind of like a speakeasy.

Evan Maynard [01:18:22]:

That’s right. Gear. And we got just so lucky finding that spot. They we did not choose the spot. The spot just came to us, and somebody sent it our way, and that was the only thing that we looked at after that.

Scott Cowan [01:18:36]:

That’s awesome. Yeah. Alright. Well, I I enjoyed talking to you. I appreciate you sharing your your company and and what your how you can help people save themselves the headache of a closet full of gear, but still having access to great great quality gear that’s put together with some attention to detail. And, helping those of us that we don’t know what questions to ask, you’re gonna help us make sure we get the right answers to the questions that we should should have asked. So, Evan, thank you so much for being on. I appreciate it.

Evan Maynard [01:19:09]:

Thank you for having me. I love talking about this all day long, and this was a great time to just have a chat, with somebody completely new and and a host of people.

Scott Cowan [01:19:30]:

Join us next time for another episode of the exploring Washington state podcast.