
A new video released by Utah Gov. Spencer Cox argues the big, semi-annual trade show called Outdoor Retailer should come back to Salt Lake City. This is despite opposition from leading brands, resorts like mine in Aspen and many nonprofit groups over the state’s environmental policies.
Oh, Utah! Will you ever learn? You can’t have the things you love like clean air, wild lands and a stable climate and destroy them at the same time. You can’t roll back historic land conservation practices and hope your state will seem welcoming to hikers, climbers, fishers, and skiers.
The 2017 move to Colorado occurred for two reasons: First, the outdoor companies selling their tents, sleeping bags, hiking boots, and backpacks didn’t want to do business in a state that was willfully and actively opposing protection of the very landscapes in which customers use those products. Yet elected officials were attempting to dismantle the Grand Staircase Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments.
Second, outdoor industry leaders didn’t want to celebrate commerce in a state whose lawmakers were mostly opposed to acting on the very thing threatening that commerce — climate change. A few years ago, the Guardian reports, the Utah legislature passed a resolution urging the EPA to “cease its carbon dioxide reduction policies, programs, and regulations until climate data and global warming science are substantiated.”
You can’t politically ignore, or slow-walk, action on climate change that is flooding, baking and burning cities and streams, mountains and fields, and expect businesses dependent on outdoor recreation to flock to your state. You have to care. And to act.
…the outdoor companies selling their tents, sleeping bags, hiking boots, and backpacks didn’t want to do business in a state that was willfully and actively opposing protection of the very landscapes in which customers use those products.
Emerald Expositions, which owns and produces the event, has to realize that outdoor brands are not environment-agnostic anymore. The show that produces $56 million in revenue is about business, but business more than ever requires protecting the environment.
Don’t get me wrong. I love Utah. I have fond memories of skiing in the Wasatch and I love the people, the landscapes, the rivers and the spirit.
But Utah politics leaves me flat. Here in Colorado, we’re pioneering new laws to cut methane pollution and drive EV adoption; to rein-in Hydrofluorocarbons and clean up our utility grid. We’ve got robust public lands protections and aggressive environmental leadership from the governor, both senators and both houses of the legislature.
Electric vehicles hit almost 13 percent of market share in December, a few years after Colorado became the only state in the central U.S. to adopt California’s Zero Emissions Vehicles standard. We’re not perfect, but we’re the kind of place where businesses and government together recognize that they need to protect the landscape, and the climate, on which their economic success is based.
Some things change, others don’t. President Trump gutted the Grand Staircase Escalante and Bear Ears monuments, with Utah’s support. President Biden reinstated them.
Utah lawmakers moved off the dime on climate, commissioning a study called the “Utah Roadmap,” with a goal of reducing CO2 emissions by half over the next decade. Whether action will follow that analysis remains to be seen. As for the two monuments, state officials have engaged lawyers to sue the federal government over their restoration. Tribes, tired of their lands being used as a political football, are preparing to counter-sue.
Until Utah begins to understand these things that matter, the Outdoor Retailer show needs to stay somewhere that does.
Mike Kaplan is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a nonprofit dedicated to spurring lively conversation about the West. He is president and CEO of Aspen Skiing Company.
Well written and I completely agree. Politicians seem to think outdoor enthusiasts have similar short memories. We do not, we know we must change and are willing to support those who support such change.
Every dollar we spend is in itself a type of ballot: carefully counted and sought.
We wield power; one way -or the other.
For instance, when I boycott a business in Texas, I do let them know why.
“Money doesn’t talk: it swears”
Al, why do you boycott a business in Texas? Any specific business or all?
@David Linsay, @A1, I 100% agree with both of you and the article.
I am very mindful with every dollar I spend these days.
Colorado has it’s own problems: real estate is unaffordable, and those who own real estate in outdoorsy areas likely don’t live there. Mountain geography is similar everywhere. Private land in the valleys, public land above in the mountains. In Aspen, this means extremely overpriced inaccessible land in the valleys, elite playground in the public land above.
Instead of a schpeel by some rich Aspenite, how about poll the employees actually having to travel to the show, that would be democratic.
As a former employee of a company that attend the Outdoor Retailer show, my guess is that the proposed Poll would overwhelmingly agree with this article and stay out of Utah.
The points about vacant housing and high prices are interesting, and not sure if anyone is addressing them head on. Or even how one would. My eyes were opened when I worked for the Census in 2020. I live in the Santa Cruz, CA area. A place where lack of housing and high prices abound. I was taken aback by the number of “Second Homes” that I encountered when trying to count the populace.
Not sure if it’s right or wrong, or what to do about it. It’s certainly a symptom of wealth inequality.
Great article. Ironic though isn’t it? Here we have an article penned by someone who is about as “big business” as “big business” gets, yet in support of environmental stewardship. Well played Mr. Kaplan.
It’s like reading an article on how to remove bloodstains from a carpet……..after you commit a murder.
Irony. How to grow a business that is dependent upon the very idea of outdoor…stewardship: Growing a business that places pressure on the very thing you are dependent upon. Property prices are skyrocketing out here in the West. And there is nothing anyone can do about it. *shoulder shrug* Not sell? Not likely. Not buy? Yeah right. But, consumers CAN make choices about the products we buy. THAT is how voice our displeasure. Utah has some great places to go explore, but, I’m not going to in the near future until they clean up the mess they made.