This week on the podcast we are continuing with the Business of Outdoor Recreation series as Brent sits down with Gary Vernon, Director of Outdoor Recreation and Trail Innovation at Runway Group. They discuss the growth of mountain biking and outdoor recreation in Arkansas. Gary shares his background growing up in Missouri and his 30 year career at Walmart before leaving to work with Tom Walton on developing Bentonville's trail ecosystem. He describes the evolution of mountain biking in Northwest Arkansas and the economic impact of $157 million annually. Gary also explores the growing gravel biking scene and trail developments across the state of Arkansas.
Podcast Episode
Episode Transcript
Gary Vernon 0:00
You know, this whole idea about bringing mountain bike trails to town bringing access
to outdoors to town was a successful formula. We are becoming a center of excellence
for for bicycling and trails.
Brent Williams 0:14
Welcome to the Be Epic Podcast brought to you by the Sam M. Walton College of Business
at the University of Arkansas. I'm your host Brent Williams. Together, we'll explore
the dynamic landscape of business and uncover the strategies, insights and stories
that drive business today. Well, today I have with me Gary Vernon. Gary is Director
of Outdoor Recreation and Trail Innovation at the Runway Group. Gary, thanks for joining
today.
Gary Vernon 0:44
Well, thanks Brent for having me.
Brent Williams 0:45
Well, I am interested to dive in on mountain biking and its impact on our economy.
And I love how outdoor recreation in the state of Arkansas is growing and has become
a real focus, not only in Northwest Arkansas, but throughout the state. But maybe
I want to start with you first. Your background. I know you, you spent several years
at Walmart and you spent several years at the Walton Family Foundation prior to to
joining the Runway Group. So a little bit maybe professionally, personally, and then
I'll dig in on mountain biking and how you got into it.
Gary Vernon 1:25
Yeah, yeah, well, just personally, I'm just a kid from Joplin, Missouri that liked
the race BMX bikes and ended up in Bentonville because I had a 30 year career at Walmart.
Last 10 years, I was a director in the environmental compliance area and had this
really unique opportunity to work on sustainability programs when it came to recycling
and waste to products and had a great job until I ran into a 23 year old visionary
by the name of Tom Walton. And he had this idea of bringing mountain biking to town,
you know, build trails in town and Bentonville, which was really a fringe sport back
then. And so I ended up leaving my 30 year career with Tom and joined Tom and his
brother Steuart to lead their work to develop this mountain bike vision to build a
destination in and around Bentonville and here I am.
Brent Williams 2:18
You know, it's it's pretty amazing now, you can go almost anywhere in the United States.
And people now know Bentonville and, you know, of course, they probably know it either
because of Walmart or mountain biking it seems and the mountain biking scene has exploded.
And you've been a key part of that. How has this whole thing developed?
Gary Vernon 2:41
Well, you know, Arkansas has had some wonderful trails for decades, you know, the
Ozark Off Road Cyclists started in 97, you know, that club here in Fayetteville. But,
you know, back then it was an enthusiast sport, you know, the trails were built by
enthusiasts for for that, that mountain biker. And what, what happened in Bentonville,
you know, and it didn't happen on the first five miles, you know, in back in 2007,
when that first five miles were open it it wasn't really catered to the new rider,
the beginner had had one little trail on the flat ground called seed tick. And that
kind of opened everybody's eyes to where people were wanting to ride that one trail
that were just trying to start mountain biking. So that's when the focus flipped and
turned into let's build some, some trails specifically for beginners. And that's where
the All American Trail, that connector trail that goes all through Bentonville, starting
from the square that was focused on building a fun trail that is not intimidating,
but still had some alternate places to jump and all that. But that magical trail,
the All American, really was the secret sauce to Bentonville. And really the success
of you know, the first 12-15 miles and that seems to be the the amount of miles that
we're telling other communities. If you can get 10 to 12 miles of trail it'll, it'll
start really becoming something special that'll transform your community. We saw that,
you know, the first 10 to 12 miles. The success, the people that were riding mountain
bikes that otherwise wouldn't be riding mountain bikes started really evolving. You
know, the tipping point was 2016. That's when we had enough miles and hadn't started
having bigger events. And people started hearing about Bentonville. We had the International
Mountain Bike Association's World Summit that end of that year. We just built the
back 40 trail in Bella Vista started on Coler Mountain Bike Preserve. And it was that
was from when it really started booming.
Tell us a little bit about, well for those that haven't ridden these trails, Coler is an interesting place, right? In the set, you know, it seems like it is truly designed for certainly an enthusiast, but particularly accessible for anyone, whether you're walking on the trail, you're having a cup of coffee, you know, you can ride, you know, in the midst of all of that. It just seems like a really interesting place to me.
Yeah, you know, and that was the year that, I was a volunteer, you know, I'd met Tom and when he first started the first five miles and ended up as the president of a local club, you know, Fast in Bentonville, Bella Vista, and, and was just doing projects, and it got to be too much to be able to work my job at Walmart and do all these projects. So Tom and Steuart brought me on full time in 2015. So Coler was an idea that Tom had, back then it was a 300 acre park with a creek going through it a perfect little canvas, you know, to build the trail system. But the idea we brought in a couple of different companies, you know, some architects, a consulting group that had designed national parks and, and just others that were an artist, you know, and, and trail designers, and just we all sat around a table and talked about ideas. What can we do with this little 300 acre parcel just three miles west of the square. And there was an old barn in the middle of the valley, where Oscar and Esther Terrell had built their homestead back in 1930. Well, when that barn was a good anchor, you know, what can we do around this barn? Well, we obviously wanted to redo the barn. But where that old home was, was no longer there was a perfect area to put a cafe. And that was a kind of a crazy idea to build a cafe in the middle of a 300 acre park that you can't drive to. You can only bike or hike to and we thought man, that's going to be just a real big gamble. But that ended up being a homerun. Mark Bray from airship coffee, stepped up and opened up his operation there in November of 2020, pandemic, you know, and but everybody was getting outside because of those trails were allowing people to get out of the house and get active. So that coffee shop all winter was booming. And even today, it's you can go there on a Tuesday, you know, afternoon and it's full of people.
Brent Williams 7:21
Pretty, what a cool place.
Gary Vernon 7:23
But you're right, the trails are designed. If you look at the map, you know, the highest
peak at Coler is kind of the northeast side of the, you know, the the parkway, it
kind of almost runs north and south, maybe a little bit crooked. But the northeast
side is kind of has the highest peak. And that's where we wanted to put some gravity
jump trails and some technical trails to ride down. But then on the southwest, it's
kind of the easier train and through the valley. So it's kind of separated into a
jump trail, more advanced on the northeast, and then a family fun area on the southwest
and then connecting it all throughout the middle and then the Greenway the paved trail,
goes down the valley on the creek, you know, fall in the creek. And then there's some
easy trails for the kids to ride along that paved trail.
Brent Williams 8:13
Yeah. So such a wonderful place. And it's fun to just, it's just a fun place to be
and fun place to take your family and there's kind of something for everybody there,
it seems to me, you know, and I know you've been focused on Bentonville. And we've
it seems to me that we've really seen mountain biking grow throughout the state, right,
you know, now Devil's Den is amazing. Nebo, Pinnacle at Little Rock, kind of what
do you see in you know, if you kind of step back and look at Arkansas and what's happening
in mountain biking?
Gary Vernon 8:45
Well, Arkansas had five major trail systems, you know, in the early 2000s, that were
considered by the International Mountain Bike Association, they rated trails, and
they were considered epic trails, you know, they were 20 plus miles and they were,
you know, the scenery was great. And the conditions were good, but they are in the
middle of nowhere. And so when Bentonville was an experiment, so Bentonville, the
success of that building a trail in town, where people could pop over there on the
trail on lunch, or after school after work, that changed everything where other communities
wanted trails. So that really started a spark that spread throughout Arkansas. And
then we started looking at, you know, there's some great places to build trail, but
we're not going to build anymore in national forest because we have trail counters
that measures how many people ride trails, we noticed that these five trails in the
middle of national forests, were getting no visitors, you know, maybe maybe a big
bump, if there's an event, but throughout the year, it was a lot of maintenance, because
they're in the middle of nowhere and there's no volunteers nearby or even staff at
the Forest Service to maintain them. So we're having to pay to maintain those trails.
So that's when we connected with Grady Span, the state park director and started working
with him and like what you know, some of the best terrain we have in the state is
state parks. And you talk about, you know, Mount Nebo, Devil's Den, those are state
parks, they have cabins they have, in some cases, they have restaurants and they definitely
have staff that can maintain trails. So that became a relationship. In late 2015 we
took Grady and his staff to some site visits for you know, around the country for
destinations for trails, and they really started to get how wonderful this relationship
could be. And that started the brand, the monument trail brand, which is trails and
state parks in Arkansas. So, you know, Mount Nebo, Hobbs State Park, Pinnacle Mountain,
and Devil's Den are all four of those State Park Monument Trails, and we've got a
few more up our sleeve that are coming, that are going to be wonderful.
Brent Williams 10:45
Okay, I can't wait to find out. Well, you know, Gary, as you, you know, you've been
riding bicycles your whole life. But, you know, I can clearly you've got a passion
for it. But I think you have a passion for like, it's good for people, right, you
know, so kind of how do you see one being good for us at an individual level, but
then, you know, let's talk about how this connects to business in our economy. And
as, as our economy is growing, as companies are growing as companies are moving here,
I think this matters, talk a little bit about all that, you know, sort of magic sauce
there.
Gary Vernon 11:24
Well, we've seen it in real time, you know, in this region. And specifically Bentonville,
Bella Vista where, if you want to talk about, you know, it's it's definitely a quality
of life initiative, when you build access to nature. I mean, the studies have shown
that, if you just get out in nature, it's a benefit for your mental health. And it's
a it's a form of getting active. So those two things together, are powerful. And if
you have a good quality of life, then people will want to be part of your community.
So we've started to see people move to the region, to be near the trails, in some
cases, they're moving here without a job. And we're seeing businesses that are attracted
to that kind of influx of young talent, talent of all ages. And so we have seen businesses,
and we've been courting businesses in the outdoor industry in the cycling industry.
Because they see that as a, you know, you can certainly bring in talent and retain
talent, if you have a community that people want to be part of. And that's simple.
When I moved here, 20 years ago, I moved to Bella Vista 20 years ago, with my career
at Walmart. And I wanted to move here, I knew it was a good place because I just grew
up there, up the road in Joplin. I knew this was a wonderful community. But people
outside this region don't understand what we have here. And it was a tough sell, to
get people to move here. But now with the reputation of this outdoor lifestyle, with
trails on every corner, that you can jump on. I've had so many people come to me on
the trails and say we moved here. Third visit, in the first visit, we were blown away,
came back with a family third visit we looked at real estate and bought it. That story
happens all the time. And I would have laughed if somebody told me 20 years ago that
was going to be a story here. Because it wasn't.
Brent Williams 13:18
Yeah. But it certainly is today. There's no doubt about that. Well, you know, as you
as you as you think about how do you see how do you see that whole economy around
cycling developing you started to mention it you started to say businesses are starting
to wrap around right you know, there's services, there's bike shops, like as you're
looking at the future of what that economy you think is going to look like in Northwest
Arkansas, give us a little bit of a sneak peek you know in Gary's mind of how you
see this continuing to develop.
Gary Vernon 13:53
It's already started, there's no secret you know, we have Eddyline Kayaks moving from
Seattle their headquarters here you know, Allied Bicycles is in Rogers they're building
high end, carbon fiber, mountain bikes, gravel bikes, road bikes. Victoria Tire their
US headquarters is here. Rapha, you know, the apparel company is headquartered here.
There's the continues to be outdoor apparel companies pop up. I mean, it's we were,
we were courting the rest of the industry, you know, Specialized Bicycles has an Experience
Center. YT Bikes is going to have one of their experience centers they call a YT Mill.
It's going to be a state of the art showcase where you can come in and look at their
products and demo their products. And they've got some of the more affordable high
end bicycles you can get. It's an online business but you'll be able to come to Bentonville
and try out one of their bikes before you order it online. You could actually come
here on a weekend, demo one of their bikes on a day and then go back over to their
location and just have one shipped to your house, that's going to continue to evolve.
And again, as we bill and the Ledger, have you seen the Ledger office building I mean,
that's built. It's the, it's the world's first bikable building six or six stories
tall and you can ride your bike to every floor. And that has been filled up with different
bike industry, USA Cycling has moved to headquarters here where their our Olympic
mountain bike hopefuls are going to be training in this region. People for Bikes has
a headquarters here and they're helping us really master plan how to get people to
ride to work on bikes. And the story goes on so yeah, we are we are becoming a center
of excellence for for bicycling and trails. There's a Bicycle Technician Program at
the community college in Bentonville at NWACC. And we're just getting ready to launch
a trail builders trade school in Bentonville at NWACC that Dr. Bollinger is spearheading
and we've made some partnerships with the the EU program that they're trying to build
over there. There's several countries in Europe and Scandinavia that have been working
together to build trail building curriculum. And it's because trail buildings kind
of wild west, but there's gonna be credentials and certifications to be a trail builder.
And they are partnering with us because they've kind of ran into a little bit of headwinds
on their curriculum. And so we're going to work together with them and build a universal,
you know, trail building curriculum and certification. And it'll be based out of Bentonville.
How cool is that? And Professor Jon Johnson here, is focused on outdoor industries and engaging students and thinking about careers in the outdoor industry, which is another great fit to go alongside what you guys are doing.
There are so many kind of synergies happening now. It's hard to even keep up with it. But what is it what is exciting is, you know, that grand experiment that Tom and Steuart are doing are doing in Bentonville, and in surrounding areas have grown to where other communities in Arkansas are doing it themselves, just because they can see it works. And building trail and, and getting people active.
Brent Williams 17:14
What about this whole gravel scene that's happening, as, and that's kind of, seems
to have really been developing as of the last several years. But getting more and
more popular.
Gary Vernon 17:29
I used to ride gravel roads to get to a trail, you know, back when I was growing up,
but it's amazing, it's and it has become a phenomenon. And we have a we have a you
know, registration for a gravel event they sell out in minutes.
Brent Williams 17:44
Really?
Gary Vernon 17:45
You know, like our Little Sugar event in October sold out quickly. But anyway, it's
just, it's just a way to get out and it's it's social, where you can ride side by
side with your friends and ride to another town and get lunch and see the backwoods,
you know, by bike and it's and in some cases, some of the riders may be not quite
ready to go off road on a mountain bike. So it's a good starting point. And others
are pure, you know, endurance motorheads that just want to go out and ride 100 miles
on back country and not have to worry about the high speeds of a highway. But man,
you can see the most beautiful spark parts of the parts of the state just by riding
your gravel bike and in one of the one of our best experiences is the Arkansas High
Country route. The Adventure Cycling's route and now that's a 1000 mile loop around
the best parts of the state.
Brent Williams 18:45
It is amazing now what you can see and the beauty that you can see in Northwest Arkansas
on a gravel bike and other parts of Arkansas too I know there's I haven't ridden it
but I know there's a ride a gravel ride that happens down near Helena I think yeah,
which is completely differently landscape but has a unique beauty of its own.
Gary Vernon 19:06
Well, I didn't understand how, how great that area is for gravel riding until I you
know, Ted Hergert and Martin Smith from Martins from Bird Eye. And Ted's in Jonesboro
and they kept telling me about the Crowley's Ridge experience and I didn't I just
knew that over there you're gonna be riding in the grids of farmland on gravel. And
it's, you know, can't be that exciting, but they convinced me to come down there we
rode from Jonesboro to Helena on Crowley's Ridge, which is a really unique like two
mile walk, you know, it's in the middle of that delta flat farmland, but it's a two
mile wide, basic, rolling hillside that's eroded over the years, but it's remained.
So you're riding through canopy and you're going through these small towns that have
wonderful cafes, and I discovered fried pies there. And every 10 miles you can get
a fried fried pie. But we rode from Jonesboro into Helena and and then rode on into
Clarksdale, Mississippi on the levee. And that was a wonderful trip and so, but what
else was happening from Helena, the Delta Heritage Trail, which is an old rail bed,
it's being created into an 86 mile, rail to trail you'll be able to leave Helena,
jump on it and ride Arkansas City, you'll be able to cross the White River and the
Arkansas River on these giant, old railroad bridges that are going to be reconditioned,
and there'll be a way to a hut to hut plan for that on the way so you'll be able to
really eventually ride Crowley's Ridge from the Missouri State line all the way to
Arkansas City.
Brent Williams 20:50
Really great to see, you know, this, I guess exploding throughout Arkansas. I think
that's the one thing that I love. I love seeing about it. And you know, it's had a
substantial economic impact, at least I know you've been able to measure it, I think
and in our region. Tell us a little bit about that.
Gary Vernon 21:11
Well, just recently the University of Arkansas did their report. And it's $157 million
annually of just economic impact in the in the Northwest Arkansas two county region.
And that's just driving the business of bringing people here to ride bikes on trails,
and then local businesses being enhanced by people riding bikes and getting active.
And it's real dollars. And we started seeing, you know, the people from out of town,
like I said, when we started having 12 or more miles and Bentonville, that's when
we started seeing these bike racks on cars with license plates from outside the region.
And we started really understanding hey, this is this is bringing people in so that
as the miles, you know, continued to add on and it became more of a destination. We
saw more and more out of towners come in they, they're spending real money here. So
it definitely is an economic impact to the community.
Brent Williams 22:08
Yeah, and you're starting to see you know, more hotels in Bentonville being built
and more restaurants. As you said, the the synergies are a little bit hard to even
keep up with.
Gary Vernon 22:21
You know, people ask me sometimes what are they building over there? I don't know.
They're building quicker than I can keep up. But you know, when I first moved to Bentonville,
or to Bella Vista and worked in Bentonville, Station Cafe was a burger joint on the
square. And that was it. You know, there's nothing else to really do on the square
and, and now it's, it's a model for downtown revitalization and, and, you know, when
we were out there working on that first few miles of trail it slaughter pen in Bentonville.
With Tom he had his vision, he wanted to revitalize the downtown as part of this whole
mountain bike. So he got it early, he knew what he was wanting to do, and did it with
the help of the community. And the community, you know, if it wasn't for the community,
buying in and entrepreneurs jumping in and helping and, you know, Tim Robinson starting
Phat Tire Bike Shop, you know, in 2009 or 2008. You and as the trails grew so did
his business, and that's, that's, that's all part of it, you know, just people having
the vision to jump in and be part of the growth and it's, it's really been fun to
see,
Brent Williams 23:31
It has been a you've been really a huge part of that development. You know, one one
thing, Gary, I'd love your thoughts on for our students, you know, so at the Walton
College, you know, we'll have, oh, let's say, you know, over 8,000 students in the
Walton College and you know, there's probably 32 ish 1000 at the University of Arkansas,
and many of them from here, but many not, and many might not have grown up riding
bicycles, you know, and they might be looking at all the trails around and thinking,
like, alright, where do I start? How do I how do I jump in to this to this ecosystem?
What would you what advice would you give them?
Gary Vernon 24:14
Well, the first thing is rent a quality bicycle. You know, you don't want to ruin
your experience by maybe starting out on the wrong piece of equipment, but rent a
quality bicycle. I know you, you guys rent them here at the University at UREC. There's
bike shops are all around the region that you can go in and spend 40, 50, 60 bucks
just to try it out. Or borrow a friend's you know, it's even easier. But just give
it a try. Get some instruction early. You know, if you get out and give it a try,
hire a coach to teach you good habits first. And then it'll be a lifelong sport. And
that's what I like about cycling and mountain biking. It's a lifelong sport. You know,
I'm 40 years older than my son and so we go on trips together and ride bikes. Because
it's a lifelong sport. He's getting a lot better than me, but I'm still able to keep
up.
Brent Williams 25:09
I bet. Well, you know, as you maybe even broaden it out a little bit, last question
for you, again, thinking about our students, and as you look back at your entire career
of, you know, being involved in what's happened in cycling in Bentonville, and the
state, and then 30 years at Walmart, couple of lessons learned that you would say,
if you're, if you're a student today at the Walton College that you'd give them some
advice.
Gary Vernon 25:40
Well, what has worked for me and made me successful, or at least happy, is, have ambition,
but also enjoy where you're a in life. I saw so many people that weren't happy in
a long career, because they were never satisfied at what they're doing. And so I think
that was my secret is, enjoy the moment, what you're doing and try to be the best
you can be and things happen. Advancement happens if you're, if you're positive, and
you're, you know, you're doing a good job of what you're doing and don't lament the
fact that you're not able to make the next step quickly. That's been really my success
in at least secret to life, but also just having the confidence and just try new things.
I mean, my, you know, kind of make your own luck, you know, be you know, hard work
and and opportunity, you know, creates, creates good luck. And you can't do enough
of that.
Brent Williams 26:42
Well, you know, say yes to opportunities, be present, work hard, do your best and
the opportunity that's in front of you, I think it's wonderful advice.
Gary Vernon 26:53
10 years of volunteerism, you know, got me to my role, but it was passion, you know,
that I enjoyed doing, didn't expect it to turn into anything, because there wasn't
such a job there, but it worked out. But then I would just, I would just finally say,
you know, this whole idea about bringing mountain bike trails to town, bringing access
to outdoors to town, was a successful formula. And same things happening with paddling.
You know, we have 96,000 miles of rivers, creeks and streams in this state. And Stewart
Nolan who started the Arkansas Canoe Club back in the mid 70s is helping lead that
effort to bring paddling to town. So what about Little Sugar paddling down it in Bentonville?
Bella Vista? Or what about, you know, the White River paddling into Fayetteville.
So making it easy, make you know, lower the intimidation factor getting more kids
and first timers out on the water. That's all part of the the secret formula is make
it easy bring it to town. That way people don't have to make a decision on a weekend
to go somewhere two hours away.
Brent Williams 28:04
Well, Gary, thanks for all you've done for for our community in Northwest Arkansas
for our state and for for all the businesses that are benefiting and for all the people
that are benefiting so deeply appreciate you. Thank you.
Gary Vernon 28:21
Well, thanks for having me.
Brent Williams 28:22
On behalf of the Walton College thank you for joining us for this captivating conversation.
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