April 17, 2024 • 36 mins
Welcome to this special episode of the Sends and Suffers podcast. Join host Mario Stanley as he engages with the passionate climbers and industry experts at the Indoor Climbing Expo. Hear the thrilling stories of their experiences, organizations, and their substantial roles in shaping and supporting diverse climbing communities.
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Today's episode is a little different.
It is a recap of a conversation of my time at the Indoor Climbing Expo,
which is an event that is open to the general public, unlike a lot of climbing
and expo events in the outdoor world.
This conversation was an NGO conversation.
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It was the SECC, We Climb, and Global Climbing Initiative.
Myself, Kendall, Megan, and Caleb were all there chatting about our respective
industries that we work for and that we are passionate about.
I hope you enjoy this conversation of NGOs talking about their business,
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how they got started, and where we're going.
Hey, y'all. Thanks, everybody, for coming. My name's Meg Evans.
I'm the executive director of the Southeastern Climbers Coalition.
Y'all are here at the Meet a Nonprofit at the Climbing Expo,
Indoor Climbing Expo, in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
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To see i've got the honor of sitting with these
fine gentlemen today my panel so to
my left here we have mario stanley i don't know
if you guys have watched the hbo show lately
but he was on on tv he was a contestant on
on the climb is that right it was the climb okay
great with none other than chris oh that's
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right oh chris charmer's up too but he probably tuned
in to see mario so um um great mario also
also is the host of the send or
send and suffers right podcast
and then has been doing a lot of work with the global climbing initiative so
i'll let him talk about that more in a minute in the bright highlighter
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orange there he didn't get the black memo that today that's all right the rest
of us were black is caleb timberman he is the marketing director for the southeastern
climbers coalition which is the same organization that i work for caleb Caleb
has been known to be one of those that's the hardest worker that you'll ever meet.
He makes incredible content for the SEC that gets an entire community of people
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motivated to get involved and do the work that we do.
And then I don't know if you guys have seen his photos, but my goodness,
the guy is just a powerhouse. So I'll let him talk more about that. Thank you so much.
And then speaking of powerhouses, at the very end there, we've got Kendall Martin.
He has, by his own hands, just crafted this incredible organization called We Climb Chat.
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They focus on getting youth from BIPOC community, underserved communities,
into climbing in the Chattanooga area.
And I think he's got big plans to maybe, hopefully, expand.
I'm coming for you. I want that to come down to Birmingham.
So, yeah, I'm going to let them all talk a little bit about themselves.
Just give us a little bit of an intro.
And then I've got some hard-hitting questions that everybody really wants to hear.
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So let's start with you, Mario. So, Mario Stanley, I have been working with
the Global Climbing Initiative. The Global Climbing Initiative's mission really
is to help empower communities in developing nations or in developing communities.
In a way that they see fit for themselves. Essentially, a organization,
a community, a person will reach out to GCI, Global Climbing Initiative,
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and they will start a conversation and start a relationship.
And then we will talk to them. After a while, we figure out whether they need
gear, whether they need education, whether they need services,
whether they need just introductions.
But GCI's mission is to empower them to take hold of their own future.
And so So that's the big thing. And so myself, Genevieve Walker,
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Scott, and Liz Adende, who is part of Climb Kenya, which GCI,
that was one of their first initiatives to help in Africa.
We went down to Malawi, Africa. We were there for a month. And in Malawi,
climbing has been established for the last 40 years, but it's mainly been bolted
and developed by foreigners like us.
And so we spent a month teaching them how to guide, how to mentor,
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mentoring them, how to bolt, how to do route setting. and Genevieve and myself,
we have committed to the next four years going back and forth because what we
don't want to be is athletic colonialism.
We don't want to like, come in, we do the thing, great, look at us,
this is fun and then we're gone
and so we're currently working on a documentary that will be released.
The release date is February, currently right now is February 23rd.
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On my calendar. Yeah, it's on the calendar.
It will be, the showing is going to be at one of a local gym in DFW and then
we are going to be doing tours throughout the country to raise money.
To send myself, Genevieve, It's got everybody, the whole team back so we can
keep our promise of continuing mentorship and working with that community to know what they need.
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And we feel like one of the best things to know in order to figure that out
is to be boots on the ground.
And we were the first team ever to be sent out by GCI.
Most of the stuff is done just through distribution, gear and through relationships.
And so that is the global climbing initiative.
A kind of a nutshell with my experience with them i'm
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gonna go ahead and thanks for that yeah top that caleb go for
it man i just think it's so cool how you
you began that with describing the
the intent for empowering locals
to do their thing and and giving them the tools that they need because they
are the most knowledgeable about what their needs are absolutely and it and
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it made me think a lot about the work that we do at the Southeastern Climbers
Coalition because we work in a fairly large area.
We work in three states, Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, and we've been an organization for 30 years.
But I think a really key component to the sustainability of our organization
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is empowering local climbers to safeguard,
steward, and care for their local climbing areas in their cities,
in their counties, in their regions.
We have primarily been a volunteer organization for 30 years.
We've only recently in the past five years had staff, paid staff.
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And the reason we've been able to operate for that long at that level is because
of an individual who comes to the SEC and says, hey, I care about this climbing area.
I want to do something about improving access.
I want to do something about cleaning it up for the community.
I want to, I have the energy to put into this.
Help me. And then we have the resources to help them, whether that's funding
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for gear, for bolt replacement, whether that's knowledge of how to clean graffiti off of a boulder.
We get that question a lot. morning that's how yeah i
didn't think about that yeah so all that say
i i piggyback off of what you said like that is
the the sustainable strategy that is how you impact a community whether it's
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local or international is empowering individuals who who have the fire to do
it and who care deeply about their local climbing area yeah so i'll circle back
to the original question caleb,
I'm the marketing director and chief Stoke officer of the SEC.
I've worked for the Southeastern Climbers Coalition for almost three years now.
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Is that the official title, Chief Stoke? It is my given title.
Okay. My self-given title.
Can I see that on a plaque? It's not on the business card, but it's on his social
media. Yeah. I say it enough that people know it. Yes, people know it.
I donate, so can we put that on his business card? When you donate,
you can specify, and it goes into what's called a restricted fund.
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It can only be used for that.
So, Mario, next time you donate to the SEC, can't wait for that to come into
my inbox. It'll be great.
So my work with the SEC primarily is around communication, education,
and just rallying the community together at every opportunity when we have a cause to do so.
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So whether that's trail days or fundraisers, I make sure that the community
knows about it and comes together to, yeah, take care of our southeastern sandstone granite.
Great. Yeah. Hit it, Kendall. Man, this is a lot of pressure.
I mean, honestly, dude, I think this is a solid trick. I was good for you.
This is a solid flow. You are worthy. The river of life is flowing, my brother.
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You know, to start off is crazy, hearing how long each and everybody's organization
has been around, because we're very, very new.
I started my organization in college, but hearing about an organization being
around for 40 years and 30 years, it's like that's where we want to be at a
certain point, where where we're able to be sustainable and continue to grow things.
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Like I tell everybody I meet is like, I want to go to the point where I'm not needing anymore.
Like I can go off into like the sunset and reclimb is still a thing, right?
We're at the point now where we obviously have to have a lot of boots on the
ground where we're doing a lot of things.
And then also it's quick side note, athletic colonialism, that is a bar.
That was crazy. I was like, I'm going to use that.
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It's yours. That is his gift to you.
And Genevieve and I were talking and it just like blowed out and Genevieve stopped
and she was like, oh, we just did a thing.
I was like, that is, I was like, I'm going to use that.
Please do. It's yours. Especially because in our, I guess it's a good transition a little bit.
And what We Climb does, it's easy to kind of do that. Right.
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I mean, you see it at like local schools where there's coaches like recruiting
everybody and all that stuff, which is great.
Have a sports program. That's awesome. But if that's the only thing you're providing
to these kids, you're not providing them.
And say a kid breaks their leg, what are they going to do after that?
And experiencing like just as climbers in general, we get injured all the time.
And there's a moment where there's a lull in your life and you're just sitting
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there and maybe not be talking to friends as much or whatever.
And you're just wondering, oh, my entire life was climbing for blank years.
What am I going to do now? I mean, and so kind of bringing it back to what we climbed us.
We don't fix any broken legs, but what we do is like our mission is using climbing
as a tool to introduce kids to the outdoors. Thank you.
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I tell people all the time, if you take a kid outside and they say,
man, I absolutely hate climbing. This is the worst thing I've ever experienced.
We're like, that sucks that you don't like climbing, but it's amazing that now
you know you don't like this thing. How about you try mountain biking?
How about you try this thing?
It's literally to show them that there's a world within the outdoors in general.
I want to have begin mountain biking if it wasn't for climbing.
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I want to have learned about powderboard. I want to have learned about a lot
of things if I didn't go outside and climb. climb just because the people within
the climbing world do a lot of different things.
And so, like I said, that is our mission, but there's plenty of other things
that we try to do and introduce to our kids.
And just naturally the way our program works with us, partnering with programs
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and schools and all that type of stuff, we're naturally diversifying the outdoors.
And so it's very weird because people always ask like, how do you diversify the outdoors?
I want to say it's not that difficult, but it really isn't.
You look at where they are and you go there um so i had to mention a lot of
people are kind of scared to go there but like i said with a lot of the programs
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we work with they're naturally doing what we want to do as well but in another
facet so like one of the organizations work with bridge outdoors.
They're basically kind of like an after-school program that works with delwood
and east briner kids and their group of kids are just naturally diverse because
of the school that there are I think,
I'm not gonna spare statistics because I've completely forgot all of them but,
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I do know that like there's a large BIPOC population at Brandon and Delwood
and so because they're an after school program that takes kids outside they
naturally do that and so they reached out to us and said hey we heard you take
kids climbing we want them to do that and so.
That's kind of like a little bit of what we do and kind of how we do make outdoor
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steppers in a very simple format.
Yes, I know. And such a big thing to be talking about.
Y'all were all kind of talking about where you are now, where you dream to be.
And that got me thinking about I love to hear about the origin story.
How how did it begin? Take us back to the beginning, right? Of how that kind
of came to be. So I'd love to hear you guys elaborate a little bit on how the
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organizations, respectively, that you all represent got organized and how they
got activated, how they began.
I know SEC, for example, started in a shoebox. So hearing about that story and
even just as simple as that, maybe just an idea that you had,
Kendall, or whatever the moment was, I'd love to hear about that.
And we can kind of start with you, Mario, if you're ready.
Yeah, so I want to first say Veronica is the one who started GCI. I did not.
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I mean, this pretty face does a lot, but not that much, you know.
But so honestly, if you if you guys really want to hear the full story of how
that started, I actually did a previous podcast with Veronica at the last CWA
and when we were in Pittsburgh.
And we go really into detail, but we'll paraphrase this.
Veronica was originally on track to work for the State Department.
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That's originally what she wanted to do. And anyone who really follows global
impact, global work, things like that, you know that like large governments
are completely, utterly dysfunctional and it's just the way it works.
And yeah, now it's a what I know surprise. Breaking news here at Indoor Climbing Experience.
We cracked the case. International. Global politics. Go ahead.
(16:22):
We got this. Sorry. So in that conversation, one of the things that she,
you know, she came to realize that like if she wanted to have legitimate impact.
Working in the state department you would either have to
be at the very top of the food chain i mean extremely top like next
to the next to the homie himself in the white house or you
have to have you know you're probably one of these billionaire donors you know
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and once and so and then shortly around that time her love for passion really
i'm sorry her love for climbing really started turning into a passion and she
kind of had the idea that maybe these two can merge.
And she wanted to do it in a way where she wanted to secure that the funds and
the resources go directly to the communities at hand.
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Like let's cut out the middleman as much as possible, or let's make the introductions as much as possible.
And I think that was something that was immensely important to her.
And then she started cultivating a team of people, some people based here in
Chattanooga, some people based in California, most of the team operates remotely.
And she found people that kind of have the shared vision. and then overthrew
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a lot of tenacity, gull and gumption.
She now runs a very young nonprofit that runs with a decent budget and operates,
I want like, don't quote me on this, but it's either like 26 or like 32 countries.
Like GCI has. They're making moves.
They make money moves, playboy money moves.
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I'm telling you like, and so, and that was one of the things that blew my mind.
And I was like, Like, how do you operate that in so many countries?
And it blows other people's minds too. But I think also too,
This is kind of goes back to what we were talking about in the beginning, in the introduction.
It's like, we're operating in the capacity that these communities need the resources.
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Sometimes the resources is really just a bunch of approach shoes so they can
go off because they have access to drills.
They have access to bolting. They don't have access to their appropriate footwear.
They don't have access to drills and they don't have access to the,
but they can do the rest of the work and that qualifies as work.
And I think the thing that I was so gravitated towards with GCI is you're really
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putting the power in the community's hands.
And that is the origin story of them.
They want to empower communities to do what they, that community needs to do.
And who are we in America or any other first world country, whatever you want
to call it nowadays, who are we to determine what is the work?
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We have no right and we just got to get out of the way. Our job is to facilitate.
And I think that in a nutshell is like how GCI got started.
I'm sure there's a lot of other details that I left out and,
you know, but just listen to the episode.
I don't remember exactly which one it is, but I'll pull it up in a minute. it and
plug the documentary because yeah yeah veronica does a
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just bangerang job in being interviewed
for the documentary yeah because i keep on forgetting about i've been
so busy like staring at this documentary so much but close to it yeah you yeah
so way too close but not close enough but yeah she goes into that in the documentary
that we're releasing it's going to be called climb malawi but she goes into
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the details of like how this organization started and and what we're trying to do.
And I do believe like what Genevieve and myself, Scott and Liz did is kind of
the pinnacle of what they're wanting to do.
And I do know we want to do more of it, but yeah.
You know, this is something that I kind of wrestled with actually,
and to kind of go on a side note and I'll stop after the, but I wrestled with this a little while ago.
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Cause like we were having a meeting and we were, she's like,
you know, we really love this documentary that you're doing.
We really love this work that you're doing. And we really think this is something
really valuable for GCI.
And I was like, cool, this is excited. I really want to do this in other countries.
I really want to do this to think. And then I remember after I got off the phone
with her, I was like, I just switched.
I started now talking about what I want to do and other countries
and I just switched and I was like I think what
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I need to do is and this is something that's important to
me shooting my first documentary I want to
go into this with the skills of like understanding that I don't know everything and
so I am bootstrapping it and I am kind of figuring it
out as I'm going along knowing that that's probably how these other countries
want to do and what I really want to do is teach them how to produce their
own documentary produce their own thing you have a second origin there
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yeah and just like but like I just I have to remember to
to get out of the way yeah and i think that's like it's a really hard thing
for us to do when we're a country when we're a community of givers when we're
a community of givers it's really hard for us to get out of the way step side
and and so that's just like a little random tidbit on the whole thing but that's
kind of how the organization started in a nutshell.
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And now i think they are the nicest 800 pound unicorn in the room Yeah.
Caleb, I know for everyone's benefit, we'd love to hear you talk a little bit
more about how the SEC got started right here in Chattanooga.
Yeah. So the way I always tell the story of the origin of the SEC is kind of a two-part tale.
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So part one is here in Chattanooga, there's a climbing area called Sunset Rock.
It's basically at the pinnacle of Lookout Mountain,
And it's known as pretty incredible, high quality track climbing area has been climbed for many years.
But in the early 90s, we started to have access issues because local residents
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had this impression of climbers as riffraff and troublemakers and didn't want
them around, basically.
So they... I don't call us trouble, but I like being a riffraff. Yeah, riffraff.
Can that be my rap name? Yes. Yes. I give that is my gift to you.
So local residents started advocating for closures to prevent climbers from
(22:15):
recreating at Sunset Rock.
And climbers didn't like that. So we responded with, what do we need to do to
show you that we are good stewards and deserve to be here, basically?
What do we need to do to show up and earn our right to be here?
So Sunset Rock is on a national park. It's managed by a national park system.
(22:37):
So the National Park Rangers basically said, show up for trail days,
kind of like help us build out this area.
And that'll show us that you guys actually want to be here.
And so people showed thousands of hours of volunteering, so much so that we
basically earned the good graces of the National Park Service and the Rangers.
(23:01):
And so they they basically went to bat for us and said no like this is a legitimate
user group They deserve to be here climbing on this mountain.
So that was in 1993 fast forward.
After this initial rallying of climbers together, like them realizing,
oh, like we can be effective as a group when we come together.
(23:23):
That was kind of the birth of the SEC as an organization. Fast forward to 2001.
We have a climbing area in Atlanta, Georgia called Boat Rock.
Classic granite bouldering in the heart of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world.
It's just smack dab in the middle of this residential area and
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it's been climbed for decades there's a
rich history of outdoor climbing competitions there but
in the early 2000s a developer bought up
the property and started destroying the boulders literally with
dynamite there were explosions and there's heavy
machinery tearing these boulders apart and the
climbing community again rallied together to
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say this is not okay these are precious
to us we value our recreation and our climbing here
what can we do to to protect and
save these boulders so the at the time they they tried the strategy again of
working with them as a partner working with them and trying to work out a deal
but but the developers were not interested so it came to a point where the only
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strategy left was to just buy the property outright.
And that was something that had never been done before by any local climbing organization.
And so there was really no template for how to move forward.
So the Southeastern Climbers Coalition came together and said,
all right, we're going to fundraise and we're going to protect this boulder
(24:51):
field by purchasing it. And we were successful.
We bought our first property ever in 2001, Boat Rock. And so that That really solidified us, I think.
In our mission of we exist to preserve access to outdoor climbing in the Southeast
for present and future generations.
And that just started this snowball effect of, all right, how do we recreate
(25:16):
this in climbing areas throughout our region, Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama?
So the early founders of the SEC basically had a shopping list.
And in the the decades that have followed we've slowly chipped away to to create
sustainable professional,
safe access to climbing all over
bouldering areas sport climbing areas track climbing areas and we've just kept
(25:41):
up the work till till today kendall i am very excited because i don't actually
know if i've heard this tale on how we climb really started i don't yeah i don't
think i've I've actually heard this.
And so I'm really excited to hear it. So it kind of all started off as like
a school project loosely. Yeah. Yeah.
(26:04):
And so obviously the intention of the school project wasn't to start an entire organization.
But the project was to find an organization in your community that's doing good.
And my major was marketing. And so it was like create a marketing plan for that organization.
And it was like a PowerPoint and all that stuff. stuff and so
there's a school called chattanooga preparatory
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school in chattanooga and their mission basically
is to have mentorship is basically the
central theme of their their organization so every
kid at that school has a mentor that they can go to and talk to and my dad was
also a board member at that school so i was like dad that's a pretty cool school
idea blah blah and so i was like could i use chat prep as like my subject for
(26:48):
my my project i also need an A, so this will be helpful if you said yes.
So, and so he said, yeah, of course. And my dad wound up actually speaking at
the school within a week of the project being announced.
And so I was like, all right, cool. I'll just go to the school with you while you like speak.
I'll talk to the teachers, the organizers, the founders, all that type of stuff
to learn their mission, whatever.
(27:10):
Talk to them, learn about all the things that they wanted to do,
the things that they were doing and whatnot.
And I wound up talking to one of the coaches and like, we're going to start
a football team, a basketball team.
Blah like we want to be on pace with Macaulay if you're not in Chattanooga Macaulay is a very.
Expensive private school that's in Chattanooga has amazing athletics academics all that stuff so,
(27:31):
they're saying we want to be on par with Macaulay and the Baylors and blah blah
and I was like you guys talk about all these sport programs that you're doing
are you gonna start like an outdoor program or a climbing program like the Baylors
and Macaulays and they had a blank look on their face like.
No, I didn't even really think about that. I was like, that's cool.
That's fine. And so because of the person I am, I went home.
(27:53):
So Kendall said, I'll do it.
Yeah, basically. And so I went home. I created an entire business plan that
was, I don't know, however many pages long of how I was going to start an outdoor
program at Chattanooga Preparatory School.
I looked at the business plan. I was like, this is not really an outdoor program
anymore. This is basically an organization.
But I still went to Chattanooga Preparatory School. I was like,
hey, I created this business plan on how I can start an outdoor program after school.
(28:16):
School they're like that's cool but we don't really
know you and also like it'd be kind of
weird if we don't really know you and you're taking our kids out I do remember
you telling me that yeah and so I was like that
makes sense I'm not mad at that and so they're like you need
to get a whole bunch of stuff together before you're able to take
our kids out and so that's when I went through the process of like talking to
a whole bunch of folks learning that I need like an LLC you
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know 501c that is like everything and
funny enough we and y'all know Andrea she
was kind of helped the process of that because she was
executive director at the time of the SEC and so
had a meeting with her like I had previous meetings
with a whole bunch of other folks because I wound up picking a lot of people's brands
of how do I start an organization I have no idea what I'm doing I'm only
(29:01):
22 and so everybody like
had a whole bunch of meetings I had a meeting with with andrea fantastic meeting
and she was like we're gonna do this this and this we're gonna set up a donation
page i was like this is great but i was like every other meeting is probably
not gonna happen within a week she had our gofundme page up i was like well
people are donating now i'm getting people's money so i kind of have to do something.
(29:25):
So i was like all right cool and so we got went through the process of getting
an llc because Because like I said, I didn't know how much money it costs to start a nonprofit.
And so, created an LLC. And also before that too, just to kind of get the ball
rolling on our entire organization, I took my little brother Kingston out,
which I think all of you guys have met.
He's a very hard kid to not forget. So, I wound up taking him out climbing to
(29:50):
like Synergy outside or whatever.
And people were like, oh, who's this kid? I was like, he's a WeClimb kid,
not my little brother, wink. And so through that process, it kind of had me
learn a lot of things because there's a lot of times I messed up with him,
but luckily it was my little brother.
So I can mess up with my little brother versus somebody else's kids.
(30:10):
So like my guinea pig. Yeah. So like a very good example is that his parents
don't don't allow him to eat.
I completely forgot about that. And so we wound up getting breakfast and he
ate bacon because he was like, I want some bacon.
I was like, yeah, that's fine. And then we go, I take him home.
His parents are like, oh, so what did you eat for breakfast?
He was like, bacon, eggs. They're like, what?
(30:31):
I was like, oh no. Yeah. They're like, you're lucky that we love you,
but don't you ever do that again.
So I was like, all right, I'm glad it was him instead of like some other kid's
parents. Right. So learn that process. And like I said, a whole bunch of other things.
But yeah, like I said, the origins of it started off as a school project.
And then, like I said, talked to a lot of people throughout the community in
(30:55):
climbing and just tried to like, basically, I'm learning everything as I go.
And so I would say the idea of Reclimb started roughly five years or so ago.
It being a legal entity and like everything being legitimate started in 2020.
Congratulations on that. I mean, my God. yeah so it was a lot like I said we're
(31:16):
still working out a lot of things we're very new,
and yeah so that's where it
kind of all started was just school project and it was like I said the intent
wasn't even to start an organization really it was just I wanted to start an
outdoor program at a school and I didn't really want to be a coach or anything
like that I was like I just want to start this thing so kids can climb at this
(31:37):
school because they're a very diverse school as So I was like,
through me starting an outdoor program at this school,
I can also diversify outdoors as well.
And, like, what's funny, like I said, we partnered with Chattanooga Prep,
where we've worked with some of their kids, but it's funny, it's like,
they're not even the main partners of We Climb anymore.
And so, it's a very weird origin story, I'll say the least.
(32:02):
Because, like I said, and funny enough, if I would have known about it transitioning
to organization, I probably would have given this idea to somebody else.
And said, hey, could you do this thing that I think is awesome?
Who has like all the expertise and all that type of stuff. But yeah,
like I said, it's cool going through like the learning process of how to start
(32:22):
an organization, the do's and don'ts and all that type of stuff.
Because like with that said, it's a journey. Everything's a journey in life, right?
So it's really cool kind of seeing how the community has like rallied around
We Climb and just the idea itself.
Because and also another reason reason why I started We Climb Too was for the
fact that Chattanooga is one of the meccas of climbing, right?
(32:45):
And Chattanooga itself is a very diverse city.
Like if you would have went anywhere else in Tennessee, I'd be like,
oh, it doesn't, this makes sense on why there's not that many black climbers.
But in Chattanooga, out of all places, it does not make sense.
Especially with how many places are close within Chattanooga.
We went to Overhatchee today, five minutes down the road from where I live.
And so with how close everything is here, how diverse Chattanooga is,
(33:09):
it just does does not make any sense and so and then when I was starting the
process of like researching nonprofits and organizations when I looked up climbing
organizations that take kids out climbing basically.
I looked at it and I was like, there's no organizations like this.
And we're in at the time, 2020.
I was like, this doesn't make any sense at all. It was like,
you see on Instagram posts all the time, diversified outdoors,
(33:31):
but like nobody's doing it. It doesn't make any sense.
And so at least not in, like I said, there's other larger organizations that
have their mission. But in your community, in your town, nobody's doing it.
I was like, that doesn't make any sense at all. And it's like,
I'm not the strongest climber.
I'm not the best climber at all. But I was like, there wasn't anybody with some
sort of like reputation behind them. They're like, we're going to push this.
Yeah. So I was like, I'm going to talk to as many people as possible.
(33:54):
And so that's kind of how it all started.
I can't help but see a very common theme here between the organizations where
there was kind of this one individual or one person that kind of sparked a was
the catalyst for kind of incredible change.
And so that makes me wonder about how you all got involved, not only in climbing,
(34:17):
but then also kind of got involved with the organization.
So, I mean, Kendall, yours is pretty clear cut and dry. You are the organization.
But I would love to hear you guys just talk about how you got into climbing
and how that morphed into wanting to do something beyond just climbing.
I've always kind of said for myself when folks ask me like what does it mean
to be a good climber? I don't think about grades.
I think about the ethics. I think about how I'm giving back I think about that
(34:39):
portion So I'd love to know how you guys got into climbing and then how it morphed
into this give back Mentality of kind of improving your own communities.
Okay. I first want to give a big shout out to Hassler the hustler Andrea.
Yes, because Yeah Yeah, just real quick, just real quick.
Just because, like, I met Andrea a while ago at the International Climbers Festival, and.
(35:07):
She is a phenomenon and I'm sure she's probably enraged at me bragging about
her right now, but I think she's probably one of the most underrated sleepers
in the advocacy community in the world.
And I don't care what anybody else says or that, because she helped me a lot
in like, kind of like really kind of forming a little bit of more business in my podcast.
(35:31):
She's helped with you. I know she's been a big influencer in
your life she hired me yeah like so
like she told me to apply i just want
to go ahead and say like if we erect a statue for her it should be done but
like if there's not up to date on their access fund membership because andrea
hasler works for the access fund so go ahead and uh membership for the access
fund so yeah but with that being said i just felt like like once you said that
(35:54):
and i was thinking about you and i was like this just has to be said because
All of us are here because of her. Yes.
Yes. And it's like, you know, and you just even said, there's like reoccurring
themes. And I think she's a person who's been thread through a lot of webs.
Yeah. But with that being said. Let's hear about you. I got into climbing.
Actually, I got into climbing. I took a girl on a date.
(36:19):
Friends and enemies, lovers and haters. I hope you are enjoying that episode.
And I know you hate me before I'm ending. but you
know what would make that hate fade away would
be a brand new t-shirt that sends and suffers drip
thirty dollars five dollars for shipping and handling shoot me a message and
i will get that information out to you and you gotta ask yourself were you just
(36:43):
suffering when i ended that that means your send is so close because if you're
not suffering are you really sending at all you.
Music.
(00:32):
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(01:21):
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So check out Organic Climbing. Tell them I sent you. Let's get into this episode.
Friends and enemies, lovers and haters, welcome to Sends and Suffers podcast.
I am your host, Mario Stanley.
(01:42):
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Monthly recaps, early show releases, and all the other cool things that we do.
Thank you so much for listening to Sends and Suffers Podcasts.
(02:24):
Breaking news, we have t-shirts. Brand new Sends and Suffers t-shirt drip is out.
If you have not gotten yours, please message me. I will get you all the details on social media.
Email me at SendsandSuffers at gmail.
And get yourself looking fly, because it does make the suffering easier when
(02:45):
you are in the right drip.
And if your suffering's easy, then your sins will be too.
Today's episode is a little different.
It is a recap of a conversation of my time at the Indoor Climbing Expo,
which is an event that is open to the general public, unlike a lot of climbing
and expo events in the outdoor world.
This conversation was an NGO conversation.
(03:08):
It was the SECC, We Climb, and Global Climbing Initiative.
Myself, Kendall, Megan, and Caleb were all there chatting about our respective
industries that we work for and that we are passionate about.
I hope you enjoy this conversation of NGOs talking about their business,
(03:28):
how they got started, and where we're going.
Hey, y'all. Thanks, everybody, for coming. My name's Meg Evans.
I'm the executive director of the Southeastern Climbers Coalition.
Y'all are here at the Meet a Nonprofit at the Climbing Expo,
Indoor Climbing Expo, in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
(03:49):
To see i've got the honor of sitting with these
fine gentlemen today my panel so to
my left here we have mario stanley i don't know
if you guys have watched the hbo show lately
but he was on on tv he was a contestant on
on the climb is that right it was the climb okay
great with none other than chris oh that's
(04:12):
right oh chris charmer's up too but he probably tuned
in to see mario so um um great mario also
also is the host of the send or
send and suffers right podcast
and then has been doing a lot of work with the global climbing initiative so
i'll let him talk about that more in a minute in the bright highlighter
(04:32):
orange there he didn't get the black memo that today that's all right the rest
of us were black is caleb timberman he is the marketing director for the southeastern
climbers coalition which is the same organization that i work for caleb Caleb
has been known to be one of those that's the hardest worker that you'll ever meet.
He makes incredible content for the SEC that gets an entire community of people
(04:53):
motivated to get involved and do the work that we do.
And then I don't know if you guys have seen his photos, but my goodness,
the guy is just a powerhouse. So I'll let him talk more about that. Thank you so much.
And then speaking of powerhouses, at the very end there, we've got Kendall Martin.
He has, by his own hands, just crafted this incredible organization called We Climb Chat.
(05:15):
They focus on getting youth from BIPOC community, underserved communities,
into climbing in the Chattanooga area.
And I think he's got big plans to maybe, hopefully, expand.
I'm coming for you. I want that to come down to Birmingham.
So, yeah, I'm going to let them all talk a little bit about themselves.
Just give us a little bit of an intro.
And then I've got some hard-hitting questions that everybody really wants to hear.
(05:39):
So let's start with you, Mario. So, Mario Stanley, I have been working with
the Global Climbing Initiative. The Global Climbing Initiative's mission really
is to help empower communities in developing nations or in developing communities.
In a way that they see fit for themselves. Essentially, a organization,
a community, a person will reach out to GCI, Global Climbing Initiative,
(06:02):
and they will start a conversation and start a relationship.
And then we will talk to them. After a while, we figure out whether they need
gear, whether they need education, whether they need services,
whether they need just introductions.
But GCI's mission is to empower them to take hold of their own future.
And so So that's the big thing. And so myself, Genevieve Walker,
(06:23):
Scott, and Liz Adende, who is part of Climb Kenya, which GCI,
that was one of their first initiatives to help in Africa.
We went down to Malawi, Africa. We were there for a month. And in Malawi,
climbing has been established for the last 40 years, but it's mainly been bolted
and developed by foreigners like us.
And so we spent a month teaching them how to guide, how to mentor,
(06:45):
mentoring them, how to bolt, how to do route setting. and Genevieve and myself,
we have committed to the next four years going back and forth because what we
don't want to be is athletic colonialism.
We don't want to like, come in, we do the thing, great, look at us,
this is fun and then we're gone
and so we're currently working on a documentary that will be released.
The release date is February, currently right now is February 23rd.
(07:06):
On my calendar. Yeah, it's on the calendar.
It will be, the showing is going to be at one of a local gym in DFW and then
we are going to be doing tours throughout the country to raise money.
To send myself, Genevieve, It's got everybody, the whole team back so we can
keep our promise of continuing mentorship and working with that community to know what they need.
(07:27):
And we feel like one of the best things to know in order to figure that out
is to be boots on the ground.
And we were the first team ever to be sent out by GCI.
Most of the stuff is done just through distribution, gear and through relationships.
And so that is the global climbing initiative.
A kind of a nutshell with my experience with them i'm
(07:47):
gonna go ahead and thanks for that yeah top that caleb go for
it man i just think it's so cool how you
you began that with describing the
the intent for empowering locals
to do their thing and and giving them the tools that they need because they
are the most knowledgeable about what their needs are absolutely and it and
(08:10):
it made me think a lot about the work that we do at the Southeastern Climbers
Coalition because we work in a fairly large area.
We work in three states, Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, and we've been an organization for 30 years.
But I think a really key component to the sustainability of our organization
(08:31):
is empowering local climbers to safeguard,
steward, and care for their local climbing areas in their cities,
in their counties, in their regions.
We have primarily been a volunteer organization for 30 years.
We've only recently in the past five years had staff, paid staff.
(08:53):
And the reason we've been able to operate for that long at that level is because
of an individual who comes to the SEC and says, hey, I care about this climbing area.
I want to do something about improving access.
I want to do something about cleaning it up for the community.
I want to, I have the energy to put into this.
Help me. And then we have the resources to help them, whether that's funding
(09:16):
for gear, for bolt replacement, whether that's knowledge of how to clean graffiti off of a boulder.
We get that question a lot. morning that's how yeah i
didn't think about that yeah so all that say
i i piggyback off of what you said like that is
the the sustainable strategy that is how you impact a community whether it's
(09:37):
local or international is empowering individuals who who have the fire to do
it and who care deeply about their local climbing area yeah so i'll circle back
to the original question caleb,
I'm the marketing director and chief Stoke officer of the SEC.
I've worked for the Southeastern Climbers Coalition for almost three years now.
(09:59):
Is that the official title, Chief Stoke? It is my given title.
Okay. My self-given title.
Can I see that on a plaque? It's not on the business card, but it's on his social
media. Yeah. I say it enough that people know it. Yes, people know it.
I donate, so can we put that on his business card? When you donate,
you can specify, and it goes into what's called a restricted fund.
(10:22):
It can only be used for that.
So, Mario, next time you donate to the SEC, can't wait for that to come into
my inbox. It'll be great.
So my work with the SEC primarily is around communication, education,
and just rallying the community together at every opportunity when we have a cause to do so.
(10:45):
So whether that's trail days or fundraisers, I make sure that the community
knows about it and comes together to, yeah, take care of our southeastern sandstone granite.
Great. Yeah. Hit it, Kendall. Man, this is a lot of pressure.
I mean, honestly, dude, I think this is a solid trick. I was good for you.
This is a solid flow. You are worthy. The river of life is flowing, my brother.
(11:09):
You know, to start off is crazy, hearing how long each and everybody's organization
has been around, because we're very, very new.
I started my organization in college, but hearing about an organization being
around for 40 years and 30 years, it's like that's where we want to be at a
certain point, where where we're able to be sustainable and continue to grow things.
(11:30):
Like I tell everybody I meet is like, I want to go to the point where I'm not needing anymore.
Like I can go off into like the sunset and reclimb is still a thing, right?
We're at the point now where we obviously have to have a lot of boots on the
ground where we're doing a lot of things.
And then also it's quick side note, athletic colonialism, that is a bar.
That was crazy. I was like, I'm going to use that.
(11:53):
It's yours. That is his gift to you.
And Genevieve and I were talking and it just like blowed out and Genevieve stopped
and she was like, oh, we just did a thing.
I was like, that is, I was like, I'm going to use that.
Please do. It's yours. Especially because in our, I guess it's a good transition a little bit.
And what We Climb does, it's easy to kind of do that. Right.
(12:13):
I mean, you see it at like local schools where there's coaches like recruiting
everybody and all that stuff, which is great.
Have a sports program. That's awesome. But if that's the only thing you're providing
to these kids, you're not providing them.
And say a kid breaks their leg, what are they going to do after that?
And experiencing like just as climbers in general, we get injured all the time.
And there's a moment where there's a lull in your life and you're just sitting
(12:35):
there and maybe not be talking to friends as much or whatever.
And you're just wondering, oh, my entire life was climbing for blank years.
What am I going to do now? I mean, and so kind of bringing it back to what we climbed us.
We don't fix any broken legs, but what we do is like our mission is using climbing
as a tool to introduce kids to the outdoors. Thank you.
(12:57):
I tell people all the time, if you take a kid outside and they say,
man, I absolutely hate climbing. This is the worst thing I've ever experienced.
We're like, that sucks that you don't like climbing, but it's amazing that now
you know you don't like this thing. How about you try mountain biking?
How about you try this thing?
It's literally to show them that there's a world within the outdoors in general.
I want to have begin mountain biking if it wasn't for climbing.
(13:20):
I want to have learned about powderboard. I want to have learned about a lot
of things if I didn't go outside and climb. climb just because the people within
the climbing world do a lot of different things.
And so, like I said, that is our mission, but there's plenty of other things
that we try to do and introduce to our kids.
And just naturally the way our program works with us, partnering with programs
(13:41):
and schools and all that type of stuff, we're naturally diversifying the outdoors.
And so it's very weird because people always ask like, how do you diversify the outdoors?
I want to say it's not that difficult, but it really isn't.
You look at where they are and you go there um so i had to mention a lot of
people are kind of scared to go there but like i said with a lot of the programs
(14:01):
we work with they're naturally doing what we want to do as well but in another
facet so like one of the organizations work with bridge outdoors.
They're basically kind of like an after-school program that works with delwood
and east briner kids and their group of kids are just naturally diverse because
of the school that there are I think,
I'm not gonna spare statistics because I've completely forgot all of them but,
(14:25):
I do know that like there's a large BIPOC population at Brandon and Delwood
and so because they're an after school program that takes kids outside they
naturally do that and so they reached out to us and said hey we heard you take
kids climbing we want them to do that and so.
That's kind of like a little bit of what we do and kind of how we do make outdoor
(14:46):
steppers in a very simple format.
Yes, I know. And such a big thing to be talking about.
Y'all were all kind of talking about where you are now, where you dream to be.
And that got me thinking about I love to hear about the origin story.
How how did it begin? Take us back to the beginning, right? Of how that kind
of came to be. So I'd love to hear you guys elaborate a little bit on how the
(15:08):
organizations, respectively, that you all represent got organized and how they
got activated, how they began.
I know SEC, for example, started in a shoebox. So hearing about that story and
even just as simple as that, maybe just an idea that you had,
Kendall, or whatever the moment was, I'd love to hear about that.
And we can kind of start with you, Mario, if you're ready.
Yeah, so I want to first say Veronica is the one who started GCI. I did not.
(15:35):
I mean, this pretty face does a lot, but not that much, you know.
But so honestly, if you if you guys really want to hear the full story of how
that started, I actually did a previous podcast with Veronica at the last CWA
and when we were in Pittsburgh.
And we go really into detail, but we'll paraphrase this.
Veronica was originally on track to work for the State Department.
(15:59):
That's originally what she wanted to do. And anyone who really follows global
impact, global work, things like that, you know that like large governments
are completely, utterly dysfunctional and it's just the way it works.
And yeah, now it's a what I know surprise. Breaking news here at Indoor Climbing Experience.
We cracked the case. International. Global politics. Go ahead.
(16:22):
We got this. Sorry. So in that conversation, one of the things that she,
you know, she came to realize that like if she wanted to have legitimate impact.
Working in the state department you would either have to
be at the very top of the food chain i mean extremely top like next
to the next to the homie himself in the white house or you
have to have you know you're probably one of these billionaire donors you know
(16:43):
and once and so and then shortly around that time her love for passion really
i'm sorry her love for climbing really started turning into a passion and she
kind of had the idea that maybe these two can merge.
And she wanted to do it in a way where she wanted to secure that the funds and
the resources go directly to the communities at hand.
(17:06):
Like let's cut out the middleman as much as possible, or let's make the introductions as much as possible.
And I think that was something that was immensely important to her.
And then she started cultivating a team of people, some people based here in
Chattanooga, some people based in California, most of the team operates remotely.
And she found people that kind of have the shared vision. and then overthrew
(17:27):
a lot of tenacity, gull and gumption.
She now runs a very young nonprofit that runs with a decent budget and operates,
I want like, don't quote me on this, but it's either like 26 or like 32 countries.
Like GCI has. They're making moves.
They make money moves, playboy money moves.
(17:49):
I'm telling you like, and so, and that was one of the things that blew my mind.
And I was like, Like, how do you operate that in so many countries?
And it blows other people's minds too. But I think also too,
This is kind of goes back to what we were talking about in the beginning, in the introduction.
It's like, we're operating in the capacity that these communities need the resources.
(18:11):
Sometimes the resources is really just a bunch of approach shoes so they can
go off because they have access to drills.
They have access to bolting. They don't have access to their appropriate footwear.
They don't have access to drills and they don't have access to the,
but they can do the rest of the work and that qualifies as work.
And I think the thing that I was so gravitated towards with GCI is you're really
(18:33):
putting the power in the community's hands.
And that is the origin story of them.
They want to empower communities to do what they, that community needs to do.
And who are we in America or any other first world country, whatever you want
to call it nowadays, who are we to determine what is the work?
(18:56):
We have no right and we just got to get out of the way. Our job is to facilitate.
And I think that in a nutshell is like how GCI got started.
I'm sure there's a lot of other details that I left out and,
you know, but just listen to the episode.
I don't remember exactly which one it is, but I'll pull it up in a minute. it and
plug the documentary because yeah yeah veronica does a
(19:17):
just bangerang job in being interviewed
for the documentary yeah because i keep on forgetting about i've been
so busy like staring at this documentary so much but close to it yeah you yeah
so way too close but not close enough but yeah she goes into that in the documentary
that we're releasing it's going to be called climb malawi but she goes into
(19:40):
the details of like how this organization started and and what we're trying to do.
And I do believe like what Genevieve and myself, Scott and Liz did is kind of
the pinnacle of what they're wanting to do.
And I do know we want to do more of it, but yeah.
You know, this is something that I kind of wrestled with actually,
and to kind of go on a side note and I'll stop after the, but I wrestled with this a little while ago.
(20:01):
Cause like we were having a meeting and we were, she's like,
you know, we really love this documentary that you're doing.
We really love this work that you're doing. And we really think this is something
really valuable for GCI.
And I was like, cool, this is excited. I really want to do this in other countries.
I really want to do this to think. And then I remember after I got off the phone
with her, I was like, I just switched.
I started now talking about what I want to do and other countries
and I just switched and I was like I think what
(20:24):
I need to do is and this is something that's important to
me shooting my first documentary I want to
go into this with the skills of like understanding that I don't know everything and
so I am bootstrapping it and I am kind of figuring it
out as I'm going along knowing that that's probably how these other countries
want to do and what I really want to do is teach them how to produce their
own documentary produce their own thing you have a second origin there
(20:45):
yeah and just like but like I just I have to remember to
to get out of the way yeah and i think that's like it's a really hard thing
for us to do when we're a country when we're a community of givers when we're
a community of givers it's really hard for us to get out of the way step side
and and so that's just like a little random tidbit on the whole thing but that's
kind of how the organization started in a nutshell.
(21:08):
And now i think they are the nicest 800 pound unicorn in the room Yeah.
Caleb, I know for everyone's benefit, we'd love to hear you talk a little bit
more about how the SEC got started right here in Chattanooga.
Yeah. So the way I always tell the story of the origin of the SEC is kind of a two-part tale.
(21:29):
So part one is here in Chattanooga, there's a climbing area called Sunset Rock.
It's basically at the pinnacle of Lookout Mountain,
And it's known as pretty incredible, high quality track climbing area has been climbed for many years.
But in the early 90s, we started to have access issues because local residents
(21:53):
had this impression of climbers as riffraff and troublemakers and didn't want
them around, basically.
So they... I don't call us trouble, but I like being a riffraff. Yeah, riffraff.
Can that be my rap name? Yes. Yes. I give that is my gift to you.
So local residents started advocating for closures to prevent climbers from
(22:15):
recreating at Sunset Rock.
And climbers didn't like that. So we responded with, what do we need to do to
show you that we are good stewards and deserve to be here, basically?
What do we need to do to show up and earn our right to be here?
So Sunset Rock is on a national park. It's managed by a national park system.
(22:37):
So the National Park Rangers basically said, show up for trail days,
kind of like help us build out this area.
And that'll show us that you guys actually want to be here.
And so people showed thousands of hours of volunteering, so much so that we
basically earned the good graces of the National Park Service and the Rangers.
(23:01):
And so they they basically went to bat for us and said no like this is a legitimate
user group They deserve to be here climbing on this mountain.
So that was in 1993 fast forward.
After this initial rallying of climbers together, like them realizing,
oh, like we can be effective as a group when we come together.
(23:23):
That was kind of the birth of the SEC as an organization. Fast forward to 2001.
We have a climbing area in Atlanta, Georgia called Boat Rock.
Classic granite bouldering in the heart of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world.
It's just smack dab in the middle of this residential area and
(23:44):
it's been climbed for decades there's a
rich history of outdoor climbing competitions there but
in the early 2000s a developer bought up
the property and started destroying the boulders literally with
dynamite there were explosions and there's heavy
machinery tearing these boulders apart and the
climbing community again rallied together to
(24:06):
say this is not okay these are precious
to us we value our recreation and our climbing here
what can we do to to protect and
save these boulders so the at the time they they tried the strategy again of
working with them as a partner working with them and trying to work out a deal
but but the developers were not interested so it came to a point where the only
(24:31):
strategy left was to just buy the property outright.
And that was something that had never been done before by any local climbing organization.
And so there was really no template for how to move forward.
So the Southeastern Climbers Coalition came together and said,
all right, we're going to fundraise and we're going to protect this boulder
(24:51):
field by purchasing it. And we were successful.
We bought our first property ever in 2001, Boat Rock. And so that That really solidified us, I think.
In our mission of we exist to preserve access to outdoor climbing in the Southeast
for present and future generations.
And that just started this snowball effect of, all right, how do we recreate
(25:16):
this in climbing areas throughout our region, Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama?
So the early founders of the SEC basically had a shopping list.
And in the the decades that have followed we've slowly chipped away to to create
sustainable professional,
safe access to climbing all over
bouldering areas sport climbing areas track climbing areas and we've just kept
(25:41):
up the work till till today kendall i am very excited because i don't actually
know if i've heard this tale on how we climb really started i don't yeah i don't
think i've I've actually heard this.
And so I'm really excited to hear it. So it kind of all started off as like
a school project loosely. Yeah. Yeah.
(26:04):
And so obviously the intention of the school project wasn't to start an entire organization.
But the project was to find an organization in your community that's doing good.
And my major was marketing. And so it was like create a marketing plan for that organization.
And it was like a PowerPoint and all that stuff. stuff and so
there's a school called chattanooga preparatory
(26:26):
school in chattanooga and their mission basically
is to have mentorship is basically the
central theme of their their organization so every
kid at that school has a mentor that they can go to and talk to and my dad was
also a board member at that school so i was like dad that's a pretty cool school
idea blah blah and so i was like could i use chat prep as like my subject for
(26:48):
my my project i also need an A, so this will be helpful if you said yes.
So, and so he said, yeah, of course. And my dad wound up actually speaking at
the school within a week of the project being announced.
And so I was like, all right, cool. I'll just go to the school with you while you like speak.
I'll talk to the teachers, the organizers, the founders, all that type of stuff
to learn their mission, whatever.
(27:10):
Talk to them, learn about all the things that they wanted to do,
the things that they were doing and whatnot.
And I wound up talking to one of the coaches and like, we're going to start
a football team, a basketball team.
Blah like we want to be on pace with Macaulay if you're not in Chattanooga Macaulay is a very.
Expensive private school that's in Chattanooga has amazing athletics academics all that stuff so,
(27:31):
they're saying we want to be on par with Macaulay and the Baylors and blah blah
and I was like you guys talk about all these sport programs that you're doing
are you gonna start like an outdoor program or a climbing program like the Baylors
and Macaulays and they had a blank look on their face like.
No, I didn't even really think about that. I was like, that's cool.
That's fine. And so because of the person I am, I went home.
(27:53):
So Kendall said, I'll do it.
Yeah, basically. And so I went home. I created an entire business plan that
was, I don't know, however many pages long of how I was going to start an outdoor
program at Chattanooga Preparatory School.
I looked at the business plan. I was like, this is not really an outdoor program
anymore. This is basically an organization.
But I still went to Chattanooga Preparatory School. I was like,
hey, I created this business plan on how I can start an outdoor program after school.
(28:16):
School they're like that's cool but we don't really
know you and also like it'd be kind of
weird if we don't really know you and you're taking our kids out I do remember
you telling me that yeah and so I was like that
makes sense I'm not mad at that and so they're like you need
to get a whole bunch of stuff together before you're able to take
our kids out and so that's when I went through the process of like talking to
a whole bunch of folks learning that I need like an LLC you
(28:38):
know 501c that is like everything and
funny enough we and y'all know Andrea she
was kind of helped the process of that because she was
executive director at the time of the SEC and so
had a meeting with her like I had previous meetings
with a whole bunch of other folks because I wound up picking a lot of people's brands
of how do I start an organization I have no idea what I'm doing I'm only
(29:01):
22 and so everybody like
had a whole bunch of meetings I had a meeting with with andrea fantastic meeting
and she was like we're gonna do this this and this we're gonna set up a donation
page i was like this is great but i was like every other meeting is probably
not gonna happen within a week she had our gofundme page up i was like well
people are donating now i'm getting people's money so i kind of have to do something.
(29:25):
So i was like all right cool and so we got went through the process of getting
an llc because Because like I said, I didn't know how much money it costs to start a nonprofit.
And so, created an LLC. And also before that too, just to kind of get the ball
rolling on our entire organization, I took my little brother Kingston out,
which I think all of you guys have met.
He's a very hard kid to not forget. So, I wound up taking him out climbing to
(29:50):
like Synergy outside or whatever.
And people were like, oh, who's this kid? I was like, he's a WeClimb kid,
not my little brother, wink. And so through that process, it kind of had me
learn a lot of things because there's a lot of times I messed up with him,
but luckily it was my little brother.
So I can mess up with my little brother versus somebody else's kids.
(30:10):
So like my guinea pig. Yeah. So like a very good example is that his parents
don't don't allow him to eat.
I completely forgot about that. And so we wound up getting breakfast and he
ate bacon because he was like, I want some bacon.
I was like, yeah, that's fine. And then we go, I take him home.
His parents are like, oh, so what did you eat for breakfast?
He was like, bacon, eggs. They're like, what?
(30:31):
I was like, oh no. Yeah. They're like, you're lucky that we love you,
but don't you ever do that again.
So I was like, all right, I'm glad it was him instead of like some other kid's
parents. Right. So learn that process. And like I said, a whole bunch of other things.
But yeah, like I said, the origins of it started off as a school project.
And then, like I said, talked to a lot of people throughout the community in
(30:55):
climbing and just tried to like, basically, I'm learning everything as I go.
And so I would say the idea of Reclimb started roughly five years or so ago.
It being a legal entity and like everything being legitimate started in 2020.
Congratulations on that. I mean, my God. yeah so it was a lot like I said we're
(31:16):
still working out a lot of things we're very new,
and yeah so that's where it
kind of all started was just school project and it was like I said the intent
wasn't even to start an organization really it was just I wanted to start an
outdoor program at a school and I didn't really want to be a coach or anything
like that I was like I just want to start this thing so kids can climb at this
(31:37):
school because they're a very diverse school as So I was like,
through me starting an outdoor program at this school,
I can also diversify outdoors as well.
And, like, what's funny, like I said, we partnered with Chattanooga Prep,
where we've worked with some of their kids, but it's funny, it's like,
they're not even the main partners of We Climb anymore.
And so, it's a very weird origin story, I'll say the least.
(32:02):
Because, like I said, and funny enough, if I would have known about it transitioning
to organization, I probably would have given this idea to somebody else.
And said, hey, could you do this thing that I think is awesome?
Who has like all the expertise and all that type of stuff. But yeah,
like I said, it's cool going through like the learning process of how to start
(32:22):
an organization, the do's and don'ts and all that type of stuff.
Because like with that said, it's a journey. Everything's a journey in life, right?
So it's really cool kind of seeing how the community has like rallied around
We Climb and just the idea itself.
Because and also another reason reason why I started We Climb Too was for the
fact that Chattanooga is one of the meccas of climbing, right?
(32:45):
And Chattanooga itself is a very diverse city.
Like if you would have went anywhere else in Tennessee, I'd be like,
oh, it doesn't, this makes sense on why there's not that many black climbers.
But in Chattanooga, out of all places, it does not make sense.
Especially with how many places are close within Chattanooga.
We went to Overhatchee today, five minutes down the road from where I live.
And so with how close everything is here, how diverse Chattanooga is,
(33:09):
it just does does not make any sense and so and then when I was starting the
process of like researching nonprofits and organizations when I looked up climbing
organizations that take kids out climbing basically.
I looked at it and I was like, there's no organizations like this.
And we're in at the time, 2020.
I was like, this doesn't make any sense at all. It was like,
you see on Instagram posts all the time, diversified outdoors,
(33:31):
but like nobody's doing it. It doesn't make any sense.
And so at least not in, like I said, there's other larger organizations that
have their mission. But in your community, in your town, nobody's doing it.
I was like, that doesn't make any sense at all. And it's like,
I'm not the strongest climber.
I'm not the best climber at all. But I was like, there wasn't anybody with some
sort of like reputation behind them. They're like, we're going to push this.
Yeah. So I was like, I'm going to talk to as many people as possible.
(33:54):
And so that's kind of how it all started.
I can't help but see a very common theme here between the organizations where
there was kind of this one individual or one person that kind of sparked a was
the catalyst for kind of incredible change.
And so that makes me wonder about how you all got involved, not only in climbing,
(34:17):
but then also kind of got involved with the organization.
So, I mean, Kendall, yours is pretty clear cut and dry. You are the organization.
But I would love to hear you guys just talk about how you got into climbing
and how that morphed into wanting to do something beyond just climbing.
I've always kind of said for myself when folks ask me like what does it mean
to be a good climber? I don't think about grades.
I think about the ethics. I think about how I'm giving back I think about that
(34:39):
portion So I'd love to know how you guys got into climbing and then how it morphed
into this give back Mentality of kind of improving your own communities.
Okay. I first want to give a big shout out to Hassler the hustler Andrea.
Yes, because Yeah Yeah, just real quick, just real quick.
Just because, like, I met Andrea a while ago at the International Climbers Festival, and.
(35:07):
She is a phenomenon and I'm sure she's probably enraged at me bragging about
her right now, but I think she's probably one of the most underrated sleepers
in the advocacy community in the world.
And I don't care what anybody else says or that, because she helped me a lot
in like, kind of like really kind of forming a little bit of more business in my podcast.
(35:31):
She's helped with you. I know she's been a big influencer in
your life she hired me yeah like so
like she told me to apply i just want
to go ahead and say like if we erect a statue for her it should be done but
like if there's not up to date on their access fund membership because andrea
hasler works for the access fund so go ahead and uh membership for the access
fund so yeah but with that being said i just felt like like once you said that
(35:54):
and i was thinking about you and i was like this just has to be said because
All of us are here because of her. Yes.
Yes. And it's like, you know, and you just even said, there's like reoccurring
themes. And I think she's a person who's been thread through a lot of webs.
Yeah. But with that being said. Let's hear about you. I got into climbing.
Actually, I got into climbing. I took a girl on a date.
(36:19):
Friends and enemies, lovers and haters. I hope you are enjoying that episode.
And I know you hate me before I'm ending. but you
know what would make that hate fade away would
be a brand new t-shirt that sends and suffers drip
thirty dollars five dollars for shipping and handling shoot me a message and
i will get that information out to you and you gotta ask yourself were you just
(36:43):
suffering when i ended that that means your send is so close because if you're
not suffering are you really sending at all you.
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