Skiing has always been part of the family business with the Uhls at Ski Shop Inc. in Colorado Springs. Current owner Rick Uhl took over the shop from his parents Wolf and Julie in 2002. They had purchased the business in 1981. The shop, as a business though, has been thriving and evolving for nearly 65 years.
The key for Rick who runs the shop with his wife Debbie and brother Scott (along with other family members pitching in) is to keep ahead of the curve, get every person their right fit and promote what he believes is one of the great family sports.
Uhl explains that the south town location that houses the Ski Shop was sort of the center of Colorado Springs back in 1981. “We had Ski Broadmoor just to the west of us and we had a much smaller downtown to the north of us. We’ve stayed right here, but the whole town itself has just grown so far northeast. It’s kind of crazy that so many people still drive to us right off the interstate. It’s pretty cool to see.”
Family Time in the Summer
That said, because it is a family business, Uhl does devote time to working on family. The shop shuts down usually from mid-May to late August during the non-skiing season. “In the winter, it is all about skiing and family [time] kind of suffers a bit. So we try to spend as much time as we can [in the off-season]. But now that their kids are older, “it’s tough taking 3 months off. It sounds like it’s great but you need some adult interaction” so they do help out at the garden shop next door.
In the summer, Uhl and his family also traditionally head down to Covington, Louisiana. “My parents have a house down there, so we usually go for a couple of weeks and just enjoy the humidity, bugs and gators…all that fun stuff you down South for during the summer.” But then at the cusp of fall, it is back to work full throttle.
Testing all the Equipment
He says a big thing that the Ski Shop has always done is test every single piece of equipment that comes through the door. What was keeping him busy when we spoke is that he was back and forth to the mountains testing new releases. “Tomorrow I’m going to Breckenridge to demo the new Rossignol lineup of skis.” As of early February, he had been testing the new season gear for about three to four weeks and the actual ordering process with what he will carry in store next season ends in those following two weeks. Those orders will be in and be ready to go in late August/early September after the summer break.
“I’m a very unique ski shop where I get to go through and tell my rep I’m going to cherry-pick his line. So, I’ve already got 15 skis on my radar from Rossignol that look good from a shape point of view. But then after reading about [the differences], I actually get up and ski on them to figure out what’s right for my customers.”
Uhl says the Colorado Springs customer is totally different than the Boulder customer or the guy who lives in Breckenridge or Summer County. “And the unique thing is my staff has personally skied on everything that I have brought in from Rossi. So when people come into the store, we’re the only shop where we can totally tell you that we’ve skied on everything. If you’re looking for a ski that’s going to do ‘this,’ I know exactly which one is the right one for you.”
On the boot fitting side, which is also one of the specialties at Ski Shop, Uhl says they’ve taken it one step further. “So there’s a lot of people who sell boots in this industry. We’ve taken a different angle. You can sell boots or you can be a boot fitter. So a boot fitter, the difference to me is we make our living selling and fitting ski boots.”
He says one of his boot fitters has been with them since 1984 and he himself has been doing it consistently since the early 1990s. The key, he says, is really looking at the anatomy of a foot, looking at how a person walks … the way one foot gets displaced over another and being able to take that skier and put them in the right ski boot. They then can “add some foam or some pad or an insole and make that boot exactly what that foot needs.”
Getting the Right Fit
To get that right fit, they measure the length, the width and the volume of the foot. “We look at the instep and then we just look at the mechanics of that skier. When the skier stands up and they bend those knees slightly forward, what’s the range of motion? What does their ankle do as they walk into it? Do we need to mold an insole to give them a little bit more, a little bit less ankle flexation? There are just tons of things we’re going to do to look at that one skier and try to make [that boot] as good as we can.”
The irony, he says, is that some people come in thinking their boot is going to be phenomenal from the get-go, but when it’s 10 degrees outside “and we’ve got metal buckles surrounding a foot, it’s going to hurt sometimes. There’s no doubt that everybody has their different feeling of how a boot should fit, but we’re a very firm believer that the boots should be comfortable, but very, very skiable. It should make you a better skier.”
Uhl explains that even during the pandemic, the key was to learn how to survive and thrive in that environment. But, for him, it was also about taking it to the next level, especially with an even bigger increase in interest in the outdoors.
“Number one, I found that if you can hire the best people, you look like a genius no matter what happens. So the real key has been having really good people in every department, whether you’re looking at a ski boot fit or a ski tuner.”
He says ski tuning has just taken everything to the next level where they are using a lot of robotics that give the most precise tune. “We’re actually tuning a couple of the Special Olympians in terms of some of their gear, those easy-to-sit chairs. We also competed in the X Games so we’ve been tuning a lot of that athlete stuff as well.”
The Next Evolution for Ski Shop Inc.
Uhl is always looking for that new talked-about ski. With the boot fitting, and “with our insole technology … I flew to Utah a couple of years ago and learned from some of the best in the world on how to mold insoles to the feet [ski tuning]. I’ve learned from some of the best there.”
He says soon they are going to be the only shop in North America that has some of this kind of equipment. “It’s really cool to see as we are looking to be one step ahead of everybody else.”
“And for a little tiny ski shop … we’re only 10,000 square feet with 20 employees. When you drive by my building, it looks like I’m a little tiny chalet-looking place, but you walk in, it’s like, ‘Wow, this is actually pretty cool.’ And that’s always the response I’m looking to get from my customers, that when they find me, they come in. Number one, I treat my customers like they’re part of my family. If they have a problem, I want to hear about it. I’m going to try to solve it as best as I can. I know you can’t make everybody happy, but if there’s something we could do to make it better, I’d love to hear it.”
He says he takes advice from a lot of people in different industries. “I listen to trends from real estate, even oil prices, because that just kind of effects the whole economy of Colorado Springs. I’m always listening to what the trends are … and to me, it’s just learning from the best and listening to really smart people. I’ve been very lucky.”
