A new indoor space in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood aims to get more people outdoors. To do so, Gearhouse is relying on a two-sided business in which it serves as a both a social meeting place and a gear rental spot.
The startup was founded by Evan Maynard, a former engineer at Kent, Wash.-based Blue Origin, the space venture founded by Jeff Bezos.
Maynard left Blue Origin in 2020 with a desire to launch something other than rockets. A sustainability focused software startup called Kotoo was his first stab at entrepreneurship, but that business struggled during the pandemic.
Gearhouse was started in a windowless alley garage in South Lake Union in 2021. Growth and a desire for a more social setting landed the business on Capitol Hill with the opening of the Basecamp Cafe / hangout / rental location at 800 E. Thomas St. in a former AT&T Lounge location.
“We are optimized around helping people make friends and try new things in the outdoors,” said Maynard, working this week in the 3,100-square-foot space where people tapped on laptops and a coffee bar churned out drinks. “The whole purpose of the place is to help you indulge in what you’re interested in. It’s either get you started, get you to the next level or get you doing it more often.”
Maynard and a small team of 12 employees are seeking to reinvent the gear rental experience for Gearhouse members — more than 200 of them so far — who pay $95 a month for a variety of perks including access to a wide range of gear, from mountain bikes to camp stoves; unlimited clinics and classes; curated trips; free co-working space; discounted food and drink; an active Slack community; and more.
“We kind of do everything,” Maynard said of the roughly 1,500-item rental business, stuffed into a room off the cafe. “If you need a headlamp, we’ll rent that to you. If you need a pillow, we rent that to you. If you need a cooler, we rent that to you. You don’t need to suddenly need something for a weekend, buy it and then have it sit in your closet all the time.”
Gearhouse differentiates itself in that regard from other outdoor competitors such as Seattle-based REI and Evo, who rent gear for a few specific pursuits, such as biking or skiing. Another startup called GeerGarage acts as a peer-to-peer marketplace for outdoor-focused camping and recreation equipment.
The social space hosts about 10 events a week, ranging from movie nights to detailed classes on everything from how to set up campsite gear to introductions on sport climbing, backcountry skiing, or crevasse rescue. Some classes extend beyond the cafe and include hours in the field learning a new activity with new friends.
Making new connections and getting through the so-called “Seattle Freeze” is important to Maynard.
“I think people move here for the outdoors, and then they struggle accessing it,” he said. “It’s an intimidating place. People are very intense about it.”
Gearhouse helps match people to activities and intensity levels that are a good fit.
Like most startup founders, Maynard, who is bootstrapping the company, is doing a bit of everything to make his business work. He’s learning how to fix gear and how to be a barista. And he’s leaning on the tech skills he honed at Blue Origin.
“It’s still data-driven decision making, and still experimentation and a bias for building something new,” he said. “The same principles apply here — the best way to learn how it’s going to work is to try it. And then look at the data.”
Leilani Fisher, a lawyer who lives on Capitol Hill, was also looking to rent a mountain bike. After passing by Gearhouse in recent days she stopped in to work and signed up for a membership.
“Storage is a big thing. I already have two bikes and wasn’t sure if I wanted to pull the trigger on a third,” Fisher said. “These bikes tend to get really spendy, so it’s a good way to test them out and see if I even like it.”
After work, she was headed to a class through Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance at Duthie Hill Mountain Bike Park. Her membership allowed her to keep the bike for four or five days.
Jared Siegel, a fish biologist who works mostly from home these days, signed up for a membership while GeekWire was visiting this week. He was looking for a way to get out of the house and meet people a bit more organically, and was drawn to Gearhouse and the potential for a new social network.
Getting into mountain biking or paddle boarding without purchasing another piece of gear was also appealing to Siegel.
“We do live in a consumer society where everybody wants all the goodies,” he said. “But really, we can do things in a more efficient way.”
Michael Magan is a tech worker who used to live in South Lake Union when Gearhouse set up shop near where he lived. That location has been idled until winter while the Capitol Hill location gets off the ground.
A member since the start, Magan first stopped in when he was prepping for a bikepacking trip and didn’t have any of the necessary gear.
“They were still setting up. So I just walked in, and I met Evan. And I said, ‘Hey, can I rent bikepacking gear?’ And he said, ‘Yeah, I have it.'” Magan said. “Later it turns out that was literally his bikepacking gear that he just rented out to me.”
Magan said Gearhouse is a fun way to get friends involved in outdoor activities because it lowers the barrier to entry. And he likes the sense of community that’s been created.
“I feel like I’m part of something,” he said.
