Durango, Colo. – Mountain Bike Specialists, or MBS, as it is colloquially known about this town, is something of a local institution, as well as a national and even international destination for folks visiting Durango.

Indeed, it is revered as the premier bike shop in Southwest Colorado and the region, and the home of and inspiration to many of the greatest cyclists of all time, as well as Durango’s Small Business of the Year, but this notoriety was never imagined at the outset, and the store has come by its fame via a rather circuitous route.

On March 1, 1968, the seeds of what would blossom into MBS were planted by the Zinks, a multi-generational Animas Valley farm and ranch family, with the purchase of a small, general gun/sporting goods store located at 940 Main Ave. in the heart of Downtown.

“My dad was a good friend of Mr. Crowley said Ed Zink of the former owner. “He liked to tinker, and anything he could work on he sold – from chain saws to Honda motorcycles to toasters. And he sold some bicycles.”

But when Crowley passed away, his widow no longer wanted the store. Patriarch John Zink saw it as a business opportunity and a less strenuous operation than ranching. Ironically, John never worked a day in the store. It became son Ed’s responsibility, and ultimately his life’s career.

“I was in college at Fort Lewis at the time, studying engineering and chemistry,” said Ed, acknowledging he needed a job to help support his young family. “I agreed to run the store until my dad could sell the ranch and come to work.”

But John liked retirement, and Ed liked the store. Ed changed his major to business and has never looked back.

Within two months of opening on the east side of Main, the Zinks purchased the building at 949 Main, MBS’ current location. At the time it housed a pool hall, but by May of 1968, it became The Outdoorsman. Today, the retail space with its high ceiling offers only ghosts of the old sporting goods store, when gun racks and sleeping bags – and animal trophies – adorned the walls.

Today, those expansive walls allow for a virtual museum of cycling history and memorabilia, literally chronicling the growth of both mountain and road biking in Durango and the region. But we’re getting ahead in the story.

“We had the motorcycles in the back, and the bicycles were lined up right down the middle of the store,” said Zink, describing the first layout of the facility. “I’d never touched a motorcycle in my life and there we were a Honda dealer.”

True to his strategic personality, Zink went in search of someone in town with a passion for motorcycles, and found him in Gary Wilkinson. Wilkinson was graduating from high school at the time and took Zink up on his offer of a job.

The Zink family purchased the adjoining building and moved the motorcycle operation there in 1972, where it remained until Handlebar Cycles spun off as a separate store on Camino del Rio. Wilkinson purchased Handlebar from Zink in 2007, 39 years after first coming to work at The Outdoorsman.

“Ed is a real planner and a person who thinks strategically,” said John Glover, who joined the store in 1980 and is currently the manager. “He recognizes opportunities.”

“I don’t believe that if you think you want things to happen, they’ll happen,” said Zink. “But if in thinking you want them to happen you recognize opportunities, then in that regard, we’ve been strategic. Opportunities came along and we said, ‘We’ll take that opportunity.’”

Zink admits he had “no clue” how to run a retail operation when first taking on The Outdoorsman. As a country boy his “shopping” experience had essentially been limited to purchasing necessities at Farmer’s Supply, the predecessor of today’s Kroeger’s Ace Hardware in Town Plaza.

The town was different in the sixties, still rural and much smaller than the Durango of today. Guns, fishing poles, as well as basketballs and baseballs – even Cub Scout supplies – made up the bulk of The Outdoorsman’s sales beyond the motorcycles. Mail order, internet sales were non-existent. Distribution was tied more closely to manufacturer’s wholesalers.

“There were, in essence, traveling salesmen who would come through town representing various wholesalers,” said Zink who welcomed their advice on purchases. “I actually cannot think of a situation where they took advantage of my inexperience. To some degree, they took us under their wing and said, ‘Let us help you understand what you need in this store.’ So that was good.”

For a time, The Outdoorsman dabbled in ski equipment, which didn’t take hold, but, interestingly, bicycles, along with the motorcycles, did. In the early days, it was common for Zink and his small staff to run the retail store during the day, and after hours service the bicycles and motorcycles.

“Crowley’s was a Schwinn Bicycle dealer,” said Zink, who found a one-sheet franchise agreement that specified the dealership was non-transferable. “I didn’t know enough to not think I couldn’t do anything. So I just called Schwinn Bicycles and explained we’d bought the store and would like to be the Schwinn dealer.”

The Schwinn representative asked, based on the store’s market survey, what annual sales in units and dollars did Zink forecast, and what were the store’s market share and potential market penetration.

“I had never heard any of those words,” said Zink. “I paused, thought a minute and said, ‘Last year Mr. Crowley sold 15 Schwinns. I think we can sell 15 Schwinns.”

To this day Zink can here the representative’s voice, “Son, if you can’t sell 100 bicycles a year, you’re wasting your time trying to be a bicycle dealer, and you’re wasting our time to have you be a bicycle dealer.”

“I said, ‘OK, we’ll sell 100,’ and he said, ‘You’re the dealer,’” said Zink. “That was the whole conversation, and we sold 100 bicycles that year.”

The oil embargo that hit in the early 1970s proved to be a boon for The Outdoorsman, as bicycles were in demand. Schwinn had, however, just begun manufacturing bikes in Taiwan, and the old school, made-in-America dealers refused to support the company. MBS was too young to have preconceived notions, and began buying container-loads of Schwinn bicycles.

“They would come in and here and just go right out,” said Zink. “I would say that the fact that we had bicycles to sell when nobody else did during the years of the oil embargo really moved us into the bicycle business. We became known as THE bicycle shop in the area.”

With the motorcycle shop next door, the entire center section of 949 Main was a line-up of bicycles from end to end. Held only by kick-stands, the bikes more than once would fall domino style, tipped by an unsuspecting, and ultimately frightened child.

About the same time, running emerged as a popular sport, thanks in great part to American Frank Shorter winning the Olympic Marathon. The Outdoorsman began carrying running shoes, but they simply weren’t selling.

John Glover, a cycling enthusiast and Fort Lewis agricultural science graduate who had decided the Forest Service wasn’t for him, was working at the store by that time and let Zink know about a new guy in town employed as an auto mechanic for Dorman McShand’s Precision Imports, and running foot races on the side. Zink offered this “new guy” a position selling shoes, and he quit his mechanics job and joined the team. What Zink didn’t know at the time was that this new hire – Ned Overend – was also a cyclist.

“That was about the time mountain biking got started,” said Zink. “And he started competing – and winning – and we started carrying mountain bikes in the late ‘80s.”

Overend won the National Off-Road Bicycling Association Championships every year but one between 1986 and 1992.

“Durango hosted the World Mountain Bike Championships in 1990, and that was organized essentially by Ed out of our store,” said Glover. “Ned won it, and that was a very emotional thing to have happen. I was there at the ski resort, and there were literally thousands of people. The roar of the crowd was amazing. That has been a high point.”

The store was still predominantly a Schwinn dealer – with Overend riding to victory on the bicycles – but Zink had opportunity to purchase the inventory of Four Faces Outdoor Sports, which had closed.

“The rep for Specialized Bicycles came and knocked on our door,” said Zink, explaining that the bicycles were being repossessed. “He asked to store them in our back room until he could get them shipped. We said, yes, but suggested he just make us the Specialized dealer. He agreed, and that’s how we became a Specialized dealer.”

This didn’t, however, sit well with Richard Schwinn, who visited Durango for the National Championships in 1987. Schwinn bicycles were still selling well at the store, and because of that, the floor inventory was disproportionately Specialized simply because Zink couldn’t keep enough Schwinns in stock.

“He was so irate, we could not reason with him,” said Zink. “He walked over to the phone and dialed the home office and said, ‘Cancel these guys,’ and walked out. That was the last year we were a Schwinn dealer.”

Schwinn’s loss, Specialized’s gain. Today, MBS is a leading dealer in the Specialized network, continually recognized for its support of the cycling industry.

Also in 1987, the transition from The Outdoorsman to Mountain Bike Specialists began. Mountain Bike Specialists was originally a successful Fort Collins mail order business that was capitalizing on the growth of mountain biking. Zink purchased the business and moved it to Durango. However, operating a mail order business from the town was not fiscally viable for the long term, plus mountain bikes were becoming more readily available throughout the country.

“We closed it down in about three years,” said Zink. “But in the process of having it, we started hanging the sign on our building, encouraging those who were coming to Durango to visit the factory outlet. We began using both names.”

At the same time, Wal-Mart came knocking on Durango’s door. Zink’s son Brian was studying business at Fort Lewis at the time and took on “How to Wal-Mart-proof Dad’s Store” as his senior seminar project.

“The bottom line of the study was,” said Brian, now chief financial officer for the Southern Ute Indian Tribe, “if you’re talking about price-driven merchandise, they – Wal-Mart – will win. If you talk about service-driven merchandise, then MBS would win.”

The guns, the fishing poles, the basketballs and camping gear – all price-driven merchandise –  went by the wayside; and bicycles, sales of which are service-driven, emerged as the survival product.

“When we made the conversion from being a sporting goods store that sold bicycles to becoming a bicycle store, that was really a hallmark moment for me,” said Glover, who had been running the bicycle side of the business. “I think for Ed too. We were able to be more enthusiastic about what we did. It’s a passion for Ed, so it was a fun time.”

“We enjoyed bicycles,” confirmed Zink. “We captured the market segment and focused on that and it’s worked.”

Throughout the years in business, The Outdoorsman/MBS has been a key community supporter. Though Tom Mayer conceived the idea of racing the train to Silverton, it was Ed Zink who made the Iron Horse Bicycle Classic a reality in 1972. Now, 37 years later, the Iron Horse is a premier cycling event that draws thousands to Durango annually.

MBS is a key supporter of the trail advocacy organization, Trails 2000, working with the group since its inception in 1990. Zink was instrumental in founding the San Juan Mountains Association in 1987, and helping to organize a Road Advocacy effort to make the roads safe for both cyclists and vehicular traffic. MBS also supports dozens of non-profit, school and agricultural programs.

“It scared me initially,” said Zink of the number of non-profit entities that came knocking for donations. “I went over to visit with Fred Kroeger – I’d gone to school with his son – and I asked him how to handle all this. He said, and I still use this as my guiding light today, ‘If what they’re asking for is a good thing, then do it because it’s the right thing to do… If it’s not the right thing to do, then don’t do it. Don’t let the advertising talk you into it.’”

It’s proven to be good advice, and the store and Zink have been lauded. In addition to MBS’ honor as Small Business of the Year for 2007, Zink received the Durango Chamber of Commerce “2004 Citizen of the Year.” He has also been inducted into the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame.

Over the years, Mountain Bike Specialists has been at the core of significant cycling media coverage, from Mountain Bike Magazine to Bicycling Magazine, which has helped christen Durango a cycling mecca. Men’s Journal named MBS the #1 bike shop in the nation in both 2005 and 2006, with Outside magazine repeatedly citing the store as a “must visit.”

Within the industry, Mountain Bike Specialists was named by Bicycle Retailer & Industry News as a top retailer in 2005 and 2006, and Glover notes, “We are in a small town in a small market, and out of perhaps 5000 stores, we have been named a Top 100 store twice.”

Mountain Bike Specialists’ current staff includes Cindy Dahlberg, Sue Grandjean, Dylan Kirchner, Mike Phillips, Ryan Barthel, John Glover, Darian Harvey, Evan Meyers, Hap Purcell and Ed and Patti Zink.

As to the future, Glover sees the complexity of the industry increasing, and knows MBS will evolve with it. Beyond offering a highly-trained master mechanic shop for today’s technical bicycles, MBS employees receive continuing education in all aspects of cycling – from computer skills to precision fitting to training.

“We have customers who are very sophisticated,” said Glover. “So we have to try to keep pace with them.”

“When we started, I really had no business philosophy,” said Zink. “I just tried to do a good job and be fair.”

The philosophy has served MBS well.

indiana@durangodowntown.com 

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