The Mountaineer is a family-run outdoor specialty retail shop in Keene Valley, New York. The Mountaineer has been owned by the McClelland family since 1975. Shortly after graduating college with a Forestry degree, Vinny McClelland and his brothers under the supervision of their Marine Corps father, George McClelland, headed into the mountains, harvested the trees and had them milled to build the store. George, his four sons and some friends built the post and beam structure in the small hamlet of Keene Valley.
After the store opened, Vinny headed north to Alaska and spent 12 years working and exploring. Family and Adirondack mountains lured him home to Keene Valley in the 90s where he took over management of The Mountaineer and raised a family. The shop is now owned by the four McClelland brothers and has prospered with Vinny at the helm.
The sales numbers coming out of the pandemic thus far paint a picture of unpredictable, if short-lived, demand. In the first few weeks, dehydrated meals—the kind backpackers carry to lighten their loads—seemed to be worth their weight in gold. Companies like Mountain House, ...read more
Not long after Patagonia CEO Rose Marcario wrote a blog post in June about the value in giving employees time off to vote—something she did in November 2016 and is doing again this year on Election Day—she started talking to other company executives on both sides of the political ...read more
A Grassroots Outdoor Alliance award is a very big deal. The group, which is a consortium of 64 independent outdoor specialty retailers and 68 vendor partners, represents the best of specialty retail. The awards, which will be given out on June 13, 2018 on night one of the ...read more
The SNEWS team was so impressed this year by the number of outdoor retailers thinking outside the box, showing devotion to their community, and simply put, giving customers a cool shop to gear up for the great outdoors. Here are a few of our favorites: Hometown Sports in McCall, ...read more
When Vinny McClelland was in his mid 20s, he helped his father build a cabin-like shop out of wood from the local tree mill, not knowing that one day he’d be the owner of The Mountaineer. The family-owned retailer is nestled New York’s Keene Valley, an area with a year-round ...read more
