Today on the show Colin is rolling solo as he talks about the recent ThredUp report about the growth of secondhand as well as reflecting fondly on the recently concluded Barkley Marathons.
Then Colin offers a take on why you may not want going outside to be your sole existence for being.
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Episode Transcript
Colin True
00:00:00.400 - 00:12:14.634
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Welcome to the Rock Fight where we speak our truth, slay sacred cows, and sometimes agree to disagree. This is an outdoor podcast that aims for the head.
I'm Colin True and today I'm going to talk a bit about the identity of being an outdoorsy individual. But before we get to that, I hope you haven't missed an action packed week here on the Rock Fight.
On Monday, we hit on the state of the outdoor economy. On Wednesday, Shantae Salibair filled in for Justin Hausman as we talked about some outdoor community headlines.
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Well, I haven't rolled solo in a minute, so today we're going to have an old school short form hot take on something that's been rattling around in my head. But before I go through that, there were a couple of headlines that came out the last few days that I want to touch on.
The first is that resale platform ThredUp released its 13th report detailing the overall state of the secondhand market and it shows encouraging signs. With the US secondhand marketplace expected to hit $75 billion by 2029, as well as see the largest increase in that space since 2021.
And it's outpacing the broader retail clothing market by five times. This report also showed that the global secondhand marketplace is expected to hit $367 billion by 2029. I guess 75 billion of that 367 is pretty good.
I would think maybe the US part of it would be a little higher, but I'm going to go out in the limb and say that sounds great because as we've talked about a lot here on the Rock fight, secondhand is the best tool we have at the moment anyway to the stuff problem that's being created by the apparel industry at large. So seeing increases on this scale is absolutely huge.
Now, this upcoming Monday, you're going to hear us talking about new ways the outdoor industry could be innovating. And we don't actually touch on secondhand that much in that particular conversation.
But these statistics are a great reminder of the opportunity that exists for the outdoor industry to come together around secondhand and do more with what we've already made. I mean, it seems that the fight our industry is being forced into right now is on public lands and protecting our wild places.
Something that's kind of like, it's like fucking bonkers, guys. Pretty much everything happening in our nation's capital is on par with what I expected to happen when this new administration took over.
But I, I was not expecting our national parks, the one thing that seems to be truly nonpartisan in this day and age, to be impacted.
So if that could be a unifier for the industry, that we can carry that momentum into other topics and that momentum to our brands to find ways to shrink their first quality output and invest more in secondhand. That'd be a good thing, but might be wishful thinking. But that said, great to see secondhand continue to grow.
We might touch on this topic again in some other upcoming episodes. The second headline to come out was the Barclay Now Lazarus Lake continues to be one of the best personalities in the outdoor world.
One year after a record five participants finished Tennessee's the Barkley Marathons, including, famously, the first female finisher in the history of the event, Jasmine Paris, race director Gary Cantrell, AKA Lazarus Lake, AKA Laz, went back to his mad scientist laboratory and devised a new course, well, a course in the same place anyway, that thwarted all attempts this year.
The best finish was previous Barkley champ Kelly, who managed to complete a fun run, which is three of the required five laps out on Frozen Head State Park's course.
Look, the Barkley has gone from being basically an underground race to something that now captures the attention of the outdoor world each March due to the fact that no one knows what to expect. And it's also a absolutely brutal event.
And at the heart of it is Cantrell, who blows a conch shell at a random time to let runners know that the race will start in an hour and then lights a cigarette to actually start the race. And these are the types of personalities that the outdoors needs in this day and age of over the top niceties.
It's good to know there's a little fuck you in the world. I don't find much interesting about accomplishments by endurance athletes anymore.
Like, later this summer, someone will win UTMB and Western States and the Tour de France and Hard Rock, whatever. But when I see somewhere that the Barkley has begun, I can't help but feel intrigued.
And that's primarily due to the personality of the guy who started and runs it.
And when he's done doing it, either because he doesn't want to do it anymore or because he has moved on from this earthly plane, I hope the event ends. These two are so entangled with each other, the. The. The race director and the race itself that I think it would be odd. I mean, just not even odd.
Just like straight up weird and disrespectful to have one without the other. So good on you, Laz. Good on. Good on you for bringing the. The course back to being the champion this year. No one wins. Love seeing it.
Can't wait to see what happens next year. All right, everyone, before we get started today, I need to tell you about our amazing teammates at Darby Communications.
If you run an outdoor, an endurance or an active lifestyle brand, there is no better PR or digital marketing belay partner or drinking buddy than Darby. They can help your business reach new heights and you know, they might just keep you from falling on your ass.
And since we started working with Darby, more and more people have been reaching out to us here at the Rock Flight because of that messaging. Look guys, if they can help us, they can help anybody.
Hit them up@darbycommunications.com do it today okay, the main thing I want to talk about today is on identity.
Now, I'm not claiming to be a psychologist or anything, but it seems to me that many people that you encounter in life have cultivated a personality or identity that is rooted in something that they're passionate about, but also outside of their control. And that thing then becomes so attached to how they look at themselves that no matter what, they can't evolve past it.
Now, number one on that list is easily the identity of the mainstream sports fan.
I spent most of my young adulthood living in New England, and I could tell you right now that if you thanos snapped away the Celtics, Bruins, Red Sox and Pats, if you did it right now, you'd see just millions of New Englanders wandering around aimlessly wondering what the hell they should do with their time. They'd be just a total shell of themselves. Another all consuming identity is politics person.
You know, that person whose allegiance to their political party has just absolutely consumed them. And this is worse than the mainstream sports fan because the stakes are higher.
There are people in my life who will justify any move made by their political party of choice because it's become so much of who they are that they can't bear the thought of not being a Republican or Democrat or going against the trend of their party. It's worse than the mainstream sports fan, but pretty much adjacent to it because these people just remain committed to their team at all costs.
There are other examples I could list, like those who get too into their job, video game folks, people who post photos of their jars of sourdough starter or the baked loaves of their sourdough bread, et cetera. But the reason I bring this up is because of how prevalent this is in the outdoor world. For as healthy as our outdoor activities can be, holy shit.
There are some of us who take this stuff way too seriously, to the point where it becomes all consuming. And this verse occurred to me when considering how insufferable a lot of mountain town people are.
And let me explain There's a statistic that says that those who are happiest in their marriage are the ones you see that post the least on social media about their marriages, the rationale being that those who are secure in their relationships don't feel the need to draw attention to themselves, while those who are barreling towards divorce are more likely to post pictures of their significant others talking about how sweet or how handsome or how incredible or how beautiful they are. They are either subconsciously or consciously looking for others to validate something that isn't so rock solid in their lives.
And I think a lot of mountain town people are like that too.
If you are consistently posting about how amazing your town is and how lucky you are to get to live there, there's a chance you are also counting those likes and comments of those who say that they are jealous. And if I see one more person living in a mountain town talk about how there's nowhere else like where they get to live, I may lose my shit.
Because like mainstream sports or like politics person, you're tying your boat to something that isn't necessarily always going to be the way it was when you made this thing. Your entire personality, like your favorite sports team can completely shit the bed looking at you right now.
Mavericks fans and now this thing that defines you is going to be a train wreck for like the next decade.
In politics, let's say, for example, all you do is defend a specific party and then you end up with a leader who wins the White House and then works in opposition of what you once stood for. But you're so all in on that party that you don't know how to leave it behind. Is this sounding familiar to anyone out there?
For those of an outdoorsy persuasion, there is a ton of baked in. I could never do that in most outdoor activities.
So to show others what you choose to go do or where you choose to live brings along a pretty healthy dopamine rush.
But by hitching your wagon to a location or to just doing outdoor stuff, you might find yourself missing out on so much more because your identity is tied to making sure everyone knows you went mountain biking or skiing last weekend.
The only point I'm trying to make is that variety is good and the things that we benefit from when it comes to the outdoors putting ourselves in sketchy situations, trying new activities, seeing new places. It can all be found elsewhere.
If you're a dirt worshipping trail lover, you know the value of getting outside of your comfort zone and having new experiences. So put the outdoor identity aside. Get gussied up and head to Vegas for the weekend.
You may be surprised by what you learn about yourself and other people in general.
And whether you just live at 10,000ft and like going outside or you work in the outdoor industry, those new perspectives can only pay forward because you won't be limited by a singular point of view. So yeah, don't let the outdoors be the only thing that defines you.
The stuff in the world that is ugly is pretty loud, but there's a lot of stuff out there that is beautiful too, and you can't always find it on a trail. That's it. That's all I got for you today. Nice and tidy. Little show for you. We want your emails.
Send them to myrockfightmail.com the Rock Fight is a production of Rock Fight LLC. I'm Colin True. Thanks for listening and like always, Chris Demaicz is right here to take us out and sing the Rock Fight Fight song.
We'll see you on Monday, Rock Fighters.
Chris DeMakes
00:12:14.682 - 00:13:10.510
Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Welcome to the Rock Fight where we speak our truth slay sac and sometimes agree to disagree.
We talk about human powered outdoor activities and big bites about topics that we find interesting like pop culture, music, the latest movie reviews, ideas that aim for the head this is where we speak our truth. This is where we speak our truth. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Welcome to the Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Rock Fight. Welcome to the Rock Fight.
Rock light Rock Fight. Rock light Rock light Rock Fight. Welcome to the Rock Fight. Rock fight. Rock Fight.
Colin True
00:13:12.410 - 00:13:14.890
Rock Fight.