The Outdoor Industry Needs to Stop Overlooking these People🎒
"Stop using diversity as a selling point if you're not investing in the communities." — Nadah Feteih, Founder of Ma'wa Collective
It’s probably my favorite quote from any panelist at Outdoor Retailer 2026.
Nadah is the founder of Ma’wa Collective, an adventure company for Muslim women. It’s been incredible to see her community grow over the years, and I finally got to say hi IRL at the show a couple weeks ago!
As I shared last week, the big question I brought to my first ever OR was: How can outdoor industry leaders work together in creative ways to bring more communities into nature? Thankfully, there was a lot of conversation about just that (while many of us in the industry acknowledge we have a ways to go).
There’s a difference between belonging and fitting in.
Fitting in is when you change yourself to blend into a group. Your body, your pace, your gear, your voice, your vocabulary. Shrinking the parts of you that stand out.
Belonging is being welcomed as you arrive. You don’t have to change, shrink, hide, or adjust yourself to feel at home in a group or environment.
I want the outdoor industry to start shifting their systems, gear, and marketing to foster true belonging, rather than making it easier for people to “fit in” to what already exists.
Too many groups face barriers to belonging, but this week I want to focus on 3 that were specifically on my mind at OR: women over 50, people in bigger bodies, and novices.
The outdoor industry needs to stop ignoring…
🏔️ Women who are 50+
Browse the catalogs, the campaign photography, the website hero images, a brand’s own Instagram grid. Women are there, sometimes in abundance, right up until roughly age… 45ish? Then they vanish (not from the trails, obvi, but from the branding).
There was a lot of talk about Gen Z consumers at OR this year. But at the end of a panel discussing younger buyers, my hand shot up — what insights do we have on “older” buyers, and why do we never talk about that? When I turn, like, 45, will I stop seeing myself in any outdoor media?
Forget about the fact that not putting women 50+ in media is just wrong and exclusionary. It’s also bad business. Older women tend to have more discretionary spending than younger ones. They have bigger networks and more time to spend.
I co-guide Grand Canyon Rim to Rim hikes through The Cairn Project, and we decided to hold this October’s trip for women 50+. Guess which trip was the quickest to fill and whose fundraising finished the fastest? These 50+ women who are rocking it outdoors.
Maaany thoughts are swirling in my head about this one, so I’ll write a longer post in the future after I do some more research and chatting with these women. For now, start to notice the lack of effort outdoor brands put into reaching this amazing market segment.
🥾 People in Bigger Bodies
One of the best conversations of the week was facilitated by Leander Lacy. 8 of us sat around a table to have an open discussion about bigger bodies and inclusion outdoors. (For context, my body is widely accepted in the world + industry, so what I share here may not be my own lived experience but those of the people who kindly shared them with me and the others.)
Some of the folks at the table were creators who were invited and credentialed by OR to be there. And yet, some skipped morning activations because they had no way of knowing whether it’d work for their bodies — specifically, the morning canoeing session. They wanted to paddle, but they didn’t want to become the story of the person who didn’t fit in the boat.
And before you say c’mon Angie, of course they’d fit in the canoe — yes, for sure, but without signage or marketing materials explaining size or weight limits, how would they know that? Can you imagine how hard it’d be to have to show up and ask if your body was allowed in?
(And on the business case: That’s a brand losing an advocate or customer at the door without even realizing it.)
Someone suggested the way that roller coasters put a tester seat in the line. You sit in it, you find out if the restraint closes, and you walk away privately if it doesn’t, no attendant tugging at a harness while a hundred people watch. A metaphorical tester roller coaster seat can lower stress and increase engagement from people in bigger bodies (or really, anyone).
We also talked about the false reassurance people too often hear from gear reps: “Oh, of course it’ll fit, you’re not even that big, and it’s universal sizing!” Then they try to put on the gear, and it doesn’t fit. Of course that would deter many people from trying on other gear in the future.
Another sub-topic was language. One person chimed in that “no drop” is triggering to them in a run club, since they’ve been told a group was no drop, just to then get dropped. Another runner replied “what’s no drop mean?” which led to the conclusion that “all speeds welcome” is better phrasing (so long as it’s true). “Universal” or “one size fits all” was another term for the trash can. Nothing is one size fits all, and saying it just tells the people who’ve been failed by sizing that you haven’t thought about them. Same goes for “extended sizes” from a brand that stops at 2X.
I asked what my trail race company could do to ensure we’re welcoming bigger runners as soon as they discover us. Photos of past events was a big one. Visual proof does more than any inclusion statement we could write.
According to the NIH, ~74% of American adults are classified as overweight or obese according to standard health metrics (not that I approve of said metrics, but this is the data). When specifically looking at clothing sizes, about 54-67% of American women wear a size 14 or above, which is the standard retail definition of plus-size. So HELLO! If you’re an outdoor brand, wouldn’t you want to make sure you’re truly considering all these consumers?
🌻 Novice outdoor enthusiasts
The shared vocabulary of OR as the industry describes outdoor product users:
first timer → beginner → novice → casual → core
Mandela Echefu made the case on stage that novices are the growth market and brands should focus on them more.
A novice has done the activity a handful of times. What she’s missing is confidence, skills, habits, and identity (just one of those four is something a lesson can really fix).
Most of this industry designs, markets, and sells to core users, who are a fraction of the market and who already own everything and have big opinions about their gear. Meanwhile the group with fewer than ten years of experience in their sport is enormous, and it’s the group that replaces the core users who are aging out.
A business case for brands to give extra attention to novices is that they haven’t bought everything yet. Which gives you three massive opportunities:
Novices need ecosystems, not products. A tent doesn’t make somebody a camper. A group that camps monthly does. What ecosystem can you build for novices?
Whoever teaches a novice becomes their default resource. (See last week’s post for more on that.)
Move someone from “I’m trying to mountain bike” to “I am mountain biking” to “I’m a mountain biker.” Identity is what makes a customer stick around for thirty years instead of one season.
A quick note I learned about “casual” users (the step above novice): Somebody who backpacks twice a summer and has zero interest in doing more is not a project you failed to convert. She’s a customer with money who’ll buy quality gear for six weekends a year, forever, if you stop implying her version doesn’t count. Too often we try to move casual users straight to core, and lose them entirely.
✨ Put your values where your mouth and wallet are
Mirna “The Mirnavator” Valerio sang a jaw-dropping opera rendition of “Summertime” to kick off our week, and then asked the room how our values fit into our outdoor work.
We — as outdoor enthusiasts AND as brands — say we care about freedom, inclusion, health, community, empowerment.
And sometimes, that manifests. Sometimes, that shows in marketing but not in practice. And other times, it’s a total misalignment.
Which brings me back to where I started. Don’t sell diversity if you’re not actively investing into the communities you’re putting in your brand photography.
Gen Z has the most sensitive bullshit meter of any group this industry has tried to sell to, and they aren’t reading your values statement. They’re checking whether your actions match it, and they’ll find out faster than your marketing team can respond. Meanwhile Zara and H&M are both eyeing the outdoor space, and if we won’t build for women over 50, for bigger bodies, for novices, fast fashion will. Badly. And it’ll take the customers anyway as the planet suffers.
Inclusion stopped being a choice between doing the right thing and protecting the business a while ago.
Let’s stop focusing on fitting in. Let’s start to foster belonging by being the outdoor leaders we so often claim to be.