“When I finally had this set up and I sat behind here, I was like, ‘Wow, that’s why I did all this,’ because this is where I belong. This is my spot.””

NEDERLAND — “I realized this right away: I was carrying camping goods like tents, but people buy tents once every ten years, but they’ll buy a new T-shirt once every two weeks. So, I started carrying more and more clothing, especially warm clothes.”

John Thompson said this to The Mountain-Ear back in 2022, as Mountain Man Outdoor Store was celebrating its ninth anniversary.

Thompson was reflecting on how the store has always shifted and morphed along with Nederland’s, and his own, fluctuations. 

“It’s just naturally evolving; it’s really easy, just listen to what the people ask for, start at the low end and work your way up.”

Now, four years after that interview, Mountain Man has just quietly celebrated yet another anniversary, as Thompson made the leap into the world of retail thirteen years ago on June 1, 2013.

Trading in his mad-dash days as a bicycle courier in San Francisco and his snow-laden stint as a snowmaker up at Eldora for a swivel chair behind a desk—where he wildly wields a sticker- making machine and a megaphone—Thompson’s creativity and madcap manner make his store one of Nederland’s quintessential operations. 

“I’ve got a little bit of everything,” Thompson says to nearly every visitor who walks through his door, as they almost always get immediately swept up in the organized chaos of the store layout.

The jungle of Christmas lights weaving in and out, up and down, through racks of Carhartt, walls of hats and gloves, shelves full of tents, and endless displays of camping supplies and essentials, is a window inside Thompson’s mind, where his impish intricacies mesh well with the ever-changing tides of the retail world, and of the desires and needs of tourists and locals in the mountains. 

Newcomers or visitors to Nederland will no doubt find Mountain Man Outdoor Store to be one of the best representations of the “quirkiness” and “funkiness” that defines the town. Though it may appear as though Thompson has always been at his location at 98 Peak to Peak Highway, most locals know that for over 10 years, Mountain Man, along with 20 other businesses, called the Caribou Village Shopping Center its home. 

Back in October, 2025, the Lakeview Fire ravaged his original location, displacing all those businesses, forcing many to move shop, a feat which, Thompson remarks, feels less like a simple move and more like starting all over again. 

John Thompson got a closer look at the space where his store used to be for 12 years.

Photo by Christopher Kelley

 “The fire, my dog having seizures, and getting my knees replaced—it’s been a great eight months, man!” Thompson joked, listing his hardships while remaining full of joy and hope. He pointed out his new, healthier lifestyle as the strong silver lining getting him through the tough times.  

“At the very beginning it was like my boat sank and I was just trying to build a raft to not drown.” Thompson was one of the many who gathered at 4 a.m. and watched the shopping center burn down, listening as the canisters of camping stove gas, stored by his front window, continued to pop and explode from the incredible heat of the blaze.

John Thompson, aka The Mountain Man, has been the representative of Nederland weirdness for more than a decade.

Photo by Christopher Kelley

After escaping down the hill to try to find some clarity, while crying in a McDonald’s, Thompson was suddenly able to see clearly through the intense emotion. He noticed the hustle and bustle of life continuing around him, despite the infinite, untold tragedies that persist for every person.  

He decided at that moment that he couldn’t simply give up on his role as the Mountain Man, and he immediately began hustling to get himself, and his store, back open—something he was able to do in less than two weeks. 

“I’m still tripping on the fact that a week after the fire, I didn’t have shit in the bank. But then the GoFundMe came and I was able to get an advance from the insurance company and I wrote a check for—I don’t even remember how much—to get in here, and it’s like, how the fuck did I do that?! How did I make that happen in eight days? How did I step off that cliff and not fall?”

Looking back at that tumultuous time, Thompson is glad that he chose to build Mountain Man back up from scratch, and finds levity in the accounting that played a part in the decision he made then.  

“I got like $15,000 from the GoFundMe; if I hadn’t rebuilt I would’ve had to pay taxes on it, so I would’ve ended up with $7,000, and that wouldn’t have gotten me lunch down in Boulder.”  

Rebuilding Mountain Man happened in waves, as the fire occurred just as leaf peeping season was wrapping up and ski season was about to begin—a time when Thompson would move all of his summertime stock over to his shed, and then organize the store with winter clothes and ski gear.

Unfortunately, Thompson’s backstock supply was slim pickings, which left him scrambling to find products to sell in his new location. Though he notes that there are still holes in his inventory eight months later, he remains immensely thankful to his vendors and to the community for their selfless efforts in supplying Mountain Man with stuff to sell, including tons of donated clothes for consignment. 

Thompson loves to point out to his customers that, just beyond the magic brick wall at Platform 9-3/4, there’s a back room filled with donated clothes and shoes, which are sold at fair prices specifically for locals and visitors in need of an extra layer, or the proper boots to traverse the mountains.  

But the back room is just one of the features that Thompson has added to his new location, as the larger space—as well as increased rent—has motivated him to expand his business model and to try new things: to remain open to the natural evolution of retail, as he has these last 13 years. 

The Mountain Man has increased his sticker and T-shirt production by expanding his work space and acquiring new technology in order to continue creating the fun, goofy, and often tongue-in-cheek slogans and designs that have become a staple of the store.  

Additionally, the new location comes with an impressive deck, which Thompson has been filling with idea after idea, from the Becky Zucker Hummingbird Sanctuary—a space with a birdfeeder and some educational information on hummingbirds, dedicated to his mother—to promoting E-bike rentals and highlighting Nederland’s skyline by staging photo opportunities for tourists. 

But all the innovating aside, it’s the banter that Thompson really basks in, as he loves to educate and entertain all who enter the store, whether he’s telling cautionary tales to amateur hikers about the importance of keeping their dogs on leash, or showing off his surgery scars. 

“Walking had gotten so bad I couldn’t walk down stairs,” Thompson commiserated with a customer and fellow knee surgery patient, explaining how the Cortisone shots he was receiving were producing diminishing returns, and that the pain and discomfort had become so inconvenient that he decided to get the first knee replacement on March 22, and the second knee two months later. 

Despite the surgeries completely killing his 2026 ski season, and despite his teenage Husky, Doc, continually escaping from the yard while he attempted to recover from those surgeries, Thompson still remained upbeat in the face of adversity and took only a handful of days off from the store—though he mentions that he was only able to do so with the help of good friends. 

“I just rode my bike a couple of hundred yards!” Thompson said excitedly about how his new knees were faring. “I had the seat all the way up and my feet were barely touching the pedals, but I can get around. And that’s the first thing; once I get on that, I’ll do it all the time.”

As for any banter with customers about the Caribou Village Shopping Center, Thompson notices that the discourse has changed a little bit now that the debris has been cleared, and newcomers just assume that the center is being built anew, not rebuilt after a disaster.

Thompson is sure to correct them, though, and is always willing to show the video of the fire that he shot himself. 

When the inevitable question of what caused the fire is asked, Thompson has been telling people it was the Devil. “He found out we were smoking his lettuce,” he cackles. 

A local customer came in during Thompson’s interview to buy socks and commented about how Tebo Properties could get a building up this August if they wanted to, to which Thompson guffawed and said, “You’ve been to Nederland, right? You're lucky if you can get a sign up by August.”

Thompson’s flippancy about the fire doesn’t come from a place of pain, anger, or frustration, but is more of an extension of his sense of humor, of his urge to make things lighthearted, not just for the benefit of the person he’s talking to, but also to aid his own need to keep going and not look back.  

“I probably don’t think enough about it,” he said about the fire. “There’s no way of changing it. Can I change the fire? No. Can I start again? Yes. So keep moving. Is your boat still floating? Yes. Then keep paddling.”

All that paddling has gotten Thompson to calmer waters, where he’s settled into his new wake and can finally take a moment to look at the storm clouds that he’s passed through finally drift off into the horizon behind him. 

He converses with his customers, lightly chiding them about where they’re from and what they plan on experiencing in Nederland, being sure to point them in the direction they didn’t even know they should have been going all along. He hands out “authentic imitation” bear claw necklaces to kids, creating memories of the mountains by staying true to the local culture. 

“That’s why I do this,” Thompson said, soaking up the view of his full store, remembering how it felt when he finally reopened and his space was full of people again. “When I finally had this set up and I sat behind here, I was like, ‘Wow, that’s why I did all this,’ because this is where I belong. This is my spot.”