NEDERLAND - Two weeks ago, The Mountain-Ear reported on the sudden changes to the state of commerce in the Town of Nederland, focusing on the Caribou Village Shopping Center. This week the conversation continues with a focus on the area surrounding the Visitors Center and an update regarding what the Town is doing to support local businesses.

To be fully up-to-date on this series, read “The State of Commerce: Caribou Village Shopping Center” here: https://www.themtnear.com/stories/the-state-of-commerce-caribou-village-shopping-center,51568 

There is always a mixture of sounds and smells surrounding the Visitors Center parking lot. Motorcycles can be heard loudly accelerating as they leave the Smoker Friendly, but that chaos cannot outshine the smell of garlic coming from Kathmandu.

A walk in the other direction reveals the smell of bacon and coffee surrounding Town Hall, accompanied by the sound of a familiar local strumming on his guitar. 

The parking lot gets full quickly, with its EV chargers becoming occupied as soon as the sun rises. Tourists and locals alike park in the lot and all along North Jefferson Street all day long, sometimes for a quick run into Peak Wine and Spirits, or to pick up dog food at Nederland Feed and Pet, or to pay a bill at Town Hall.  

But often people park for hours while wandering elsewhere into town, as both the parking lot and North Jefferson Street provide some of the most convenient parking close to “downtown,” which is mostly considered to be East 1st Street.  

“I think one of the factors of being so busy is the location, and I think the paid parking on 1st Street has forced more people to park over here and at the RTD lot,” Skyler Scott, Interim Manager at New Moon Bakery and Cafe told The Mountain-Ear. “It’s free and people don’t mind walking over.”

New Moon is one of the main attractions in the area, as it draws in curious visitors just cooling down to 25 miles per hour after the canyon, and who are looking to stretch their legs. It also serves a large number of dedicated locals.     

“Usually on weekdays we have our regulars, and we already know what they want most of the time,” Scott said, taking a ten minute break out on New Moon’s patio, “but 11 to 1 has been busy lately.” He kept looking over to the entrance as customer after customer kept pouring in. It was nearly 2 p.m. on a Tuesday. 

“On weekend days there's always a line out the door, especially for the last month. We’ve been getting through the weekends all right, then Mondays come around and we’re completely wiped out of everything. I’ve had to go to [The Market] for emergency milk multiple times this summer.”

Scott noted that, despite recent shifts in the management dynamics at New Moon and some minor difficulties with staffing—regarding availability—the hardworking crew at the bakery has so far successfully tackled a busy summer season.

While New Moon’s patio was bustling, most of the other surrounding businesses were closed on Tuesday, except for nearby restaurants Kathmandu and Mountain Peak Cafe, each of which had a customer or two on that Tuesday afternoon. 

However, just that previous Sunday, the town’s newest diner, Mountain Peak Cafe, was so busy for breakfast there were people gathered around the front door waiting for a table. 

During a rare lull, the staff there briefly conversed about their impressions of summer business, though they could not offer any revenue numbers for comparison, since this is the Cafe’s first summer in business.  

The consensus from the staff was that tourists were definitely their primary customers, and that inflation was the biggest factor affecting the cafe’s local business, which most restaurants in Nederland rely on to stay afloat throughout the whole year. 

Though the restaurants surrounding the Visitors Center area have reported being busy, notably with a high concentration of tourists, there are other businesses nearby that are experiencing the opposite. 

Chasity Lamb, Manager at Smoker Friendly, stated that she had noticed a drop in tourism business, and that summer traffic was dwindling earlier than usual. The Smoker Friendly, one of Nederland’s two gas stations, sees a heavy concentration of visitors to the area, and helps to drive tourist traffic throughout town. 

Just across the street at another local institution that runs on tourism, the Nederland Mining Museum, the dedicated Boulder County crew and area volunteers just recently celebrated their busiest weekend of the year, right at the beginning of August, with just over 300 visitors. 

Donal Maloney spoke with The Mountain-Ear on a Sunday, just as strombolis from The Deli were being delivered. Though a tour group was there, with some of the group gleefully ringing the historic signal bell, Maloney remarked that the museum’s attendance numbers seemed low.  

“We’re not getting those consistent days with numbers of 100 or more people. We’re getting close, with 80 or 90 people some days, but my impression of July is that it wasn't as busy as previous years.” 

Maloney explained how July is typically their busiest month and that attendance usually drops around the start of the new school year, before experiencing a resurgence in business around Labor Day and during leaf peeping season. 

“I thought we would see a pretty significant decline in foreign visitors, but I’m not seeing that,” Maloney said while flipping through a log book, pointing out the visitors to the museum from Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, and Peru.

Back on North Jefferson Street at Boogie Records, owner Ryan Blackwell spoke with The Mountain-Ear right before closing time on a Saturday. Blackwell discussed how national politics was currently affecting the economy and how the long term implications will affect small businesses for many years to come. 

“Obviously the political environment we’re living in is unsteady and uncertain,” Blackwell said. “With all the layoffs, the tariffs, the inflation, the economy definitely doesn’t feel stable and I think people are being cautious with their money, and I’m beginning to see it in my sales.”

Blackwell shared that his sales numbers for the summer are down 9% from last year, with his year-to-date numbers having plateaued. For a business like Boogie Records, sales from summer tourism help to ease the strain of the slower winter months.

“It can be very challenging running a business here in this small town, and I’m thankful that I’ve been profitable since day one, but winter months are rough,” Blackwell admitted.

He added that if economic trends point to harder times ahead resulting in less tourism income, as well as fewer local dollars being spent on luxury retail items like records and CDs, he may have to consider drastic alternatives, from moving his store to a bigger market, or moving entirely online. 

“The amount of time it will take to rebound from all this…it’s decades. It’s potentially a generation,” Blackwell said about the state of the national economy. “It’s just starting, but I feel like we’re in for a real bumpy ride.”

Since such purveyors of luxury items rely so heavily on tourism, the question lingers as to what the Town of Nederland, its government and officials, can prioritize in order to give local businesses the support they need, so they in turn can help to reinvigorate the local economy. 

“Support anything that brings more people up here,” Blackwell continued. “Focus on tourism, hiking, festivals, and affordable housing. We need more people to move up here. This town needs an injection and it’s hard to do with the state the economy is in.”

Right next door to Boogie Records is Inkhaus Tattoo Studio, owned and operated by Everett Nielsen, who on that Saturday evening was just finishing up an impressive tattoo inspired by the movie “They Live.”

Nielsen, who also works for the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT), had also been a volunteer member of one of the Town of Nederland’s most prominent—and sometimes controversial—advisory groups, the Nederland Downtown Development Authority (NDDA), which focuses primarily on invigorating the downtown sector through infrastructure projects and event promotion. 

“There’s a lot of really good energy on the NDDA, and there are people who really care and want to do better,” Nielsen said, “but I feel like there’s a lot of wheel spinning. There’s some conflict of interest there, and I think they’d benefit from a core group of about five who are really committed, who can draw on others for specific matters, for what they excel at.” 

Nielsen is one of two members to have recently resigned from the Authority, though he stated that his main reason for leaving resulted from not having the time on top of his other commitments.

He did state, however, that dealing with detractors from the community remains a major deterrent from wanting to serve. 

“I love my community, and I don’t always agree with what’s going on, but I do understand that it’s not always going to be about what I want; that it’s got to be for the betterment of the whole community. I feel for those who volunteer and put their effort into it and all they get is blowback.” 

As for the Town’s other efforts in bringing economic stability to Nederland, Nielsen compared the potential Eldora acquisition with the same form of asset management that CDOT applies to prioritizing specific “tiered roads,” like Boulder Canyon Drive, during a snow storm. 

“Right now Jonathan is focusing on finding an alternative revenue stream,” Nielsen said, referring to Town Manager Jonathan Cain, “and it needs to be large because we’re behind on bringing everything up to code, making the roads passable, having functional infrastructure.

“It’s a big gamble, it’s a big risk, but if the payoff works the Town isn’t going to have these money issues and we can fix all these things that need to be fixed.”

Cain spoke with The Mountain-Ear about the state of commerce in Nederland, in particular about the Town’s efforts to align with the NDDA, about how this alignment and other future endeavors will support local businesses, and how the Visitors Center itself is faring in 2025. 

The Visitors Center operated at a loss of $41,000 in 2024, as well as experiencing staffing problems. During a budget discussion last November, the Board of Trustees (BOT) discussed the possibility of shuttering the building, which would save the Town $44,600.

However, the consensus among the Board was to research other options to avoid shutting the business down. 

One such suggestion included reaching out to the NDDA about the possibility of sharing in the operation and management of the Nederland Visitors Center, which would require funding from the Authority’s special events budget. 

The matter was briefly discussed with the NDDA back in April of this year, but has not been revisited since. 

“Last year wasn’t great. We did have some gaps, and this year we are down more than I anticipated, too,” Cain said about the Visitors Center, detailing how there have been several days over the summer when the center saw upwards of 200 people come through. They have not suffered any major staffing issues this year, remaining open for their peak hours Thursday through Monday. 

“One of the things I’d really love for the Visitors Center to be is a showcase of Nederland art and culture,” Cain continued. “It really should be the starting point to your Nederland adventure.”

As for how local businesses can be supported in order to truly give those visiting Nederland an enjoyable adventure, Cain explained the steps being taken to bring new opportunities for economic stability and growth. 

“Now that we have a [Comprehensive] Plan and we’ve been doing all these planning efforts, we want decisions to flow through the BOT,” Cain said. “Not necessarily dictated by the board, but really just worked through that process.”

Since the beginning of the year the NDDA, as well other advisory boards, have been working on updating their bylaws and forming a Memorandum of Understanding with the Town, in order to legitimize and strengthen the Town’s democratic process for major projects and financial decisions. 

Cain stated that the other boards aligning with the BOT ensures full disclosure and transparency, and that an auditing of a lot of the Town’s administrative processes is required to dramatically improve the Town’s ability to provide services.

Additionally, Cain wants Nederland to focus on the Eldora acquisition as not just an economic opportunity, but also as a chance to truly bolster and promote Nederland’s culture and identity. 

“One thing we can do to support that is to really think through our economic strategy and have conversations about what kind of places do people need to thrive,” Cain said. “And also have conversations about wayfinding because people need to know what to do when they come here—they need a path, kind of like a choose-your-own-adventure.”

Please follow The Mountain-Ear for continued updates on the state of commerce in Nederland, including a focus on East 1st Street and a review of the implications of the Downtown Subarea Plan.