Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Erin Crider. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Erin, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?
Meet Erin, Erin has a fiery passion to break down barriers in the outdoors for women and other “unliklies” such as people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. She aims to create the much needed gateway to the outdoors that conservation truly needs. “It takes a team!” She could not do it without the Dream Team of women Uncharted Outdoorswomen employees in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, and Oregon. She fearlessly leads the way as the first woman owned outfitter in North America employing all female hunting, fishing, and hiking guides in multiple states. Armed with her business sense from her former career as a private wealth advisor, Uncharted Outdoorswomen does more than create opportunities for folks to learn outdoors skills and conservation concepts, but also empowers the female guides to have a career in the outdoors. She prides herself on paying the Uncharted guides more than any other outfitter by empowering them to know their worth, set their own prices, and create events they feel their community craves. This has created a movement in the outdoor industry that business owners must pay women more or Erin will hire them and their guide service loses out on the fastest growing demographic in the outdoors, women. “If you want to have a cash flush business, hire and empower an inclusive female guide.”
Erin learned to fly fish after moving to Colorado from Missouri in 2014 with her husband, who, by the way, does not enjoy hunting or fishing. It was nearly impossible to find other women that fly fished and would let her tag along. She joined a women’s club, but the “club” aspect was just was not her vibe. This is also why Uncharted’s membership is free. She craved education, so she looked around and found a group “Colorado Women on the Fly” that was inactive on Facebook. Reviving the group, she soon traveled the state fishing with others. Then she took an interest in hunting birds, which was very intimidating because there was not a waterfowl guide service that would take her hunting. Go ahead… assume gender discrimination… she did. She became an adult onset hunter, on public land, and harvested her first duck in 2019 in Wyoming.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Meet Erin, Erin has a fiery passion to break down barriers in the outdoors for women and other “unliklies” such as people of color and the LGBTQ+ community. She aims to create the much needed gateway to the outdoors that conservation truly needs. “It takes a team!” She could not do it without the Dream Team of women Uncharted Outdoorswomen employees in Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, and Oregon. She fearlessly leads the way as the first woman owned outfitter in North America employing all female hunting, fishing, and hiking guides in multiple states. Armed with her business sense from her former career as a private wealth advisor, Uncharted Outdoorswomen does more than create opportunities for folks to learn outdoors skills and conservation concepts, but also empowers the female guides to have a career in the outdoors. She prides herself on paying the Uncharted guides more than any other outfitter by empowering them to know their worth, set their own prices, and create events they feel their community craves. This has created a movement in the outdoor industry that business owners must pay women more or Erin will hire them and their guide service loses out on the fastest growing demographic in the outdoors, women. “If you want to have a cash flush business, hire and empower an inclusive female guide.”
Grandma put a rod in her hand at a very young age and they reeled in crappie, bass, and catfish together. “This is the proof in the pudding that adult women teach their kids, especially daughters and granddaughters, how to recreate outdoors.” One of her talking points for why it is so important to include women in the outdoors. However; youth programs seem to be overwhelmingly popular, even though parents and grandparents are responsible for driving, buying gear, carving out time, and keeping the youth involved with little to no opportunity to learn themselves. “Creating an outdoor addiction for parents and family members is how to get youth involved.”
Keep in mind that many women were not invited to join family hunts and fishing adventures in the past. Shoot, women were only recently allowed to have a bank account in 1960 and credit in 1974 thanks to the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (gender specific). The discrimination lingers into the outdoor world and more gentlemen are needed to help pave the way. Don’t get her started on race. Or do… Or ask Anh Thai, professional fly tyer, who is partially responsible for the expansion of Uncharted Outdoorswomen to employ guides around the West. Erin Crider has been named as an advocate and an ally for people of color and the LGBTQ+ community who also battle the barriers to the outdoors.
Erin learned to fly fish after moving to Colorado from Missouri in 2014 with her husband, who, by the way, does not enjoy hunting or fishing. It was nearly impossible to find other women that fly fished and would let her tag along. She joined a women’s club, but the “club” aspect was just was not her vibe. This is also why Uncharted’s membership is free. She craved education, so she looked around and found a group “Colorado Women on the Fly” that was inactive on Facebook. Reviving the group, she soon traveled the state fishing with others. Then she took an interest in hunting birds, which was very intimidating because there was not a waterfowl guide service that would take her hunting. Go ahead… assume gender discrimination… she did. She became an adult onset hunter, on public land, and harvested her first duck in 2019 in Wyoming.
Thanks to the boys club that is/was waterfowl hunting in Colorado… She is now the only female waterfowl guide in the Rocky Mountains, but hopeful to find or create more inclusive waterfowl guides for “unliklies” such as women, people of color, the non-religious, and the LGBTQ+ communities. She opened her trips in July and they filled days later, so there is something to be said for creating space! Erin also hunts pheasants, chukar, turkey, big game, medicinal/edible plants and mushrooms and has ZERO ego about any of it. “Getting outside is about your mental health and filling your freezer… or not.” She also employs a vegetarian who teaches archery and wilderness survival. The Uncharted Team teaches many vegetarians how to use bows and firearms to harvest their first wild game.
She has enjoyed fly fishing in different fundraisers such as the Denver Trout Unlimited Carp Slam where she has never caught a carp (Carpless Crider) but is a fundraiser for the Denver South Platte, which is essential to the farmers and ranchers out East. Her bachelors degree is in animal science specific to sustainable beef and dairy production. The folks out on the Eastern plains, and the habitat in Eastern Colorado, are very important to her. She has also enjoyed competing in the “25 on the Fly” for the benefit of the Mayfly Project and the ”8 River Rodeo“ benefiting Project Healing Waters and Colorado Trout Unlimited. She served in a volunteer capacity in multiple positions on the Colorado TU board.
She loves to get outside, learn new skills, protect the environment, and empower others. She is a punchy feminist with a mission. She is hiring and she hates plastic.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
When the current fly shops and guide services didn’t want to partner with me to create women’s events. I created an outfitter myself. I was told it was hard to do, but it wasn’t. The permits however; can be a different story. We want to use public land but can’t fill the required 180 days. Some of the adminstrators in the National Forest and BLM offices understand what we are doing and grant us a permit. Others wave me away like flies from a chilled drink. But I keep pushing on and re-apply every year with a bigger team and more events to get closer to those 180 days.
How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?
When a local fly shop wouldn’t hire Anh Thai because she spoke broken English. I looked into how expensive it was to have employees and create a safe space for them as well. Now I have almost 30 girl bosses that have experienced discrimination in the work force and they are happy to be here and empowered to share their passion project and skills!
Contact Info:
- Website: UnchartedOutdoorswomen.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/uncharted_outdoorswomen/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/UnchartedOutdoorswomen/