Nate Barton is incredibly serious about being nonserious.
When the 27-year-old rock climber first started sewing chalk bags during the pandemic, he decided to promote them in an unexpected way: on his existing Instagram page dedicated to climbing memes. The account — Beta Sprayer Climbing — was decidedly absurd. But Barton’s commitment to selling the bags on there? No joke.
“I don’t know how to do marketing,” Barton said. “But I can sort of make jokes on the internet and people like funny stuff. So they’ll come to my page and then I’ll just, you know, sell them chalk bags.”
That’s how, in 2021, the Missoula-based outdoor apparel shop Lolo Hardware got its start — with a couple of people making hand-sewn chalk bags and a parody Instagram account. He and his friends sewed the chalk bags in a small garage. But then:
“I realized you can’t have a viable business just sewing chalk bags,” Barton said. “It doesn’t make sense if you want to maybe, like, own property someday.”
So Barton partnered with local gear designer Carson Wilde. Now, nearly five years later, the business has grown, recently moving into a Hip Strip storefront with a branded line of beanies, T-shirts, hoodies and fleeces — and its own Lolo Hardware Instagram account.
A Missoula-based apparel company that sounds like a place you get a power drill in the Bitterroot Valley? Here’s how that happened.
Originally from Colorado, Barton started rock climbing in the University of Montana’s climbing gym while studying wildlife biology. But he really fell in love with sport climbing in a 16,000-acre swath of the Lolo National Forest near Lolo Pass. Lolo is a town in the Bitterroot Valley. But this climbing spot, covered in granite domes — what the company’s website calls “some of the best worst rock climbing you’ll ever encounter” — is what “Lolo” means to Barton and his friends.
It’s a wild sort of climbing area, with mostly difficult and intense routes, awkward slabs and confusing trails. The rocks are often covered with plants and lichen and the weather can go sideways fast.
“We have access to this stuff you can’t manufacture. I’m just documenting what we do all the time.”
For Barton, these rocks became home, so naming his outdoor apparel line after Lolo made sense. The “hardware” part is more tongue-in-cheek. The company tagline is “We don’t make hardware” — a nod to the fact that many major outdoor apparel brands start out selling metal climbing gear such as carabiners and belay devices before switching to clothing when they realize it will make more money. Barton thought it’d be an especially funny name because he knew his company would never make or sell any hardware. Ever. And it helped that the domain name lolohardware.com was a fraction of the price of the still-for-sale lolo.com.
Most of Lolo Hardware’s items are sewn in the store, including their line of “produce” beanies styled after carrots and tomatoes, eggplants and blueberries. Other items pay homage to “Lolo” itself, like the “lichen cap” whose green and purple patterned print was inspired by the lichen found on the rocks. Local climber Cy McIntosh helped design the cap and receives a portion of the proceeds. Lolo Hardware athletes — people who wear the apparel to represent the brand — include McIntosh and 73-year-old Kurt Krueger, a rebel mountain bike trail-builder who’s been climbing all over the world since the 1970s.
The fleeces and hoodies are designed with climbing in mind but are, like so much outdoor gear, suited for general outdoor use. Some of the T-shirts feature simple, cheeky phrases like “I like rocks” and “No one cares you climb.”
Lolo Hardware moved into the 829 South Higgins storefront — where Wave and Circuit used to be — in March. You can’t find the location or hours on Google Maps. Instead, Google directs you to Lolo Hardware — an actual hardware store out in the actual town of Lolo. (Barton says people mistakenly head there frequently. He finds that kind of funny.)
Usually, Barton opens the shop when people message them directly through Instagram asking to see what’s in stock, or when some of his employees are already on-site sewing.
Once inside, there’s no veneer of sleekness. Their business license is duct-taped to the ceiling. A chalkboard is covered in writing and sketches. Climbing magazines litter the floor. Dried flowers hang from the lights.
Until recently, there was no bathroom in the shop, and the random items in the back storage rooms include a mountain bike and a mattress. Occasionally, Barton turns the shop into a space for live music, with local alternative bands like Look Busy and Renters playing to a small audience slurping drinks.
“I’m never not working in my head. That’s annoying. But also I kind of like it.”
Events like these are promoted on Lolo Hardware’s Instagram, a mishmash of climbing photos, joke videos and product shots. There are no hired apparel models or major climbing celebs. There’s no special media team with marketing degrees creating the content. Barton and his friends are the face and voice of the brand, and the company responds to almost every comment.
Many of the posts are of young people climbing routes with chalk-dusted hands or smoking cigarettes on peaks. Some are what they call “condition reports,” which are clips of the landscape where they climb — no climbers, no apparel, nothing overtly promotional, just short videos fixed on a flowing stream or snow falling on pine trees (and the occasional dog). There’s no audio beyond the sound of water, wind or rain hitting rock.
“We have access to this stuff you can’t manufacture,” Barton said. “I’m just documenting what we do all the time.”
The shop’s website also deviates from the typical online storefront. Beyond the actual merch page, there’s lore and literature — pages on things like the mysterious “Lolo Man,” the company’s Bigfoot-like creature (complete with a drawing), and the company’s manifesto, which was transcribed from a napkin.
Their manifesto is a work in progress and hasn’t been updated in months, but it explains why Lolo Hardware makes things the way they do. Its first bullet: “Designed with intent.”
For Barton, this intent is in home sewing 90 percent of the items, in spending more time climbing outdoors than in the shop, in designing clothing inspired by Lolo’s granite domes.
Barton says the shop is finding its footing, but slowly. He says the move to Higgins was a little premature from a financial standpoint, but not wanting to pass up the opportunity, he picked up a second job at Tagliare Delicatessen to cover the gap.
“It’s a challenge, not being able to relax, personally,” Barton said. “I’m never not working in my head. That’s annoying. But also I kind of like it.”
It’s a fine line Lolo Hardware has found itself walking, between building a credible, lasting brand and staying true to its (weird) self. And it means Barton walks that line, too — being a goofball who climbs three days a week but also a serious business owner.
He’s OK with that. For now, it allows him to do things he loves, like spending June on a sailboat, even if it means hustling at two jobs when he gets back into town — all in service of why he started the shop in the first place: to sew cool items that you wear when you climb in cool places.
