CANNON TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WOOD) — A ski shop inside Canonsburg Ski Area northeast of Grand Rapids has closed indefinitely.
Summit Sports ran the Canonsburg shop. On Monday, it wrote on Facebook that all locations would be closing. It said the closure is due to circumstances beyond its control.
“We were obviously just completely blindsided, along with all of the Summit employees. A few days ago, we were just notified that Summit had just gone out of business and they would no longer be paying their employees and they would no longer be selling any merchandise,” Canonsburg spokesperson Danielle Musto said.
Canonsburg will be opening for the season this weekend. Musto says this has been highly anticipated after warmer winter weather put the opening on hold for several weeks.
She said guests will be without the services the shop provided until Cannonsburg can get another shop in Summit’s place.
“Not only were the employees at Summit like family to us but all of the racers and customers who come out here usually end up in Summit Sports to get their skis or their boards worked on, to buy last-minute items. They had a junior trade up program where kids would come every year, so it’s definitely a blow,” Musto added.
Summit Sports said on Facebook that the shop would remain open this week, Monday through Friday until 3 p.m., for customers to pick up gear left there to be repaired. Canonsburg says it is also working with Summit customers to get remaining gear out of the store and back to the owners.
“We’re doing everything that we can but we’re very limited. Any customer that has equipment in the shop that they dropped off to get worked on, we are going in and getting the equipment for our customers,” Musto said.
The website for Summit Sports now redirects users to a new landing page. On it, a note says that the ski shop is now a part of The House, a sporting company based in Minnesota. News 8 reached out to both Summit Sports and The House for more information regarding the closure but did not hear back. It’s unclear what will happen to online orders placed or gift cards purchased from Summit Sports.
The sport shop’s closure is happening at a time when winter sporting gear is in high demand. Sport shops credit the pandemic for increased interest in outdoor sports.
“We’re backed up a little bit. We’ve seen a big increase in demand in town here. There’s not very many of us that do this,” said Jon Holmes with Bill and Paul’s Sporthaus on East Paris Avenue SE south of Cascade Road.
Holmes says on top of repair backups at many local shops, there’s also a limited supply of new gear. He said people who still need to buy ski, snowboarding or snowshoeing gear might be better off renting this season.
“It’s high demand and low access and that’s just going to be amplified a little bit. We certainly welcome the new customers if they choose to come and shop with us,” Holmes said. “It’s not a very good thing to lose a member of our community. I mean, it’s a popular sport. It’s a great activity and so we hope that folks are going to be able to get taken care of wherever they choose to go.”
Canonsburg says it is unsure how long it will take to get another sport shop into the storefront. In the meantime, it is encouraging people to come out and enjoy the winter weather. The resort also says anyone with questions about gear left in the store should call.
“Embrace winter and come out and enjoy every minute of having snow. Our restaurant is open and we have a shipping container serving hot cocoa and we have made so much snow over this last week,” Musto said.
