APP BLAZES TRAIL TO THE OUTDOORS
CEO shares how the pandemic fueled the company's growth and what the future might hold
If you like to hike, chances are good that you know AllTrails. More than 60 million hikers use the San Franciscobased hiking app, which offers 400,000 curated trail guides to locations around the world. With more than a billion miles of trails logged, the platform was named Apple's iPhone app of the year in 2023.
The app provides trail reviews and user-generated hiking tips for nature lovers in every country in the world, but it also offers some insights into its users — how much we're getting outdoors these days, for example, and which trails we love most. (Bay Area hikers are all about the Mission Peak Loop, followed by Land's End and Steep Ravine.)
We recently met up with AllTrails CEO Ron Schneidermann near his Alamo home — for a hike, of course — at Las Trampas Regional Wilderness to talk about the company, app features in the works and how his team is working to help more people than ever connect with nature.
Q What was your path to AllTrails?
A I grew up here in Walnut Creek. My dad is a geologist, and he dragged me and my sister around Mount Diablo and local, state and national parks, where we would go check out rock formations. As a kid, I hated it. I just wanted to go to the beach or Disneyland, but I think that's where the seed got planted. Fast-forward quite a bit: I had a startup in the ski space for nine years called Liftopia. The original founder (of AllTrails) had been at it for about five years and wanted to go do something else, so he hit me up to see if I wanted to come and run it. I was working at Yelp at the time and couldn't say no. I started as chief marketing officer and chief operating officer (in 2015) and then in 2019 became CEO. I've been doing that ever since.
Q Skiing, hiking — being outdoors is clearly a passion for you …
A Connection to nature is a human thing. For different reasons, we've lost connection to that, but I think there's a reawakening. This matches the data we've seen going back to 2010 that more and more people are recognizing the importance of nature in their lives and are very proactively and intentionally trying to spend more time outside. That's really what we're all about: trying to get as many people as possible to spend more time outside.
When I first started, we pivoted to focus on inclusivity and accessibility and move away from anything that might make people feel that the outside isn't for
“Connection to nature is a human thing. For different reasons, we've lost connection to that, but I think there's a reawakening.”
— Ron Schneidermann, AllTrails CEO
them. Our root philosophy is that the reason people don't spend time outside is a lack of information and a lack of confidence — and we think we can use technology to instill both.
Q What are some of the challenges and responsibilities that come that? How do you help people manage risks outdoors?
A We take our responsibility very seriously. We are sending people off the pavement and sometimes off the grid. We have to get it right. That starts with the way that we create and curate our trail content and add usergenerated content. The thing about trails is that they change all the time. We create feedback loops and mechanisms so that as soon as we get a signal that maybe the trailhead has moved or there's a closure, we can communicate that. We've got this beautiful, symbiotic relationship with the community. They're going out and taking the time to leave reviews for other future trail-goers.
Q How did the pandemic affect AllTrails?
A At the start, everything stopped. No one was using our platform or going outside. We bet that at some point, there needed to be a release valve. There's no way that people can stay inside for months with this level of stress and anxiety. There's nothing that's more pandemic-appropriate than time outside, so even before things started opening up, we decided we were going to get in front of this.
I don't think it's a secret that we were one of the lucky companies during COVID. We saw tripledigit growth. But what really transformed our company was hiring amazing tech talent. During the pandemic, everyone was at home having these existential crises, asking things like, “Am I happy with where I'm spending my time and my energy? Am I working on things I even want my kids to use?” We began getting applications from people with a level of talent we would never have been able to reach pre-pandemic.
People spent more time outside in 2023 than they did in 2022. I think that's because of the pandemic, when people were trading their commutes for a morning or evening hike — once you've rediscovered the joy of coming outside, it's got staying power.
Q Tell us about your company culture.
A We're about 90% (from) outside of the Bay. We went remote first from a hiring perspective, plus a ton of people in the Bay also left — as you can imagine, they went to every cool mountain town you can think of.
The first Friday of every month is trail day. We close the office and encourage everyone to go outside and get some time on the trail. That's a core part of our culture, and I think it's unlocked some of our best ideas.
Q What's your process for adding new trails to the app?
A We now have trails in every country in the world. We crossed that threshold last year — the last two countries were Sudan and North Korea. We're truly a global platform that's mapping the globe.
Our data integrity team does not just trail creation but curation. We have our own set of proprietary tools and processes. There's machine learning, clustering algorithms, and we're leaning on AI a little bit more, but it's all still through this lens of human curation.
One thing we added to our toolkit is a partnership with public land managers all over North America. The partnership will give land managers the ability to issue alerts for community members as well. We're also building out more safety tools to help with search and rescue. Obviously, our goal is to give people information upfront, so that they pick the right trail for them and don't get lost. But once they're out there, the question is, what kind of tools can we give them so that if something were to arise, they stay safe and can get home and communicate with loved ones? We have a new feature coming out this month where you can share your live location on the trail.
Q Is climate change impacting trails?
A The climate change question is daunting. We're 1% for the Planet Partners, and we donate 1% of our revenue to environmental nonprofits. We focus our energy through the lens of connection to nature. People don't care about things that aren't personal to them. If you just think the outdoors are buggy, muddy, scary or dirty, then you're not going to care when a developer comes in or an area burns down. Our focus is on that connection, getting people outside and getting them to care about nature. From that, wonderful downstream things can happen, but it has to start with caring about the outdoors.