Why I Offer A Retainer - and Why it Matters

The Short Version

My retainer program does two big things: It lets me make a sustainable living as a career guide, and it gives you more flexibility and value out of your time in the mountains.

It’s not an extra fee tacked on for nothing. It’s a simple, transparent way to cover the real work I do that goes into a great trip — the stuff you don’t always see.

Why This Exists

Guiding is an incredible profession, but it’s also a tough one to sustain in the U.S. system.

Every guide working on public land has to operate under a permitted company. When you book through one of those outfits, you pay them, and they pay me for my time in the field. That’s fair as far as it goes — but it doesn’t account for everything else that makes your trip work well.

Before you and I tie in or click in, there’s a ton of behind-the-scenes work: checking weather, tracking conditions, building logistics, reviewing gear, coordinating access, and all the other little pieces that make a climb or ski day safe and successful. After the fact I can also add value with debrief of the experience, continued consultation and editing and sharing of photos.

The retainer is what covers all that "extra". It lets me keep doing this professionally and give you the kind of preparation and attention I think every client deserves. (for a variety of reasons, adding extra charge(s) -and, thereby, compensation to me- to what you pay the permitted company is undesirable to downright impossible).

What You’re Paying For

Here’s the breakdown, simple and clear:

The guide-service fee covers your field days — the time we’re actually out climbing, skiing, or moving through terrain together.
The retainer covers all the planning, prep, and follow-up that surrounds those days.

That means the emails, route planning, condition checks, travel time, photo sharing, post-trip advice — the full spectrum of guiding work that happens off the mountain.

How It Works in Practice

The most common use is for multi-day visits to the Tetons or similar trips elsewhere.

Say you’re coming for five days in winter. Maybe we’ll plan to ski together three or four of them, depending on your other scheduling constraints, weather, avalanche conditions, and how your legs are holding up. The retainer holds those five days on my calendar without us locking into exact dates or objectives ahead of time. Many like to come to a ski mountaineering trip with the option to ski big stuff when it is awesome but then ski at the resort or hang with family or log in to work when it is not conducive to the big objectives.

That flexibility matters. We can move rest days, shift to different venues, or chase better snow — all without rebooking or renegotiating.

The same idea applies in summer. You might hire me for a week that includes one three-day alpine objective, with a few buffer days for conditions. The retainer lets us build in that margin.

Another example: some clients keep a running retainer during a key season. Maybe they want to ski something condition-dependent, like the Apocalypse Couloir here in the Tetons. They’ll hold every Thursday in February and March, and when it lines up, we go. If it doesn’t, we pivot (each individually, or together) to something else worthwhile.

That’s what the retainer buys: time reserved, with asymmetric commitment; I'm committed to you, while you have more options than other booking styles.

What You Get Out of It

It’s not just flexibility. There are real qualitative benefits too:

You know who you’re getting. When you book through a guide service, you can request me — but you might end up with someone else. Sometimes that’s fine; sometimes it’s not. With a retainer, you’re booking me, period. Decades of experience, full international certification, and a long-term commitment to guiding as a craft.

Better prep and follow-through. I take the time to help you prepare — gear lists, training ideas, route options, timing strategy.Afterward, I send photos, debriefs, and advice for your next steps. Most guide-service bookings don’t include that level of continuity. This one does.

What It Costs — and Why It’s Worth It

Retainer cost alone starts at $250 a day. (Starts there, and usually stays there. Retainer days that involve being away from home with no option for paid field time together will be billed at a higher rate. Like travel days.) That is in addition to the fee charged by a guide service that will employ me for the field portion of your trip ($400 and up). Yes, it costs more than booking through a guide service. And I'll reiterate that the primary benefit is to my family’s bottom line. Very, very few guides make it in this business. I've made it and that is entirely thanks to the support and generosity of clients. When you pay “market rates” for mountain guiding, that guide is not making a livable wage. My long-term clients that "predate" this retainer system, when I have introduced the idea to them, have been very supportive and more than willing to pay the extra amount.

But you get more too:

More flexibility in timing and terrain
More preparation and follow-up
More personal connection
A guarantee that you’re working with an experienced professional

Warbonnet, Sawtooths, ID. September 2025.

It’s Not Required

You don’t have to pay a retainer to work with me. Some clients still hire/request me directly through guide services.

But when the trip requires flexibility, customization, or deeper involvement, the retainer is what makes it possible.

And because it gives me some financial stability, I can also be flexible in return. If there’s a trip I really want to do, or if cost is a barrier for you, I can occasionally reduce or waive the retainer. It’s a tool, not a wall.

What It Doesn’t Guarantee

This part’s important: A retainer doesn’t buy good weather, stable snow, or a guaranteed summit. The mountains don’t care what we pay for them.

What it does buy is commitment — from me. It means I’ll do everything I can to set us up for success, adapt intelligently, and make the best possible use of the conditions we get.

Why I Believe in It

I’ve been guiding for almost three decades now, and I want to keep doing it well into the next one.

The retainer is how I do that — ethically, sustainably. It lets me:

Prepare thoroughly
Build longer-term client relationships
Keep my attention where it belongs: on the craft and the experience

In the end, it’s not just a payment structure. It’s part of the way I approach guiding — as a collaboration built on trust, preparation, and care.

Final Thoughts

You can always try and book me for a standard day through a guide service, and that’s a perfectly good way to go. But if you want to build something more flexible, more personalized, and more connected — if you want the kind of guiding relationship that lasts beyond a single trip — the retainer is how we do that.

It’s what allows me to guide with integrity and focus, season after season.

“The retainer turns a one-off trip into a partnership — built on flexibility, preparation, and trust.”