Guidebooks To More Than Terrain
Sure, they get you where you want to go, but they can also encourage exploration, skill development, cultural understanding, and the conservation of wild places.
Inspiring Adventure through Education & Quality Information
Core Values – Thrive
Our guidebooks are about more than just the classic routes. They celebrate each area’s history and the individuals and cultures that have shaped it. Along the way, we’ll lead you to seldom-traveled places you never knew existed.
Meticulously produced text, photos, maps, and charts get you where you want to go, quickly and easily. We fact-check exhaustively, so you can focus on your adventure.
Core Value – Connect
Strengthening Community
Each area covered by a Wolverine guidebook has people who care about it. They play and adventure here, commune with nature here, challenge themselves and meet people here. They are the area’s stewards and champions. Wolverine books connect and support these communities through direct involvement, visitor education, and donations to local advocacy organizations.
Non-profit Organizations
Many of the mountains, rocks, and rivers in Wolverine books have local advocacy organizations that help protect them. Other organizations work on a more national scale to provide a voice to climbers, skiers, paddlers, and trail users who depend on these public and private lands. It’s part of Wolverine’s mission to consult with these non-profits and support them financially.
Authors
We are proud to know the 50-odd authors who are at the heart of Wolverine’s books. Their local knowledge and passion for their areas is a constant inspiration to make each book the very best it can be.
Editors
Guidebooks - especially climbing guidebooks - have an absurd number of facts. Authors know these areas - but sometimes too well! Our editors are not only sharp-eyed with the p’s and q’s and dots on the i’s, they are the book’s first focus group. Do these directions make sense to someone who’s never been here? What’s a good first day if I paddle Class 3 or climb 5.10c? Is this “new” crag really the best in the West? Editors keep it real.
Design & Marketing
Wolverine’s design team brings it all together. A well-designed guidebook organizes the wilds, brings clarity to the opportunities, helps organize your trip, and gives you the confidence to explore. It also inspires you to stretch your comfort zone. We also keep abreast of what’s new and cool in publishing.
Jeff & Amber
Wolverine’s owners have almost a century’s worth of combined experience in the outdoors, encompassing climbing, paddling, skiing, trail running, mountain biking, guiding, outdoor journalism, and outdoor education. They love this stuff. It’s their life. Oh, and they love books.
Respecting the Environment through Awareness
Core Values - Protect
The places we describe in our guidebooks are precious and delicate. We leave an impact, and we take it seriously. We hope the knowledge you gain by using a Wolverine book will help protect these wild areas. If they are gone, we are gone.
We produce our books to last a lifetime. We hope you keep them, write in them, use them as journals, mementos, planners for next time. We hope they never see the recycle bin. When we ship books, we pick materials with thought to the planet. We donate to local organizations dedicated to the areas. We have an impact, a mix of good and bad, and that balance is always in our minds.
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Our books have high production-value with glued and sewn bindings, designed to last a lifetime of abuse.
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When you're done, please gift, resell, or recycle / compost at your local facility.
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We use a variety of shipping materials, and do our very best to choose sustainable options. These can be reused, fully or partially recycled, and compostable or recyclable. The options are always changing and we keep a sharp eye out for the best materials!
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Purchases of most of our guidebooks include a donation to the local advocacy organization. We also support fundraising efforts through donations for raffles and prizes.
Wolverine History
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![Wolverine founder Dave Pegg at the bottom of a cliff with Jeff Achey]()
2001
Dave Pegg, founder of Wolverine, leaves his editor position at Climbing Magazine. While Dave and wife Fiona are building a house in the local hills they spot a wolverine, extremely rare in Colorado and an omen. The next year Wolverine Publishing is born with the publication of the local rock-climbing guide, Western Sloper, which was a great excuse to catalog all the new routes Dave and friends have been doing!
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![Guidebook covers of Bishop Bouldering and Hueco Tanks]()
2004 - 2007
Wolverine goes national! Guidebooks to two world bouldering Meccas, Hueco Tanks, TX, and Bishop, CA; as well as a climber’s guide to Kentucky’s Red River Gorge, soon to become America’s most popular crag. Dave and team create Wolverine’s signature style — full color cliff base beta photos, and magazine quality action photography.
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![Guidebooks covers of Joshua Tree and Whitewater of the Southern Rockies]()
2007 - 2011
Wolverine expands into whitewater paddling, backcountry skiing, and takes a stab at a coffee-table book. Also, the debut of Wolverine’s extremely successful climbing and bouldering guides to Joshua Tree National Park.
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![Wolverine Publishing owners Jeff, Amber, and Fiona sit at the base of a cliff in the shade of a tree with their dog]()
2014-17
Founder Dave Pegg’s tragic death. By this time, Wolverine has published over 40 books and is an industry leader. Dave’s wife and Wolverine co-owner Fiona Lloyd takes over the business, hiring Jeff Achey, former Climbing Magazine editor-in-chief as Creative Director. He joins wife Amber Johnstone, who is already busy selling and shipping books for Wolverine. In 2017 Amber and Jeff become official owners of Wolverine Publishing, as Fiona embraces a new life as vagabond equestrian, gearing up to compete with her willful horse, Paris.
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![Wolverine Publishing's new historic warehouse in Rifle, CO sits empty before the move-in]()
2020
The Pandemic. Gyms close. National Parks and countless trailheads close. Wolverine survives and moves to a new warehouse (its 5th) in an historic building in downtown Rifle, CO.
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![Guidbook Covers of Penitente, Redwood Burl, and Sierra Trail Runs]()
2022
Nine books printed (including three reprints), a Wolverine record for one year. New guides to Sierra trail runs, the climbing of the Redwood Coast, CA, and Penitente Canyon, CO.
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![All Wolverine Guidbook covers in a mosaic pattern on an orange background]()
Today
Books published tops 70, and Wolverine continues to expand its diverse catalog of outdoor-adventure titles. We are grateful to have worked with many passionate and talented authors, designers, and believers over the years. Here’s to many more years of guidebook inspiration!
