Coalition Snow Closes Its Doors After 12 Years, but the Brand’s Impact Will Live On

Jennifer Gurecki fell in love with the hard goods side of the snowsports industry (skis, snowboards, boots, etc.) while working in the tune shop at Arizona Snowbowl as she attended college in nearby Flagstaff.

When she moved to the Tahoe area in 2001 and began looking for work in another shop, she was told, “Women don’t work in repair shops; they sell clothing.”

Roughly a decade later, Gurecki was still tired of waiting for the snowsports industry to get on board with the idea that women deserved more. In 2014, she launched Coalition Snow with the idea that the brand would not only make exceptional skis and boards for women but also disrupt the sexism that had long plagued the industry.

When Coalition Snow started, there were few, if any, ski brands owned and operated by women. “You can’t disrupt an industry by doing the things that you’re supposed to be doing. Women are supposed to do apparel. Women are supposed to do accessories. Women are supposed to do fashion and look cute and do all those things,” said Gurecki as we chatted on a video call in April 2026.

Since Coalition Snow started, Gurecki has done more than design skis and snowboards; she’s also worked with a variety of contributors to create apparel with phrases like ‘Dangerously Good Pussy’ and ‘Spring Ski, F*ck Ice’, she’s released a print magazine, hosted events, and has worked to make those who had felt marginalized by the ski industry’s propensity towards straight, white men feel welcome and seen.

On April 8, 2026, Gurecki announced that she was closing Coalition Snow after 12 years. In a letter posted on the brand’s Instagram page, she cited troubles that seemed to plague much of the ski industry over the last year, including tariffs, inflation, and a dismal winter.

Unsurprisingly, her decision to close the brand was far more complex, and frankly, inspiring, than any monetary or logistical issue.

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In July of 2025, Gurecki was diagnosed with type II breast cancer. She underwent surgery and an aggressive form of chemotherapy.

Prior to her diagnosis, Gurecki had moments when she asked herself whether running a ski brand was truly what she was put on Earth to do, but the hard-on-herself entrepreneur in her (Virgo sun, Scorpio rising, of course) kept pushing through when a fear of failure would arise. The final quarter of 2025 came and went, and Gurecki had worked her way through it, while undergoing chemo, and it had gone better than she’d anticipated.

Yet, as she looked in the mirror and watched her hair and eyebrows fall out and saw her own mortality stare back at her, she kept asking, ‘Do I want to keep doing this year after year after year?’ In the week between Christmas and New Year’s, as she took time to recenter herself creatively, as she does each year, she knew it was time to close Coalition Snow.

It wasn’t that Gurecki couldn’t keep the lights on at the brand, but faced with the idea that her time on Earth might be limited, she didn’t want to spend it making skis and snowboards and dealing with the trials and tribulations of manufacturing, and staying afloat in an industry that was still male-dominated.

As she made the decision in December of 2025 and slowly began telling those closest to her and the brand, the response was unwaveringly supportive. “Jen, you did your time. Go do something else. You don’t have to keep doing this,” was the common message.

“I just couldn’t imagine spending the rest of my life dealing with tariffs and low consumer confidence and inflation and climate change,” she said.

Of course, actually putting the announcement into the public was still a scary step to take, and she recalls being riddled with anxiety the whole morning before she made the post to Coalition Snow’s social media. But once she did, she felt great, and none of the fear or anxiety or doubt has returned since.

“I am celebrating what I built. I know that I did something remarkable. I know that everybody who joined me in this, we all did something remarkable together. And I think we’re going to remember all of these wonderful things we did for the rest of our lives,” she said.

Since Coalition Snow started in 2014, there has not been another woman-led hard goods ski or snowboard brand that’s come to the market; a gap that the brand will leave. Despite the path that led Gurecki to start Coalition Snow, it was never really about skis, but rather about disrupting the industry and fostering community.

Gurecki recalled an event in 2017 that was a pop-up market (before those were all the rage) in Denver, where she invited a bunch of women-owned brands to come and participate.

Coalition Snow’s creative director (and the pen behind many of their ski graphics, apparel products, and more), Andrea “Slu” Slusarski, met Boot Tan Fest (ICYMI, the all-women’s ski festival) founder Jenny Verrochi at the pop-up market.

Coalition Snow would go on to be a sponsor of the event, and one which Gurecki says she’ll continue to attend and personally support. At that same market, Slusarski and Verrochi also met Lisa Slagle, whose creative studio, Wheelie, went on to do branding work for Boot Tan Fest and Verrochi’s coffee company, Buck Wild.

As though those connections hadn’t wound enough of a web, they also met the members of indie folk band, LVDY, whom Slusarski has now designed the album art for, have played at Boot Tan Fest, and had songs featured in an all-female made ski film, Advice4Girls. If it wasn’t clear, the connections made at that one Coalition Snow market have permeated far and wide into the snowsports industry and are projects, people, and friendships that are still going strong nearly ten years later.

While Coalition Snow might be closing its doors (officially on May 31, 2026), Gurecki already has her next venture well in the works. Far Out will take some of the most beautiful elements of Coalition Snow: the connections with creatives and makers, the curated destination trips, the community engagement events, and much more, and continue to create a space for anyone who felt seen by the Coalition Snow community (and hopefully more!). Gurecki plans to launch the business in mid-May of 2026.

Gurecki’s eyes lit up as she talked about Far Out, building its future, and her own. She has no intention of “taking the long nap,” as she said, anytime soon. However, the perspective she got from her cancer diagnosis— that none of us really ever know how much time we have, so why spend it grinding away at something that’s not fulfilling— resonated deeply with me.

While today, I may not have a cancer diagnosis, I have lost many friends to the mountains this year and throughout the last several years, as have many others in the snowsports world, and it’s made me consider time and time again how short life is.

Generations above me have romanticized the grind in a way that’s frankly unsustainable, as Gurecki found. So, whether it’s just taking a minute to look at what you’ve accomplished and be proud of that, or walking away from something that’s no longer serving you, knowing that you made a difference that will last beyond you, we should all take a leaf out of Gurecki’s book.

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