Dirtbag Dan Buys Chessler Books Inventory

I have purchased all remaining inventory from Chessler Books. I have not acquired the domain name or the business.

Half of my audience knows Michael Chessler very well and half knows him not at all. So apologies if we retread some "obvious" territory here. New climbers are coming into the sport every day, and new collectors too.

Michael Chessler was THE GUY for climbing and mountaineering books for about forty years, starting in the early 1980s and holding the top spot through to the 2020s. Anyone who was there will tell you: Chessler was a legend.

(a selection of vintage Chessler Books catalogs)

He began with a mail-order catalog, opened a physical store in Evergreen, Colorado, and finally transitioned to doing all his business through a website, Chesslerbooks.com. His site is still active for now, I encourage you to poke around a bit. It is a real artifact of a now-vanished internet.

When I launched my site last year and started making more frequent buys, the seller always would ask: 'so, are you like, the new Michael Chessler?' Everyone had a Chessler story: some good, some bad, but everyone knew him. I knew him too, of course - I'd been a customer, and I had the thought in the back of my mind that I might buy him out someday. He was old, in his eighties. The opportunity would arise eventually, I thought. Some years down the line.

Unfortunately, my chance came sooner than I predicted. Michael Chessler fell seriously ill, was hospitalized, and was unable to continue with his business. I responded to a notice placed on his website, and struck a deal with his family. They told me that Chessler got his own start by purchasing the collection of an older book dealer who was ready to get out of the trade; now it would be my turn. 

I am sure some of my customers and older folks will have some stories about Michael they can share in the comments. I never had the chance to meet Michael myself. He seemed to be quite the character. But he's not the subject of this post, and I am far from qualified to tell his story.

The point of this post is to say I've got most of his remaining inventory. Some items wandered off to auction, institutions, individual collectors, and even to the recycle (only if they really deserved it). But most of the books and magazines came home with me. 

(Ed Viesturs standee we found during the move. The shelves behind were totally full).

I am in the process of listing all of these Chessler books for sale. I started in April, and it will probably take until the end of the year to get everything inventoried, processed, listed, and uploaded. Maybe longer.

(chaos in my garage)

My store began with a focus on guidebooks, so there is some conflict between those and Chessler’s inventory, which favored classic mountaineering narratives. We're working out an equilibrium, but if you notice a lot of narrative being listed, please know that it's not forever - the guides are coming back!

I am seriously cutting prices on almost everything compared to what these items were listed for at Chessler Books. This is for two reasons:

1. Mr. Chessler had a lot more space than I do, and he had forty years of accumulated inventory and inertia. I have less space and am trying much more actively to turn over this inventory and get it to people who will appreciate it and actually read the books.
2. I think lower prices are healthy for the collecting ecosystem overall. We need to welcome in younger climbers who simply don't have tons of money. As a broke climber, even $20 for a book can be a heavy investment - you can spend five days in Indian Creek for that money, if you're clever. So, although I am still listing some of the rarer, signed, and extremely fine condition books for high prices, most of the "middle-of-the-road" stuff is going up for affordable prices. Please buy it. I need my guest room back.
   
3. There is no reason for one person to have all this stuff. Chessler's operation was huge, and truthfully, it made me a little sad. He had so much excellent stuff just sitting around, part of the hoard. My philosophy is it's better to distribute these items to people who will appreciate them, even if you make less profit.

Chessler seemed to be a pretty successful businessman, at least for a while, so maybe my approach is naive. But I am a climber as well as a businessman—I'm likely to run into many of you at the crags, in the basecamps, and across the forums. We may even tie in together. I want our community to be healthy and thriving.

In this spirit I hope to carry on the work of Michael Chessler. I hope you enjoy the books.