Our Story
A message from the owners
Our story, where to start? Maybe somewhere in the middle?
When you join a climbing community it's really more like finding your people. You develop life long relationships in a space that tells a lot of different stories of people from diverse backgrounds. Whatever your journey looks like, we want to be part of it with you.
In 2008 Climb Smart Shop (CSS) grew from the needs of the climbing community in Toronto, filling voids for technical well fitting climbing shoes, specialized climbing training gear and other unique climbing items like the beautiful one-of-a-kind Organic chalk bags. During this time our philosophy around having the right/best gear was coming to life.
The growth of CSS wasn't that straight forward, sometimes the staff needed a specific tool, or athletes needs were becoming more complex and needed more exact measuring apparatus like Eva Lopez's Progression/Transgression Board. We were the first in North America to carry this hangboard and we strive to be early adopters of useful training hardware.
We've grown up a lot from our humble beginnings in 2008 and we continue to be family owned and operated. We are a family of climbers and sport enthusiasts who love to make equipment suggestions for climbers to help them achieve their goals. We are always open to new product suggestions, so please get in touch...we're sure others will need it in their gear bags as well.
The CSS logo has also evolved. Today our logo is a small section of a topographic map from the climbing region of Buoux, France. This part of France is really special to us, we honeymooned there, camped in Apt, France and climbed in the dead heat of August. It was a bit of a sufferfest but nothing that a good cafe au lait and pain au chocolat couldn't cure.
Today we carry products from amazing companies like LaSportiva, Midnight Lightning, E9, Crazy Idea and many more. Come and find us inside of our climbing centres to talk gear or build your first rack. See you on the cliff or pulling plastic.
Love, The McBurneys