LAKEWOOD, Wis. — On a warm July morning, David Gryboski showed a customer several paddle board options at Lakewood Ski & Sport in Lakewood.
The business is welcomed after he and others in the northern part of the state endured an unusually warm and mild winter that cut into winter activities.
“It was a rough winter, just the lack of snow. I know everyone up here was struggling a little bit,” Gryboski said. “The bars and restaurants didn’t have as much business as normal with snowmobilers and whatnot. We have more inventory left over than we typically would after winter.”
Ski may be in the store’s name, but unusually mild winter conditions around Lakewood and other parts of Wisconsin visually wiped out the cross-country ski season in many places.
Gryboski has owned the business 31 years and ridden other ups and downs.
“It’s not make or break, but it certainly makes it more difficult when things aren’t bursting at the seams,” he said with a laugh when asked about what this summer means to the business.
A mild winter put a serious dent into northern Wisconsin businesses and communities who depend on tourism and the weather for income.
Samantha Moravec, owner of Northern D’Lights, a fast-food restaurant in Lakewood, said those dollars are a big deal to small communities.
“We make our money on tourism,” she said. “Snowmobile season was a bust up here. That’s how we make a living, the traffic and the flow.”
Northern D’Lights is a seasonal business, but one that keeps tabs on how the community and region are doing all year round.
“We’ve seen quite a bit more traffic this year,” Moravec she said about the spring and summer. “During the week it’s busier and through the weekends we’ve had long lines. Last weekend we had one going around the corner to (county road) F, so that’s quite a distance.”
Gryboski has a stack of skis left over from last season. In just a few months, he said they’ll start selling again. But first, there’s the summer gear.
“Regardless of whatever types of sales we’re running, if it’s sunny and 85 degrees out, people will come and buy stuff to get out on the water,” he said.
He said he’s hoping for more of that before the season comes to an end.