Meet Mark Woodard, an undergraduate student at CU Boulder and founder of GeoTrek! GeoTrek creates handcrafted camper vans that can be delivered to you anywhere in the United States.
Mark is a current Senior at CU Boulder studying Business Management with an emphasis on Strategy and Entrepreneurship. For the past two years, Mark has been an executive officer for the Hiking Club at CU. The Hiking Club at CU is a community for students who wish to visit and explore the various wilderness areas in and around Boulder, CO! Mark has gained valuable leadership experience through guiding group backpacking trips.
Mark’s entrepreneurial lifestyle began in high school. He worked for a contractor and was exposed to the landscaping industry. He saw an opportunity to create his own landscaping business and began advertising door-to-door. Mark also made flyers which he put in mailboxes across his town. Over the course of four years, Mark’s landscaping business grew from one to seven employees and began to take on larger landscaping installations. This past summer, Mark set aside his landscaping business in order to fully pursue GeoTrek!
About GeoTrek Vans
Mark purchased a van during his sophomore year of college. This van was used for landscaping operations and later renovated for a cross-country road trip after the Covid19 pandemic began. He fell in love with the process of renovating the van and felt that it added a unique value to his outdoor experience.
Mark visited several national parks in his renovated van, and when he returned from his trip, he sold it! He was surprised by the high demand for camper vans and began looking into business opportunities. By 2021, Mark was up and running with GeoTrek!
GeoTrek is a van renovation company. Their mission is to provide outdoor enthusiasts with fully sustainable mobile living! The GeoTrek team is small, consisting of only six members who each contribute to van renovations and marketing efforts. Since its inception, GeoTrek has renovated five vans and is currently completing the sixth!
Upcoming Projects/ Events
Recently, the GeoTrek team moved into a warehouse! They plan to release a new camper called the Solvano. The Solvano camper will be solar-powered and have the ability to charge electric vehicles, or power a house! For updates on when the Solvano camper will be released, check out the GeoTrek Instagram account.
Challenges Faced
Managing cashflows between business and personal expenses has proven to be difficult for Mark. He comments,
“As an optimistic, I hardly expect failure and tend to get pinched for cash.”
Additionally, Mark constantly has new ideas and struggles with focusing on just one of them at a time!
Advice for Current Students
Mark provides the following advice for current students,
“Try as many things as possible and talk to as many people who have experience in the field you wish to pursue. Also, try not to compare yourself to others! Instead, focus on your potential.”
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