General Manager, Office Manager, or RockStar - RIDE Adventures - Bend, OR

Seeking a “RockStar” for work in Adventure Tourism

Now in its 7th year of operations, RIDE Adventures, LLC (www.rideadv.com) has an immediate job opening for someone who truly values a balance of career and lifestyle, while being an important part of a fun and growing adventure travel business.

When I say that I’m “seeking a RockStar,” my actual meaning of this should become more clear as you read on. First, this is not literally a music-related job opening in any sense other than that you might enjoy music while you work. Instead, the term “RockStar” has simply come to my mind as I’m looking for someone with the energy, creativity, and ability to perform their job, regardless of who is in the audience or what the audience’s wishes may be. Our “audience” in this case is a world full of motorcycle riders, all of whom ultimately want to travel. So hopefully you’re capturing my sentiment when I explain that the person I’m going to hire could be described as somewhat of a “RockStar” that will help this business run smoothly, do the things I won’t always be available to do, and ensure that our Customers enjoy themselves thoroughly.

To help make it clear what RIDE Adventures does: It’s a business that makes it easy for motorcycle riders from around the world to “RIDE” in the places shown on www.rideadv.com. Instead of forcing riders to ship their motorcycles internationally, we reserve specifically requested motorcycle brands & models for riders in places like Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Peru, southern Africa, etc. so they can essentially just “show up and ride.” Customers of RIDE Adventures might explore these areas Self-Guided on their own, with hotel packages we arrange for them, or they may join one of our Fully-Guided Group tour packages to make for the most convenient experience. These Customers are fun people with adventurous spirits, who are in many cases returning for a 2nd or 3rd motorcycle trip package after having a blast on the 1st one.

Job Opening: General Manager, Office Manager, RockStar, (TBD)

While your exact job title is something we’ll figure out later, the person I’m looking for can contribute to almost every aspect of running this business, from Customer Service to Marketing, Accounting, Purchasing, and beyond. Despite being a travel-focused business, this work typically requires extensive computer work, so if you’re not comfortable with that, this job is not for you. The person hired will be working together with Eric Lange, the Owner/Founder of the RIDE Adventures, (and the person writing this very job description.) Based here in Bend, this work ultimately won’t require a rigid schedule with strict 9-5 type hours or a “need” to be in the office every day. Getting started, of course we’ll be working closely for the coming months, but ultimately I’m looking for looking for someone who can make a positive impact on the business, get projects done whether in the office or on the road, and relieve me of some of the many hats I’ve been wearing since launching the business 7 years ago.

The Ideal Candidate: Aside from the obvious need to connect on a level that would allow us to work happily and efficiently together, the person I’m hiring has the highest concentration possible of these skills, experiences, and abilities:

• Customer Service: Without happy Customers, RIDE Adventures doesn’t exist. Simple as that. Everything from your demeanor to your writing skills, timeliness, accuracy, and punctuality is crucial in making customers happy and growing this business.


• Marketing: In some capacity or another, online marketing, social media, and all the other possibilities to promote a travel business should be part of your repertoire and experience. HUGE bonus to you if you’re familiar with Hubspot CMS/COS, other CRM programs, or just running a mappable, organized marketing program that gets measurable results.


• Motorcycle Background: While it’s not crucial that you’re currently a motorcycle rider, or that you have owned or been heavily involved in the world of motorcycles previously, some basic understanding and familiarity with motorcycle culture will be a major help in this job. In particular, RIDE Adventures is focused on adventure bike/dual sport travel at this time, doing very little with Harleys, cruisers or the like. We’ve gotta be able to “talk the talk” in this business to some extent, appreciate why our Customers crave motorcycle trips so much, and understand what they’re looking for.


• Accounting/Purchasing/Operations: Some experience in these categories will be part of helping us gain efficiencies, accuracies, and all that goes into coordinating all the information needed to keep this business rolling along. It’s up and running great now, but can you make it run better?


• Bi-Lingual/Spanish: The strongest candidates will be at least moderately proficient with the Spanish language, as RIDE Adventures was born in the Andes Mountains and continues to perform most of its services throughout Latin America.


• Background in Tourism: While not entirely necessary, the strongest candidates will have worked in tourism at some point, and can therefore leverage that experience and knowledge into helping our business run efficiently. HUGE bonus again if you’re familiar with travel booking software or other means of gaining efficiencies in such a business.


• Ability to Travel Internationally: Haven’t been to Patagonia, Peru, Africa or beyond? My goal is to get you there as soon as possible. Customers typically aren’t always “clicking and buying” these $5,000-$10,000+ vacations, which is to say that there are often many, many questions and answers via email/phone that lead up to a Customer actually making a booking. As such, you’ll need to be able to discuss these countries and regions, and share insight that helps Customers be certain that they’re spending their time and money on the right trip. So, you can plan on probably a few trips per year to these destinations, and yes, RIDE Adventures will pay for these trips. (Note: It is not necessary that you ride a motorcycle on these trips, but just that you’re able to come along, interact with the customers, and learn about why we take them on these incredible routes.)


• Photography/Videography: Skills in this area are a huge bonus, and will increase the likelihood of your participating in these trips, or your ability to help us from a Marketing perspective.

Compensation/Work Schedule/Location/Experience:

-Pay is $25/hour (negotiable) for a 2-4 month probationary period of 40 hours per week as a contract employee
-Eventual Salary and/or Bonus Schedule: TBD and agreed upon during our interviewing phase. (NOTE AGAIN: There is literally no limit to earning potential, and it should be noted that the right candidate for this role already understands the possibilities.)
-Again, this is for full-time employment, 40 hours per week or whatever is needed to help me keep this business running and growing. As described above, the work won’t need to be a hard-nosed & stringent “9-5” type of job. My hopes are that you can make a positive impact and still get work done, even if that means you spent morning or evening working, and the afternoon riding, floating the river, or doing whatever you keeps you happy, healthy and smiling along with me. At least initially, we’ll be working together pretty consistently Monday through Friday; but again, very flexible hours are available, and to some extent, encouraged.
-As I’m in based in Bend, you’ll need to be in Bend (which shouldn’t be terrible news)
-This role is ideally for someone with 3+ years of professional working experience in some combination the aforementioned areas. Less than 3 years will be considered.

PLEASE NOTE: If your first reaction to this job posting is ‘unbridled excitement’ because you “JUST WANT TO RIDE MOTORCYCLES ALL DAY EVERY DAY!” … please don’t waste your or my time. I’ve been doing this long enough that I will see right through such motivations. Of course you want to ride, but ultimately, this job has almost nothing to do with you riding motorcycles in the first place. – If instead, if you’re enthusiastic about motorcycle travel or adventure travel in general, passionate about making Customers happy and hearing/reading the feedback from their experiences, and searching for the right balance of career and lifestyle, while being part of a fun and growing travel business….I very much look forward to meeting you and starting what will be an incredible journey together.

To Apply:

Please respond with your resume and/or cover letter as you see fit to “career_lifestyle(at)rideadv.com.” (Yes, I’ll be checking the Spam folder, so don’t worry about whether your note has been received or not.) If we should meet, you’ll know it.

Job Type: Full-time

Salary: $25.00 /hour

Required education:

Required experience:

• Customer Service, Marketing, Accounting, General Business Operations: 3 years

Required language: