Movement Portland — Attraction in Portland

My wife and I have been climbing here for about 8 months now. We live up by Forest Park so this is the closest gym to us. The facilities are top notch, there aren't too many gyms in the world that can compare to this. The setting is great and changed regularly so you never really get bored.

That said, my wife and I will be making the trek as soon as our membership is over to go back to PRG. My biggest gripe is safety. Maybe I'm getting old and crotchety, but I've been climbing well over 20 years and some of the things I have witnessed here scare the crap out of me. I've seen anything from people with both hands off of the brake strand of the rope to take a picture, to people leading underneath someone who is top-roping, to the hordes of people bouldering after work climbing underneath each other. All of which had staff members watching who did nothing. We were in the gym with one accident, I didn't see what happened, but the paramedics fully immobilized the gym to get him out. I've heard of at least 2 other accidents of similar magnitude. When I asked the staff what happened, they told me they were just "freak belay accidents". This seems like a extremely high number of accidents in such a short period of time.

Next on the list is the elitism I feel has developed here. I once asked the manager Jeff if they were going to get auto-belays. Either way, no big deal right? I just wanted an easy way to do some ARC training by myself since they don't have any traverses in the gym. He went on a rant about how planet granite is about creating a community, but half the staff including, if not especially, the management will hardly talk to us or any of our climbing friends when we are in there. It's like they purposefully ignore us. It's a really odd experience, every other gym in town is extremely friendly and helpful (PRG, the Source, Circuit, Stoneworks).

Last one. My granddaughter who is 8 had a birthday here. The two staff members who "ran" the party hardly ever talked to any of the kids. They just hooked them, belayed them, and stared at the ground. It was very uninspiring. I would recommend either PRG or the Circuit if you want to have a climbing birthday party.

So long story short: World-class facilities. Horrible management/staff. Go somewhere else for the time...

I’ve been a member with movement for over a year now. I’ve always tried to bring people to movement because rock climbing is such a fun way to exercise. I brought my sister in law for the second time with a guest pass. She was considering joining the rock gym as well. We did top rope most of the day and i convinced her to try bouldering. We put our harnesses in the storage are and went bouldering. When were finished she returned her rental gear and we left. It turns out she accidentally returned my harness instead of the rental. I placed my shoes and the rental harness in my car (not knowing it was the rental)

A month passes by and I go back to the rock Gym and realise that my harness felt weird when I put it on and noticed her belay card was on the harness. I brought it to the staffs attention when they quickly took the harness and started looking for mine. My harness had a belay card and climbing glasses attached to it. After they couldn’t find the harness I showed them a picture of it with the card and glasses and card. Somehow they managed to have my glasses and not my harness. The glasses can only be removed by unclipping them from the harness. The clip was not damaged it was lost in their care and the glasses were removed.

I was told they could’ve donated it because they donated unclaimed after 4-6week. I returned for it at exactly 4 weeks so that shouldn’t have happened.

Belay car was attached to the harness.. they call everyone when items are left. I received no phone call.

All I was offered was a 20% discount at their shop… it’s 20% off for Memorial Day weekend anyway? But not really a discount

I was offered a month of free rental… which puts me out of a harness still.

I asked to keep the rental that I brought back to them and they said no they have to throw it out and can’t let me keep that.

Finally I found my harness online for $32 and I asked if I could just get that money back for a monthly payment credit and the manager refused. I’m disappointed with how this is handled. I’d understand if I left it somewhere at the gym and someone picked it up that’d be my fault. But it was left on the counter where rental items are returned. After a year of a membership at $1,200 a year you'd think that’d mean more than a $32 credit. But they’d rather lose a...

While the facilities are strong, the staff were unfriendly toward me. When I asked them multiple questions about their facility and resources/offerings, I was given short answers that did not fully answer my questions, and actually misunderstood my questions. I have worked at a climbing gym for 2 years and in the customer service/retail industry for over 12 years - A more customer service-friendly way to respond would be to inquire with the customer more questions in order to narrow down what information is the most helpful for them, and be able to solve their problem as best as possible. Anti-racism training is paramount for the staff members at this facility, and with this corporation, as it is with other many climbing gyms. I was also not offered a tour as a first time visitor. I believe in climbing businesses, and support them fully, and as a part of that, I have to offer them my honest experience and recommendations, so that they can grow stronger, become more inclusive and have passionate and competent staff, and evolve with the needs of the racially diverse climbing community and customers. And if they and we all take it to heart, it is all the better for ALL of us. It makes business sense, and it makes inclusivity (vs. racist attitudes and adoptive hiring, training, service...