Kristin Tara Horowitz

Kristin Tara Horowitz is a serial entrepreneur and community advocate. She is CEO of The Pad Climbing, a multi-location, multi-state indoor rock climbing gym community. She and her partner also run a business supporting outdoor human powered events locally and internationally. The Pad Climbing, in addition to winning numerous family-friendly and best employer awards, was recognized with the US Chamber's Woman Owned Business Achievement Award in 2022. Prior to being a business person, she was an English professor and a nonprofit executive director. 

Her experience as a twin mom in business and working with underserved populations has shaped her perspective of business and its impacts in the community. She and her team actively work to reform business practices to support broader community solutions, innovate processes, and adopt smart technology to allow humans to do their jobs more efficiently and joyfully so they can enjoy the fruits of their success in their private lives.

She sits on a number of councils and admins online groups that facilitate the sharing of ideas, resources, and building of communities. When she's not doing that, she's tending to her kids and a menagerie of animals, both house pets and livestock, clinging to the side of a rock, or riding her bike in the hills. She encourages constantly questioning "common sense," maintaining a sense of wonder about would could be, and heavy doses of disconnecting into nature and good stories.