northwest river supplies | nrs.com

Until recently, Northwest River Supplies (NRS) was known to many Palouse residents (if known at all) as “that little raft shop” in a nondescript building on Highway 95. Today, it’s hard to miss our 155,000 square-foot headquarters on Moscow’s East Side. We’ve long served as a can’t-miss pitstop for local paddlers and boaters traveling to landmark rivers in Idaho. But did you know that NRS is the largest company of its kind in the world? Now celebrating our 50 th year in business, NRS is a leading supplier of equipment, apparel and accessories for human-powered water sports, water safety, and water rescue. And it all started right here in north-central Idaho.

NRS was founded in 1972 by Bill Parks. Bill, who served on the UI College of Business faculty until 1994, wanted to prove to himself and others that the ideas he taught in the classroom could work in the real world. He had fallen in love with whitewater rafting and predicted that others would too. Starting with $2,000 of his personal savings, he stocked an inventory of equipment in his garage and typed out the first NRS catalog. Bill believed that a highly ethical business focused on serving its customers, employees, business partners, and broader community, could not only survive, but thrive. Five decades later, it’s safe to conclude he was right.

Today, NRS is 100% employee owned and serves private, business, and government customers throughout the US and across the globe. We employ more than 140 people on the Palouse, many of whom are drawn to the area by its rural character and proximity to outdoor recreation. As NRS has grown in scale, we’ve become a prominent voice for conservation of public lands and waterways and a leader in expanding access to the outdoors for historically underserved groups.

Despite our global footprint, NRS remains deeply rooted on the Palouse. We are a founding member of the Palouse Land Trust Business Advisory Council and supporter of state and regional conservation efforts. Our employees are active in the community, from coaching youth sports, to volunteering with area fire departments, to cleaning up waterways and doing trail work on Moscow Mountain. The people and landscape of north-central Idaho are woven into the DNA of NRS, and we’re proud to give back to this place we call home.