Inspiring reasons to rethink your approach. Patagonia is renowned for it.
One day, Yvon Chouinard, the enterprising founder of Patagonia, told his product design team to free the company’s underwear from wasteful plastic and cardboard packaging. His staff balked–he was told to expect failure. He pressed on with the changes anyhow, because it was the right thing to do. The change in packaging inspired the company to take a fresh approach to the way it markets and sells under garments, and instead of the predicted failure it resulted in a huge jump in sales.
Full disclosure: I’m a Patagonia brand advocate who loves the product and approach.
Similar disclosure re. Patagonia. Caught their 180 degrees south film recently, inspiring to say the least. One of the things it left me wondering was whether it is possible for a start up brand to approach environmental activism in a similar way. Patagonia seems to be as much derived from the accidental, unknowing entrepreneurial spirit of Chouinard as it does from their serious concern for consumer consumption and it’s environmental impact. Are they a happy accident and part of the innocent spirit of the original ‘dirt bags’ ? What would a modern version of that be ?