Patagonia
Patagonia, Inc., the Californian outdoor gear and apparel company founded by Yvon Chouinard in 1973, is noted internationally for its commitment to product quality and environmental activism. Incorporating environmental responsibility into product development, the company supports the ambitious mission statement: “To make the best product, cause no unnecessary harm and use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis.”
Patagonia has, since 1996, used only organically grown cotton in its clothing line; is using recycled materials and with its most recent launch of synthetic fibre-to-fibre recycling program is recycling an increasing quantity of its the textile range into new products, forever capturing the petroleum used in making virgin fibre.
With its Environmental Grants Program, the company dedicates annually 1% of its sales to environmental protection ($35M in cash and in-kind donations to grassroots environmental activists were attributed since the program began in 1985) and its Environmental Internship Program allows employees to work for environmental groups for 2 months while receiving their full paycheck.
In order to convince other companies to follow his path, Yvon Chouinard co-founded the 1% for the planet club in 2001, gathering more than 1000 companies worldwide, all giving 1% of their sales to environmental groups. Patagonia’s sales for last fiscal year (end of April 09) were $315 million.
