ImpactAlpha, September 16 — Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard and his family have given away the $3 billion outdoor apparel company. The new owners will earmark the company’s roughly $100 million in annual revenue for climate action and environmental preservation.
How it works: Patagonia Purpose Trust will own all of the company’s voting stock (2% of the total stock). The Holdfast Collective, a new nonprofit organization, will own the other 98% of non-voting stock. Profits not reinvested into the business will be dividended to the collective to finance nature-based solutions and biodiversity protection. Ventura, Calif.-based Patagonia will remain a B-Corp and continue to donate one percent of sales to grassroots activists.
Agents of Impact
The Chouinard family will oversee the Patagonia Purpose Trust’s board of directors. They will also guide the philanthropic work by the Holdfast Collective. “If we have any hope of a thriving planet 50 years from now, it demands all of us doing all we can with the resources we have,” said Chouinard, the Yosemite rock climber-turned-businessman who launched Patagonia almost 50 years ago. “As the business leader I never wanted to be, I’m doing my part.”
