Patagonia’s Billionaire Owner Is Giving Up The Company To Fight Climate Change & Let’s Go Elon

The billionaire founder of hot girl adventure wear brand Patagonia Yvon Chouinard is giving away the company to trusts designed to fight climate change. Jeff BezosElon MuskMark Zuckerberg… where is this energy?

In an open letter, he announced that 100 per cent of Patagonia’s voting stock will be transferred to something called the Patagonia Purpose Trust. The non-voting stock is going to the Holdfast Collective — that’s about 98 per cent of the shares, while the Patagonia Purpose Trust will get 2 per cent.

According to Chouinard, the Patagonia Purpose Trust (try saying that with a mouth full of peanut butter) was “created to protect the company’s values” while the Holdfast Collective is “a nonprofit dedicated to fighting the environmental crisis and defending nature”.

Patagonia will continue as a for-profit business, making that big ‘ol cash from fancy puffer jackets and vibey fleeces. According to The New York Times, the company is worth about US$3 billion (AU$4.45 billion).

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“The funding will come from Patagonia: Each year, the money we make after reinvesting in the business will be distributed as a divided to help fight the crisis,” he said.

According to The NYT the Patagonia Purpose Trust will be run by the family and some of their advisers.

Patagonia’s been committed to environmental activism for a hot sec. It’s a B Corp — a company that’s committed to social and environmental causes — and has dedicated 1 per cent of its sales to environmental groups since the 1980s.

Hugest of slays.

“As we began to witness the extent of global warming and ecological destruction, and our own contribution to it, Patagonia committed to using our company to change the way business was done,” Chouinard said.

“If we could do the right thing while making enough to pay the bills, we could influence customers and other businesses, and maybe change the system along the way.”

A major company? With actual ethics instead of flashy-but-hollow marketing? I’m genuinely shocked.

Chouinard said the company had tossed up a couple of options, including selling the company and donating the profits, or taking the company public.

But Patagonia decided that neither of these were options, and made their own, better, third option. We love to bloody see it.

It’s sad to see a company legit do more for the environment than like… most governments but hey, at least it’s a start.

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