One week after Patagonia founder Yvon Chouniard announced he was giving away the outdoor apparel company he founded in 1973 to help solve the climate crisis, the man he tasked with finding a way to divest his family from the company—CEO Ryan Gellert—spoke at AU about the unprecedented move. 

Gellert, the Sine Institute of Policy and Politics’ 2022 distinguished lecturer, told the crowd of mostly students on September 21 that Chouniard, 83, wanted to give away his money while he was still alive to see its impact. Even still, the first time Chouniard brought it up, “I tried to sidestep it and ignore it because I couldn’t imagine Patagonia without the Chouinards involved,” Gellert said.  

“The next time I was over to the house. He said, ‘How’s that going?’ I said, ‘I’ve been busy with some other things.’ He said, ‘I swear to God, Ryan, if you don’t get on this, I’m going to the grocery store, I’m getting one of those Forbes lists of billionaires, and I’m going to start cold-calling people.’ I said, ‘I got it, message received.’” 

Patagonia has long been a model of socially-conscious capitalism. The company instituted a 1 percent “earth tax” in 1985, donating the proceeds to grassroots environmental causes. The new structure means that every dollar not reinvested in the company will go to the Patagonia Purpose Trust and a new nonprofit, Holdfast Collective—which is projected to receive $100 million annually—to protect nature and biodiversity. The trust owns the voting stock of the company and will ensure the company’s values are upheld. 

Patagonian CEO Ryan Gellert meets with AU students at a roundtable prior to his event as the Sine Institute's distinguished lecturer of 2022.

“At the end of the day, there’s two things we want to accomplish: protecting the integrity of Patagonia as a model of a different way of [doing] business and putting a lot more money [into fighting the] environmental crisis right now,” Gellert said. “That led us to ultimately create something I don’t think has been done before in US business.”