NEWS
At the Camber Breakfast, VF Corporation’s CEO laid out a new plan to put business ethics on the same level as performance. BY RYAN WICHELNS From left: Deanne Buck of Camber Outdoors, Steve Rendle of VF Corp., and Rue Mapp of Outdoor Afro
“P
URPOSE-LED” WAS THE TERM of the day at Wednesday morning’s Camber Outdoor Thought Leader Keynote at the McNichols Civic Center Building, when the VF Corporation's CEO Steve Rendle detailed the company’s plans to redefine the conglomerate’s internal mission. “What’s that common thread that’s allowed VF to grow over the last 119 years? It’s the willingness to evolve,” Rendle said before launching into an overview of a year-plus effort on the part of the company to elevate an inclusive, environmental, and integritybased purpose to the same level of importance as the brands’ performance and profits. Rendle is latching on to a trend that’s gaining traction across the outdoor industry, as companies boost their environmental activism and advocacy. Brands like Patagonia and VF’s subsidiary The North Face have taken leading roles in pioneering purposeminded business, but VF hopes to expand it both internally and across the industry. “We power movements of sustainable and active lifestyles for the betterment of people and the planet,” Rendle said, unveiling a new internal purpose statement for VF that codified broadly the company’s personal and environmental goals. Rendle called it the “why” of VF’s corporate strategy, a piece that had been missing from the “how” and “what.”
10
THE DAILY | SUMMER MARKET
Frequently, Wednesday morning’s conversation returned to Camber Outdoors co-founder and Lifetime Achievement Award-winner Ann Krcik, who passed away in February. Rendle spoke fondly of Krcik, a prominent voice and employee at The North Face, attributing the conscience of VF’s latest initiative to her. “Much of what our journey is about, her fingerprints are all over,” he said. “She always challenged me to be a more thoughtful, more purposeled leader.” Rue Mapp, the founder and CEO of Outdoor Afro, who briefly spoke prior to Rendle, also praised Krcik. “She was my mentor, and I realized she was a lot of people’s mentors,” Mapp said. Rendle outlined VF’s goals as increasing diversity in leadership, expanding employee empowerment and interaction with the company’s goals, and growing transparency in its business. “We’re aligning our 70,000 associates against a common vision,” Rendle said, “And that’s where real success comes from.” Returning to Krcik, Rendle asked everyone in the room to reflect on what they stand for, attributing the idea to something his friend would regularly contemplate. Rendle encouraged other brands and industry leaders to adopt the same purpose-minded business practices the VF is initiating and, as was often the case, follow in Krcik’s footsteps.
MOUNTAIN STRONG
The North Face speaker series celebrates outdoor achievement. There are many faces of adventure. Tuesday afternoon, Outdoor Afro leaders Chaya Harris and Leandra Taylor detailed their recent summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro as part of the first all-black American expedition team, on a panel led by journalist James Edward Mills. Harris and Taylor discussed how their love for the outdoors was seen as somewhat weird when they were growing up, and how powerful it was to summit Africa’s tallest mountain. It felt like coming home, in a way, they said. “I get chills every time I think about it,” Taylor said. “I didn’t realize how culturally homesick I was until I reached the motherland.” Other panels held at The North Face Booth included “Woman on Top: Enabling Female Expedition Leaders,” “Off the Wall—The Hidden Benefits of Climbing,” and “Climbing and Cultural Exchange.” “As a leader in the industry, it’s important to us to create safe spaces for people to have conversations,” said Tom Herbst, global VP of marketing for The North Face. The speaker series was intended to highlight new perspectives. During the Q&A portion of the Kilimanjaro panel, one audience member asked about some of the terms we often use in mountaineering, such as saying someone has “conquered” a mountain. “We didn’t use the words ‘conquer’ or ‘conquest’ in the whole operation,” Harris said, acknowledging that many people often find such terms to be offensive, particularly if their ancestors’ homelands were colonized. “We were there to learn with the mountain,” even when they faced bad weather. When the clouds broke, they felt the mountain was on their side. “What I got most from that mountain was the power within,” Taylor said. –Kassondra Cloos
PHOTOS BY JOHN EVANS; COURTESY
Principle over Profits