The founder of US outdoor clothing retailer Patagonia, 83-year-old Yvon Chouinard - who is known for his environmental stances - has given away his company in an effort to combat climate change.
Mr Chouinard could have sold the brand, valued at €3 billion according to The New York Times, or taken it public.
But instead he and his family agreed to transfer all of Patagonia's voting shares in the company to a trust in charge of ensuring the brand's environmental values are respected.
Founded almost 50 years ago, Patagonia quickly became committed to conserving nature, by carefully choosing its raw materials and donating 1% of its sales each year to environmental NGOs.
Mr Chouinard has decided this is no longer enough.
All of Patagonia's non-voting shares have been transferred to a non-profit dedicated to fighting against climate change and for nature protection and conservation, with company profits also to be donated.
"Earth is now our only shareholder," Mr Chouinard wrote in an open letter posted to Patagonia's website.
"I never wanted to be a businessman. I started as a craftsman, making climbing gear for my friends and myself, then got into apparel."
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He added: "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."
One option was to sell Patagonia and donate the money.
"But we couldn't be sure a new owner would maintain our values or keep our team of people around the world employed," he said in the letter.
Taking the company public would have been a "disaster," he said.
"Even public companies with good intentions are under too much pressure to create short-term gain at the expense of long-term vitality and responsibility."
Instead of "going public," you could say we're "going purpose." Instead of extracting value from nature and transforming it into wealth for investors, we’ll use the wealth Patagonia creates to protect the source of all wealth.
— Patagonia (@patagonia) September 14, 2022
Read Yvon's letter at https://t.co/TolGLfHEGG
Patagonia will remain a company, which cares about its financial health and will operate with a board of directors and CEO.
The Chouinard family will no longer get any money from the company but will stay on the board, as well as oversee the trust and guide the non-profit's philanthropic work.
