Patagonia Case Study Essay

The North Face was founded in 1966 in San Francisco, California by two hiking enthusiasts taking a chance on a dream. Douglas Tompkins and his then-wife, Susie Tompkins, sold their small, climber targeted, clothing brand to Kenneth “Hap” Klopp two years later. From a single storefront to a global brand, The North Face has enjoyed incredible success in their 50 years of existence. They produce high quality outdoor apparel, gear and footwear in countries all across the globe. The North Face is a market leader when it comes to technology and performance. It’s clothing and equipment lines are catered towards college students, climbers,

Having identified the target market of their products, Patagonia was also able to more effectively develop innovative new products. Knowing that their core users wanted high performing fabrics and that they were willing to pay for it, Patagonia was able to make the necessary investments to develop superior fabrics over longer development cycles than their competitors. The new innovations in fabrics and materials trickled down from the higher end lines like Alpine, allowing Patagonia to add value across all their lines and maintain a high price point.

Robert Swan once said “the greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.” Two companies that understand this concept are Patagonia and Nike. How they address these issues regarding sustainable business practice vary, however. Both have made it their mission to deliver excellence and make the best quality products within their industries, Patagonia focussing more on outdoor active wear, while Nike is more sports oriented. Part of this process has been developing products from sustainable sources. Patagonia, for example, actively took a stand against chemical intensive cotton in 1994, and has since switched to less harmful means of organic cotton within all their cotton-based products. They are even going the extra

1) Patagonia has a history of putting sustainability ahead of profits. Based on what you learned about Patagonia’s ideals, how do you think the company determines what possible ventures will be both business practical and environmentally friendly?

This report has been created with the intent to analyze the athletic apparel industry with a specific focus on Lululemon Athletica, Inc., further refered to as Lululemon. In this report you will find that the strengths and weaknesses of Lululemon’s current strategies and future goals are analyzed and compared to that of its closest competitors. In conclusion to the analysis, recommendations have been made to potentially guide Lululemon Athletica, Inc. in a positive direction in regards to its future endeavors. The following

The company relies on certifications developed by third party NGOs with the expertise. Since the company does not have direct control over the operating environment, they want to find the right partner.“Patagonia is partnering with eBay to provide consumers a way to resell their used Patagonia apparel via the Common Threads initiative site on eBay. In addition, consumers will now be able to resell their used Patagonia apparel on a new used clothes and gear section on Patagonia's website” (Eric) And “With more than 80 factories around the world and suppliers in the United States, Mexico, Colombia, Costa Rica, China, Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines, India, Israel, Turkey and Morocco, Patagonia truly has global impact on the sourcing side.” (Gentry) “Today, Patagonia is the primary supplier of certified organic wool yarns and fabrics to the U.S. organic apparel and textile market. It also supplies its O-Wool™ to companies such as Maggie's Organics, Sahalie and Timberland.” (Speer) The company look forward to expand into other organic fibers includes its success in developing organic cotton and benefits of organic

Companies like Under Armour, Nike and Adidas/Reebok have high threats of substitute´s products. These companies share the sport apparel industry and are vulnerable to competitive pressure from the actions of buyers whenever they view that their products can be substituted for others. The availability of substitutes invites the costumer to compare performance, features, and ease of use as well as price. Under Armour’s major competitors are Nike and Adidas/Reebok because they have a similar or competing product offerings. The top sport apparel brands offer similar products and that is why each one of them needs to keep a high standard and produce good quality products in order for customers to keep buying their product.

Patagonia’s value proposition is based on embedding environmental sustainability in every business decision it makes. Its core strategy is differentiation by focusing on durability and quality of products whilst minimising its carbon footprint and use of synthetic ingredients (what). The business model revolves around developing innovative technologies and influencing competitors and suppliers alike to adopt environmentally-friendly processes (how). Commitment to these causes while maintaining quality has allowed it to develop a loyal customer base amongst high income groups and athletes (who) and significantly increase customer’s willingness to pay.

1. Patagonia uses personnel and cultural control to apply this strategy. For personnel control, the company hires people who are as passionate about environment as Yvon.

1. Strategy: Patagonia’s product differentiation as their strategy, through CSR, which involves sustainability, philanthropic initiatives, moral obligations, and reputation. They operate in ways to secure long-term economic performance by avoiding short-term behavior that is socially detrimental or environmentally wasteful. They do this all while keeping their quality high and having their core consumers in mind.

The North Face has a marketing strategy that enables the company to focus on the athlete, the potential of the athlete, and the athlete using The North Face gear for performance. In comparison, Patagonia focuses on the clothing in which they produce and sell, rather than the company's model. Patagonia places emphasis on fabric technology in their marketing efforts and mainly depicts the clothing on company websites and catalogs. Therefore, this is an area in which both Patagonia and The North Face can improve in order to increase product communication towards target consumers. Both Patagonia and The North Face have exceptional product technologies, which they can use to market their brand and inspire consumers to explore the possibilities of their products. However, The North Face invests

In 1993, Patagonia was the first company to make plastic soda bottles into fleece, as well as other materials. As many other brands are following in their footsteps, this new technology is a new way to make an Eco-friendly material and that is durable and well made. Patagonia has changed how people view recycling. They are focused on reducing the amount of pollution in the environment. They needed 20,000 barrels of oil to make raw materials, but as they started recycling plastic bottles there was no need for that. Now, there is space in the landfills by keeping millions of bottles out, which eliminates harmful air emissions, making the environment a better place. While Patagonia strives for environmental improvements and to make their products, sustainable, there are now expanding to other fabrics. It has been over

Patagonia strives to provide quality clothing and outdoor equipment while staying as environmentally friendly as possible. A hiking boot, for example, would need to fit strict requirements. The boot would need to be durable, comfortable, stylish, and made from environmentally friendly products. You also need to determine if there is a large enough market for the product. This would provide the means necessary to determine if the product has the highest chance of being successful. Given these strict requirements, one way to help keep the costs down is to use recycled material from older products that costumers turn in, therefore saving resources and money.

Kathmandu Holdings opened its first store in Christchurch in 1987. The company is a leader in the outdoor apparel and equipment sector and listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange in 2009. Today they operate 47 stores in New Zealand, 114 stores in Australia and 1 in the United Kingdom. They mainly sell Kathmandu-branded products that is designed by an in-house team of designers. The company achieves roughly 95% of all sales from Kathmandu branded products. Sales are achieved via physical stores and an online option via their website (Kathmandu Website, 2016).

Patagonia has refrained from focusing on attracting the next generation customer for fear of diluting the brand and chasing fashion trends. We recommend that Patagonia explore the opportunity to either: