Why Yvon Chouinard Just Gave Away Patagonia Patagonia has always been an outlier. Where other companies are content with green-washing product, and make fabricated claims on their environmental impact, the brand has a decades-long legacy of pursuing environmental causes - even at the detriment of it's bottom line. However, #YvonChouinard has just taken a step few could’ve anticipated - in order to future-proof Patagonia’s mission, 100% of his $3 Billion in shares have been given away to the planet. The Patagonia Purpose Trust will hold his 2% voting stock, and ensure Patagonia stays true to its mission, preserving the brand's core values. The Holdfast Collective will hold the other 98% of his stock, receive Patagonia's profits, and distribute them amongst environmental charities. The move is entirely unprecedented, and the first of its kind. Chouinard weighed up selling the company and donating the money, but a new owner might corrupt the values. Making #Patagonia public would likely do the same. “There were no good options available. So, we created our own." By all measures, there’s nothing more going on here. There’s no tax dodge, no charitable deduction, no thinly veiled PR - in fact, the Chouinard family have taken a serious financial hit. Chouinard is just a pure outdoorsman, not a business man - he doesn't even have a computer or phone. The environment takes precedent over profit - "I didn’t know what to do with the company because I didn’t ever want a company... Now I could die tomorrow and the company is going to continue doing the right thing for the next 50 years, and I don’t have to be around.” “Hopefully this will influence a new form of capitalism that doesn’t end up with a few rich people and a bunch of poor people. We are going to give away the maximum amount of money to people who are actively working on saving this planet.” - Chouinard for The New York Times It changes Patagonia from being a company dedicated to negating their effect on the environment, to actively pursuing saving it. This year alone, that will likely mean around $100 Million in profit donated to environmental causes. "Earth is now our only shareholder" - Yvon Chouinard