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Outside Magazine February 2005

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Destinations: Adventure Altruism
Giving Large (cont.)


	Myths and Mountains (Courtesy, Myths and Mountains)

Myths and Mountains
800-670-6984 | mythsandmountains.com
In the 14 years since Myths and Mountains president Antonia Neubauer started the Rural Education and Development (READ) program, an altruistic arm of her adventure business, it has built, stocked, and staffed 35 libraries throughout Nepal, and five more are in the works for 2005. Private donations—many from the company's globe-trotting clients—and local contributions fund the construction of each $30,000 facility.

Nike
800-344-6453 | www.nikebiz.com
Nike gives strong: The shoemaking superpower helped launch the Lance Armstrong Foundation's Live Strong campaign in May 2004, paying to manufacture the first five million yellow bracelets and throwing in a $1 million donation to support cancer research and education programs. And that's just a fraction of the $37.3 million Nike gave in 2004; each year the company donates 3 percent of its pretax profits to some 4,500 social and environmental causes around the world.

The North Face
310-652-8455 | www.thenorthface.com
The company's Global Giving Philanthropic Expedition Program helps people in areas where North Face–sponsored expeditions take place: For every 1,000 feet a team climbs, the company donates $100 to local charities. In 2004, The North Face began offering low-interest loans to Pakistani women working to start their own businesses.

Patagonia
805-643-8616 | www.patagonia.com
Yvon Chouinard founded Patagonia in 1974, vowing to use his business "to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis." Thirty years later, the company is still a model of eco-stewardship. Patagonia donates 10 percent of pretax profits (or 1 percent of gross sales, whichever is greater) to support grassroots environmental causes—since 1985, it's dished out $20 million to 1,000 groups, from the Oregon-based Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment to Japan's River Policy Network. And Chouinard has inspired other companies to be equally generous: One Percent for the Planet (www.onepercentfortheplanet.org), the business alliance he cofounded in 2001 with Craig Mathews, of the Montana-based fly-fishing outfitter Blue Ribbon Flies, now has 74 members, who contributed more than $3.5 million in 2004 to save wildlands around the world.

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