Patagonia
If you’re an environmentalist, you vote, right? Not necessarily.
Patagonia’s Vote the Environment
The Challenge: When leaders at Patagonia Inc. learned that 30 percent of Sierra Club members didn’t vote in the 2000 presidential elections, they were moved to do more to get people to connect their passion for the outdoors to their politics.
Our Approach: Fenton created simple yet evocative messaging for Patagonia’s “Vote the Environment” campaign: Cast your vote for the rivers and mountains you love. We advised the company to focus its efforts in 14 cities with the largest population of customers and outdoor recreationalists, and devised an ad campaign strategy most likely to reach the campaigns’ target audience — 18-25-year-olds — in alternative weeklies and college newspapers, to complement its ad campaign in outdoor magazines. We pitched Patagonia’s campaign to retail business and environmental reporters as part of a larger trend of companies leveraging their brands to get out the vote (JetBlue, Eileen Fisher, Clif Bar, Ben & Jerry’s). In the final weeks before the election, Fenton leveraged its extensive network of environmental organizations to drive audiences to see the Patagonia-sponsored documentary, Monumental: David Brower’s Fight for Wild America, and hit the polls.
Progress, Accelerated: The campaign generated nearly 4,000 online voter registrations and thousands more from in-store displays, thanks in part to widespread coverage in places like the San Francisco Chronicle, Miami Herald, Oregonian, Grist Magazine online, ESPN Outdoors.com, Wired, Outside, and Seattle Times, and features on Air America and Oregon Public Broadcasting. Our outreach also helped deepen Patagonia’s relationship with local organizations for future ventures.
