Heroes in Business - Hap Klopp North Face Founder Interview

Episode Date: January 26, 2024

Hap Klopp founder of The North Face is interviewed by David Cogan of Eliances Heroes radio show amfm. They discuss the story of building one of the most iconic global outdoor brands, and how the great Buckminster Fuller was his mentor and one of the original architects of tents and products for the company. Hap's career spans more than 40 years, and he continues to support cutting-edge product development and the entrepreneurial spirit. In his book, Almost: Twelve Electric Months in Silicon Valley, he chronicles the journey of one startup.

Up in the sky, look, it's captivating, it's energizing, it's Alliances Heroes. Alliances is the destination for entrepreneurs, investors, CEOs, inventors, leaders, celebrities, and startups. Where our heroes in business align. Here's celebrities and startups, where our heroes in business align. Now, here's your host flying in, David Kogan, founder of Eliance's. Thank you, Money Radio, and welcome to Eliance's Heroes. I'm David Kogan, and I'm your host this Saturday morning. Now, if you're not out of bed yet, you will be after you hear who I have today that is being interviewed. Absolutely amazing. Because as you know, each week,

these are heroes, heroes in business. They know no roadblocks. They're ones that create jobs, start and expand companies, mentor others. They make a difference in the lives that they touch and they leave their positive mark on mankind no matter how small or how large it may be, it counts. And today's lineup, we have a hero who is the co-founder and 20-year CEO of a household named American Outdoor Company called, you ready for this, North Face. That's right, the former CEO of North Face. And wait till you hear what he's doing now. Another hero today is the owner of a GIS, an electrical engineering expert. In other words, he started other companies and sold one of his companies to WallStreet.nl. Another hero who's a search engine optimization, who's working with unbelievable amount of companies.

And lastly, we'll be talking with a hero who is the CEO that works with top salespeople to accelerate their competitive advantage and has been with Procter & Gamble executive role for over 30 years. So good morning. Our first guest today is Hap Klopp, who is the former CEO, that's right, the former CEO of North Face. Good morning, Hap. Good morning, David. How are you? There's nowhere else I would rather be here than talking with you.

And I got to tell you too, is that my family and I, we purchased so many products from North Face. So to be able to talk to the person that was the CEO of North Face for over 20 years is absolutely amazing. Well, thank you. I'm glad that you're keeping me in spending money. Absolutely. And we'll continue to buy more.

Now, I also want to give our listeners your website so that they know where to contact you of what you're doing now. And it's almostbook.com. That's A-L-M-O-S-T-B-O-O-K.com. So what I want to do is I want to talk to you about what you're doing now. So share with our audience what you're doing now, because you've done so much for North Face. But what is it you're doing now? Well, I'm doing a variety of things. After I sold to North Face, and it's now owned by the VF Corporation, I set up my own consulting company. I serve on a few boards. One is a nanoparticles company, which makes fabrics that have functional properties that are improved.

I sit on the board chairman of a company called Obscura Digital, which does digital marketing, data visualization, things like projections on the Vatican we did in December. Also on the board of a company called Mission Athlete Care that improves athletic performance by temperature, thermal regulation, has a cooling dial. People like Serena Williams, Dwayne Wade all use it. And then I teach at some universities like Stanford and Cal and Holt University, and I write books. Hence the name, the title, Almost Book. I recently published a book, Almost, and it's about 12 months inside an actual company in Silicon Valley that I was involved in

that was trying to bring miniaturized power to the consumer goods market. And as the title implies, it didn't quite make it. The whole story there is what it's really like in Silicon Valley when everybody is theoretically going to become a billionaire if they open up a business. Actually, 80% failed there, and this is one of those companies that didn't quite make it. But it's an interesting story. It's a non-fictional narrative about it. And as I go through some of those life's experiences in there, I think people will find it interesting.

With all of these things you're doing, you must not sleep then. I mean, it's just you're involved with so many things. There's no time to sleep, right? Oh, who wants to sleep? Yeah, that's right. I love business. I particularly love being around younger people. I'm older, as would be suggested by my resume,

but older people have a tendency to be pessimistic, and they know why things don't work. And young people, whether it's in some of the companies that I'm working with, or some of the young people I met, or some of my students, they're naively optimistic, and it's energizing to be around them, I can tell you. And those of you that are just tuning in, you're listening to Alliances Heroes on Money Radio AM 1510 and FM 99.3. Are you a hero in business? Go to alliances.com. That's E-L-I-A-N-C-E-S.com. And I have the former CEO of

North Face who we're interviewing now. Amazing, and he's involved in so many things. But I got to tell you, I got to ask you, Hap, you've had such an accomplished career. Where did you start? Where did everything get going? What was one of the first jobs, careers that you had? Well, I think my first job was when I was a young kid and I hunted gophers so I could get the tails and sell them to people that made fly fishing lures. So, yeah, how does one go from hunting gophers to then really building one of the most successful companies with outdoor gear than anyone?

How do you go from one to the other? A series of linked recoveries, I think, but I ended up going to Stanford as an undergraduate, and while I was there, my father died, and we had a family company. It was in Spokane, Washington, and so I had a need to run that company while I was going to school. a need to run that company while I was going to school. I did that not very well. I had that old NC2A look, no clue at all, but I loved it. And I decided after spending my senior year doing it, I realized that we didn't have what it took to be successful. So I thought I would negotiate and sell it. So I went back at my standard MBA for a year. While I was in my MBA program, while running the company,

I negotiated the sale, which I concluded at the end of the first year. After the end of the second year, I thought, okay, somebody's going to offer me a job to run their business because I had my standard MBA and I had experience running a company. Well, nobody offered me that. So then I had to decide what I was going to do, and I didn experience running a company. Well, nobody offered me that. So then I had to decide what I was going to do. And I didn't know much about anything, but other than the fact that I wanted to do something great, I knew something about the outdoors because that's

how you spend your life in Spokane. And so I decided that I would try to get something in, at that time it was called the camping industry. I did a consulting project for somebody and developed a business plan, which ultimately became the North Face. And what we did was basically take materials from the Vietnam War and applied them to the general camping business. We took aircraft aluminum, which became tent poles and back frames. We took parachute cloth that became sleeping bags and tent tops and a little bit of funky clothing. And what we did is lighten the load that people carried into the wilderness. And so instead of going 200 feet into the wilderness, which happened in camping,

they started going miles into the wilderness. And women joined the fray because it wasn't a beast of burden act any longer. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. And so that was the basis. And of course, now most of the sales are in apparel, but the heritage is in the mountaineering, backpacking, extreme skiing market. I got to ask you, who is your hero?

Who is your hero? Buckminster Fuller. I worked with him. He's a slots for genius that created an entirely new math, figured out how to solve all the world's energy problems and food problems. And he worked with us at North Face to create an innovative and new tent called a Judaic Tent. But he was the guy who discovered that. If you ever look up his resume and read some of his things, you'll find he's probably one of the philosopher geniuses that has influenced this century and the next century more than anybody else that's out there. Getting to work side by side with him was just absolutely inspirational.

That's great. And again, those of you tuning in, I have Hap Klopp. That's K-L-O-P-P, former CEO of North Face. You can reach him by going to almostbook.com. That's almostbook.com. And I've got one last question for you. Do you think entrepreneurs is a trait that someone is born with or something that is learned? Yes or no? Maybe. I love it. True entrepreneur. Not the exact goes around that's perfect though absolutely thank you so much for being here and when we return

we're going to be learning from another hero who sold one of his companies to wallstreet.nl and wait to hear what he's doing now