1. The alliance between Patagonia and Walmart is an excellent example of a small business and a large business working together to achieve an objective. Do you think the same results would be possible if Walmart acquired Patagonia? Why or why not?

2. Walmart is learning from Patagonia. But what might Patagonia learn from Walmart?

When Yvon Chouinard started rock climbing as a teenager, he never dreamed his passion would lead to the ownership of two companies and a lifelong passion for preserving the planet. But 55 years later, the climber-businessman has joined forces with Walmart—a seemingly unlikely partner—to spread the word that sustainability is cool.

Chouinard founded Chouinard Equipment to make safer, more environmentally friendly equipment for rock climbers and mountaineers. He didn’t like the way previous generations of climbers had destroyed mountain environments. Patagonia, founded in 1972, offered the “soft” side of the outdoors—specialized clothing, boots, packs, luggage, and other gear. From the very beginning, Chouinard and his design team worked hard to develop products whose materials and manufacturing processes were eco-friendly. “The reason I am in business is I want to protect what I love,” Chouinard explains. “I used to spend 250 days a year sleeping on the ground. I’ve climbed on every continent. I’m old enough to have seen the destruction.”

In fact, in the mid-1990s Chouinard discovered that the cotton Patagonia was using for many of its garments came from industrial farms that used toxic chemicals. His response was swift and definite. He gave his company just 18 months to change completely to organic cotton. Chouinard has also been successful at persuading other businesses to go green.

For the past few years, Chouinard’s team has been working with Walmart to develop a sustainability index for its products, sharing valuable information that Patagonia has gained over the years. Walmart is 1,300 times as large as Patagonia, but Patagonia has knowledge and experience that Walmart can use to reinvent itself as an environmentally responsible firm. Chouinard doesn’t mind sharing with a company that has such a monumental impact on the marketplace as well as the planet. And Walmart officials are eager to learn. The company plans to post scorecards in its stores, rating products on eco-friendliness and social impact. And it is developing a system to give preference to suppliers who comply with these steps. At one conference of Walmart buyers and executives, Chouinard pointed out that Walmart’s use of little LED lights in its stores—which seem to use minimal energy—actually requires 19 plants in California to power them. At this statement, a Walmart buyer stood in the audience and shouted, “We’re going to get rid of those!”