Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman--Including 10 More Years of Business Unusual

by Yvon Chouinard

so much carbon has been allowed to accumulate in the atmosphere over the past two decades that now our only hope of keeping warming below the internationally agreed-upon target of 2°C is for wealthy countries to cut their emissions by somewhere in the neighborhood of 8 to 10 percent a year. There is no precedent for those kinds of reductions within an economic model that requires relentless economic growth to survive.

What we take, how and what we make, what we waste, is in fact a question of ethics. We have unlimited responsibility for the Total. A responsibility which we try to take, but do not always succeed in. One part of this responsibility is the quality of the products and how many years the product will maintain its durability. To make a high-quality product is a way to pay respect and responsibility to the customer and the user of the product. A high-quality product, in the hands of those who have learned how to use it and how to look after it, will very likely be more durable. This is good for the owner, the user. But this is good as well as part of a greater whole: increased durability means that we take less (decreased consumption of material and energy), that we need to produce less (gives us more time to do other things we think are important or enjoyable), destroy less (less waste).

We live in a culture where replacement is king. We do routinely fix big-ticket items, like cars and washing machines, but primarily it’s easier and cheaper to go buy something new. There are other reasons to avoid repair, including labels that warn that repairing a product on your own will void the warranty or the lack of access to the information and parts necessary to repair something ourselves. These conditions create a society of product consumers, not owners. And there’s a difference. Owners are empowered to take responsibility for their purchases—from proper cleaning to repairing, reusing, and sharing. Consumers take, make, dispose, and repeat—a pattern that is driving us toward ecological bankruptcy.