JanSport and Skip Yowell...one in the same

Howard Schulz did not create Starbucks. He took a good idea about selling specialty coffee, made it great and turned it into a worldwide brand.

Skip Yowell did exactly the same thing for backpacks and the outdoor industry. His cousin Murray won a design award for a pack frame, used his cash prize to start making packs and named the company after his wife-to-be, Jan. Skip showed up from the plains of Kansas, sold those packs to REI and other outdoor retailers and spent the next four decades putting packs and JanSport-branded gear on people all over the world.

Skip died last week and we're all lesser for it. He was a great friend, colleague, innovator and supporter of the outdoor experience to those of us who knew him well.  He was a quiet leader. The impact of his influence was felt throughout the outdoor industry and he touched every facet.

"Genuine" and "Authentic" were two of Skip's favorite words and they fit him to a "T". Just two years after he and Murray started the company, I met Skip and our decades-long relationship began.  I was on an acquisition team in my corporate days that had just bought the newly-started K2 Ski Company and we were looking for another product that would offset the seasonality of the ski business. JanSport Backpacks, it turned out, was the answer.

Skip had brought in famed mountaineer Lou Whittaker to test JanSport gear with his successful guide service on Mt. Rainier.  In the ensuing years, Lou became a very important part of both our lives. We are all kindred spirits and our journey together since then has been exciting, fun and rewarding.

There are enough stories about Skip to fill several volumes. As he said himself, "Murray and I didn't want a real job so we came up with a way to have fun and work at the same time." If there was ever a poster boy for "Find out what you love and just do that." it was Skip.

We literally went to the corners of the earth together and that in itself is a great story. Squirreling away canned hams in China to eat after the feline meals we were served. Taking the boss's kids on a bar tour of the North Cascades waaay after curfew. Trekking on the active runways at Paine Field.to the chagrin of security. Getting lost on the way to Camp Muir with one of Skip's legendary "Dealer Climbs". Keeping tabs on the "best tan" contest that Jane and Skip had going year round. My mind is filled with those kind of memories.

Perhaps my favorite is Skip's visit to the corporate office of the company that had just bought the young JanSport. Very slowly, he sauntered through the sea of cubicles wearing a white rawhide-fringed, bell-bottom suit with cowboy boots, shoulder length blond hair, sunglasses and a huge squash blossom necklace that would knock your eyes out. When he reached my office, he said very softly, "Do you think they noticed?" Believe me, there wasn't a white shirt and rep tie that didn't.

Since the recurrence of his cancer at the first of the year, most of our contact had been by email. He was very frustrated that he couldn't travel.  He and I were never far away from our next flight. We had finished our PBS documentary about Lou Whittaker and Skip was trying to get JanSport involved in the production.  He was never down. Always positive. Always looking to the future.

There are not enough Skip Yowell's in this world. People who love life and those it brings them in contact with. Skip was very special. He won't be on the cover of Time Magazine like Howard Schulz, but his memory is indelible in the minds of thousands and thousands of outdoor enthusiasts around the world. His New York Times obit is a very fitting epitaph. The JanSport brand is what it is because of Skip. His wonderful wife Winnie and the daughter he cherished, Quinn, will always have the love that Skip spread to so many coming back to them.  Skip, you put your stamp on all of us. RIP.

http://nyti.ms/1LzuUED