The North Face is an American outdoor recreation products company. The North Face produces outdoor clothing, footwear, and related equipment. Founded in 1968 to supply climbers, the company's logo draws inspiration from

Half Dome Half Dome is a granite dome at the eastern end of Yosemite Valley in Yosemite National Park, California. It is a well-known rock formation in the park, named for its distinct shape. One side is a sheer face while the other three sides are smoo ...

, in

Yosemite National Park Yosemite National Park ( ) is an American national park in California, surrounded on the southeast by Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by Stanislaus National Forest. The park is managed by the National Park Service and covers an ar ...

. By the late 1990s, the label had expanded beyond outdoor enthusiasts by focusing on street couture and since the 2000s it is regarded as a

streetwear Streetwear is a style of casual clothing which became global in the 1990s. It grew from New York hip hop fashion and Californian surf culture to encompass elements of sportswear, punk, skateboarding and Japanese street fashion. Eventually hau ...

style symbol label. In 2000, it was bought by

VF Corporation VF Corporation (formerly Vanity Fair Mills until 1969) is an American global apparel and footwear company founded in 1899 and headquartered in Denver, Colorado. The company's 13 brands are organized into three categories: Outdoor, Active and Wor ...

History

The North Face began in 1968 as a climbing equipment retail store in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

, founded by

Douglas Tompkins Douglas Rainsford Tompkins (March 20, 1943 – December 8, 2015) was an American businessman, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He co-founded the North Face Inc, Esprit and various environmental grou ...

and his wife, Susie Tompkins. It was acquired two years later by Kenneth "Hap" Klopp. The North Face takes its company logo from a stylised drawing of

, in

. In 2000, The North Face was acquired by

in a deal worth US$25.4 million and became a wholly owned subsidiary. The company was previously headquartered in

Alameda, California Alameda ( ; ; Spanish for "Avenue (landscape), tree-lined path") is a city in Alameda County, California, located in the East Bay (San Francisco Bay Area), East Bay region of the Bay Area. The city is primarily located on Alameda (island), Alam ...

, co-located with its corporate sibling,

JanSport JanSport is an American brand of backpacks and collegiate apparel, now owned by VF Corporation, one of the world's largest apparel companies. JanSport is the world's largest backpack maker, and together, JanSport and The North Face, also owned by ...

. In 2020, the company's headquarters relocated to

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

Fashion

By 1997, purchasers of North Face attire had expanded beyond those looking for technical clothing for skiing, climbing, and other outdoor pursuits to rappers in New York City, but remained only a small part of the company's business. In 2005, wearers of the North Face attire became the targets of robbery in

Prince George's County ) , demonym = Prince Georgian , ZIP codes = 20607–20774 , area codes = 240, 301 , founded date = April 23 , founded year = 1696 , named for = Prince George of Denmark , leader_title = Executive , leader_name = Angela D. Alsobrook ...

, Maryland. A similar trend occurred in

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

in the early 2010s where it became a status symbol, resulting in children being bullied or having their North Face apparel stolen.

Controversies

South Butt

In December 2008, The North Face filed a lawsuit in the

United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri (in case citations, E.D. Mo.) is a trial level federal district court based in St. Louis, Missouri, with jurisdiction over fifty counties in the eastern half of Missouri. Th ...

against The South Butt, its creator James A. Winkelmann Jr., and a company that handled the firm's marketing and manufacturing. In the legal action, The North Face alleged

trademark infringement Trademark infringement is a violation of the exclusive rights attached to a trademark without the authorization of the trademark owner or any licensees (provided that such authorization was within the scope of the licence). Infringement may o ...

and sought

injunctive relief An injunction is a legal and equitable remedy in the form of a special court order that compels a party to do or refrain from specific acts. ("The court of appeals ... has exclusive jurisdiction to enjoin, set aside, suspend (in whole or in pa ...

. After the court ordered mediation in the case, the parties reached a closed settlement agreement on April 1, 2010; however, in October 2012, Winkelmann admitted in court that he and his father violated the settlement agreement with The North Face and agreed to pay US$65,000, an amount that will be reduced by US$1,000 for every month of compliance.

Wikipedia edits

In May 2019, Leo Burnett Tailor Made, a marketing agency for The North Face Brazil, revealed that they had surreptitiously replaced photos of popular outdoor destinations on

Wikipedia Wikipedia is a multilingual free online encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers, known as Wikipedians, through open collaboration and using a wiki-based editing system. Wikipedia is the largest and most-read refer ...

with photos featuring persons wearing North Face products in an attempt to get these products to appear more prominently in search engine results. Following widespread media coverage and criticism from the

Wikimedia Foundation The Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., or Wikimedia for short and abbreviated as WMF, is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization headquartered in San Francisco, California and registered as a charitable foundation under local laws. Best kno ...

, The North Face apologized for the campaign, ended it, and the

product placement Product placement, also known as embedded marketing, is a marketing technique where references to specific brands or products are incorporated into another work, such as a film or television program, with specific promotional intent. Much of th ...

was undone.

Credential stuffing attack

credential stuffing Credential stuffing is a type of cyberattack in which the attacker collects stolen account credentials, typically consisting of lists of usernames and/or email addresses and the corresponding passwords (often from a data breach), and then uses t ...

attack against The North Face's website began on July 26, 2022. However, the administrators of the website discovered the "unusual activity" on August 11 and were able to stop it by August 19. The breach compromised 194,905 customer accounts.

References

External links

*
VF Corporation

founder of The North Face (archived) {{DEFAULTSORT:North Face, The 1968 establishments in California 2000 mergers and acquisitions 2000s fashion 2010s fashion American companies established in 1968 Camping equipment manufacturers Clothing brands of the United States Clothing companies established in 1966 Companies that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 1993 Companies based in Denver Mountaineering equipment manufacturers Outdoor clothing brands Shoe companies of the United States Sportswear brands VF Corporation