18.11.08

F I R S TP R E V891NEXTLAST

Esprit Park, South of Market
In 1964 aspiring San Francisco designer Susie Russell stopped her Volkswagen on the way to Lake Tahoe and picked up a hitchhiker. Six months later she married that hitchhiker, a tree-topper and Olympic hopeful skier named Doug Tompkins. The pair started a dress business out of their San Francisco apartment with the back of their station wagon serving as a showroom. The company was called Plain Jane, then Esprit de Corp, and later just Esprit. By the late 70s, their sales had reached $120 million and Doug started another business, North Face, devoted to skiing and mountaineering equipment.

In 80s the company renovated an old San Francisco winery (above) into the company's new headquarters. By featuring skylights, wood floors, and Amish quilts on the walls, the brick building gained national recognition among architects and interior designers. Esprit offered their employees then unheard of perks like access to tennis courts, a running track, and a trendy café. In addition employees enjoyed a 50% percent discount on Esprit clothing, subsidized theater, ballet, and opera tickets, as well as free vacations in the mountains and foreign language lessons.

The couple then focused their socially-aware ethic on the expanding business. They opened retails stores, launched Esprit Kids, and published ads using their employees and customers instead of models. In the 90s Esprit placed a famous 'Buy Only What You Need' ad against over-consumption. Another ad asking 'What would you do to change the world?' got 20,000 customer responses.

By 2000 Susie and Doug had gone their separate ways, the company headquarters had moved to Hong Kong and Esprit was in 44 countries, controlling over 3 million square feet of retail space in Europe and the Asia Pacific. Today the Esprit brand continues to enjoy great success and the brand started by a high school dropout and a hitchhiker is the 52nd most recognized brand in the U.S.
[ MAP I-15 ]


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