In his book, The Hippie Guide to Climbing the Corporate Ladder & Other Mountains: How JanSport makes it happen, Skip takes you from the earliest days of JanSport (with headquarters above an auto-shop and a convenient bar across the street), to the thriving internationally recognized brand it has become today.  He recounts adventures both in business and in the backwoods.

Among these stories hide bits of wisdom and advice for the novice to advanced outdoorsman or the assistant to the executive of a corporation:

Following a story about how the classic daypack originated from a school bookstore manager’s off-hand idea…

“The words LISTEN and SILENT are both spelled using the same exact six letters.  In order to really listen, a wise business person remains silent while another is speaking.”

Amidst the story about a photo shoot with a not-so-cooperative Yak…

“Sometimes the only way to reach a goal is to take yourself out of the picture…when I fight that natural it’s-all-about-me tendency by allowing others to step into the spotlight, I ultimately advance and reach my personal goals in ways I hadn’t anticipated.”

Lessons learned from challenges faced during a1984 China-Everest Expedition…

“Anyone can reach their dream or overcome a particular mountain in their life if they are willing to leave their comfort zone, work together with others, do their part with excellence, know their limits, stay ‘on mission,’ and share in the rewards when appropriate.”

“If a prairie-grown, sandal wearing hippie can find the inner resources to face a mountain the size of Everest, then anything is possible.”

Making a lesson out of going bare-chested in Bhutan…

“Our businesses can follow safe, predictable routes others have taken, or they can distinguish themselves by standing bare-chested – the unusual next to the typical.  To stand out in a crowd, we must commit ourselves to the quest of true innovation.”

Admitting that he never had a desire to become the President of JanSport (and never did)…

“Quit climbing once you’ve found your ‘sweet spot’…if in your pursuit of the corner office, you discover that your true passion lies midway up the corporate ladder, stop climbing and enjoy what you’ve found!”

I highly recommend the book as a fun, yet enlightening read for those on every rung of the ladder and every altitude of life’s mountains.

I had the privilege of meeting Skip at the Outdoor Retailer Summer Market in Salt Lake City this summer.  I attended the show with one of our clients, CORDURA® brand, and was able to meet and interview him as JanSport uses our client’s fabric as a key ingredient in their packs.

Meredith and Elizabeth Twins for a Day

Fellow PR team member, Meredith Schneider, and I were twins on Monday. We knew we had the same blouse, but neither called the other to say we were planning to wear it.  I guess great minds think alike!  We had a good laugh about it.

Adidas remixed the Star Wars Cantina scene. How do you send claps over the internet?

Do you ever have one of those days where everything goes wrong? You spill coffee on yourself, you’re late to work, you rear-end a cop at a red light. Well imagine that but with a flat tire on a plane and being in the airport during an emergency evacuation. It’s pretty awesome.

Of course, when I say “awesome” I mean crappy, as you can imagine. My 7:50am flight from Raleigh to Chicago was delayed due to one of the tires having the wrong pressure. Obviously, they’ll need a new tire, because this one is shot, or some such, so they have to BUY ONE from another airline.

Let me repeat: there are no spares on hand and they will need to BUY ONE from another airline.

Ok, that’s cool, do that. Nope. They can’t legally do it. Which is crap.

So now they’re going to fly one in for us on the next flight. The flight that lands at 9:30am. Not too bad. Wait an hour and a half for the next plane, then 30 minutes for the tire to be installed and 30 minutes for us to board. We’ll be off by 10:30. It’s like taking candy from a baby. A baby blue whale that has a lightsaber and a bad temper.

So while people call their loved ones (it’s only 8am here, and we’re all flying to the WEST which means they’re calling people at 7am or earlier) and complaining that United doesn’t just carry a spare tire on every flight, I relax with a thrilling game of Fieldrunners on my iPad. After burning 45 minutes with that (I won, of course), the alarms in the terminal go off.

Maybe it’s a false alarm? It’ll shut off in a moment. Nope. A soothing, computer-generated female voice comes over the intercom: “May I have your attention please. There has been an emergency reported in this building. Please stand by for further information.” Will do robot overlord!

After maybe 5 minutes of that, the word “fire” was inserted in front of the word “emergency” and we were told to evactuate calmly. So like cows marching to our deaths, we all file out the door and onto the tarmac.

A gentleman enjoys his breakfast under Terminal 2 at RDU

Sweet. We have 100+ people from the terminal all huddled on the tarmac now. The building not 50 feet away may be on fire, and we can’t get on our plane which is 200 feet away ’cause one of the tires, the same tires it had just LANDED on, has funky pressure. A short 15 mintues outside and we’re heading back into the terminal, so we can wait for our new tire.

The trouble with all this, is that most of us will miss our connections. That’s bad. So now they need to squeeze us onto new flights that are all sold out. Double awesome.

Maybe I’ll get body-slammed by a TSA officer and I can call this trip a success.

*Awesome photos by me.

And to complete the illusion, Pixar created a YouTube account and filled it with real vintage TV ads, sprinkling in their fakes.

Brilliant.

Lots-O’-Huggin’ Bear will be on the big screen June 18th with Buzz, Woody, and the rest of the Toy Story crew, and in your homes as a plush toy as soon as you click through and buy him for a mere $30. Your kids will thank you.

As it turns out, though, for Latinos Friday the 13th does come on a Tuesday, because in Spanish-speaking countries, Tuesday — not Friday — the 13th is traditionally considered to be the day of bad luck.

Do you see the problem?

People in Latin America are forced to face the purported hazards of Tuesday — though not Friday — the 13th, while non-Hispanic folks in the U.S. and Canada need to navigate the perils of Friday — though not Tuesday — the 13th.

We bicultural U.S. Hispanics, however, must contend with both.

So, you know, yikes!