Oil And Gas Industry Trolls North Face With Ad Campaign

 

A member of the oil and gas industry has launched a billboard ad campaign to troll North Face over what the CEO says is the clothing company’s “crazy hypocrisy” on fossil fuels.

Liberty Oilfield Services, an oilfield services firm, is placing billboards trolling the company around North Face’s Denver offices, pointing out that many North Face products depend on the oil and gas industry for their production, Fox Business reported.“That North Face puffer looks great on you. And it was made from fossil fuels. —Your friends in Oil & Gas,” reads one of the billboards.

Liberty Oilfield has also launched a website and social media campaign called “Thank you, North Face” to bring more attention to the initiative.

“North Face is truly an extraordinary customer of the oil and gas industry,” CEO Chris Wright said in a video on the campaign’s website.“I failed to find a single product that wasn’t made out of oil and gas,” Wright continued. “The great majority of North Face’s products, jackets, backpacks, outdoor pants, shirts, shoes, hats, etc., are predominantly made out of the oil and gas that we so proudly produce.”

“So thank you, North Face, and you’re welcome,” Wright said.

The impetus for the campaign was North Face’s reported refusal last year to deliver a shipment of jackets to a Texas oil and gas company. Innovex Downhole Solutions said in December that it was denied the North Face jackets it ordered because it is part of the oil and gas industry. The Houston-based company had planned to give its employees a Christmas gift of a North Face jacket with an Innovex logo.

“I was surprised but not surprised, if that makes sense,” Innovex CEO Adam Anderson said at the time.

“They told us we did not meet their brand standards,” Anderson said. “We were separately informed that what that really meant is was that we were an oil and gas company.”

Anderson called out North Face on its apparent hypocrisy as well, pointing out that fossil fuels are required to produce most of the company’s products.

“The recreational activities they encourage are all ones that require hydrocarbons to make the products, to provide the means to get to whatever activity folks want to perform,” Anderson said. “It’s just so intertwined with everything that we do.”

“I think there’s a view out there in the world that’s increasing that says, ‘Oil and gas are bad,’” he added. “And I just fundamentally disagree with that view in every dimension.”

Innovex ended up ordering the jackets from another company.

“It’s like bees shunning honey,” Wright said of North Face’s apparent decision, calling it “crazy hypocrisy.”

Last year, North Face reported that its revenue dropped nearly 50 percent from April to June as pandemic lockdowns hobbled companies across the country.

Last month, North Face’s parent company VF, which also owns Timberland, reported that recent earnings had fallen short of estimates. At the news, the company’s shares dropped 7.4% to $78.54.