Chip Wilson, the billionaire founder of athletic wear company Lululemon, recently spoke to Forbes about the woke drift of the company he founded in 1998. Mr. Wilson stepped down as the CEO of Lululemon in 2013 and then left the company’s board two years later in 2015.
As background, Mr. Wilson stepped down as CEO in 2013 after he outraged many by saying that the company’s clothing would not “work” for some “women’s bodies.” That comment came in the context of Wilson discussing Lululemon’s sheer yoga-pants production problems and quality control issues.
During the interview, Wilson told Bloomberg TV, “Quite frankly, some women’s bodies just don’t work for it. . . . Because even our small sizes would fit an extra-large. It’s about rubbing through the thighs and how much pressure there is.” Predictably, that outraged many Lululemon customers, and Wilson stepped down as CEO shortly afterward.
Now he’s back. Speaking to Forbes, Mr. Wilson argued against “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” (DEI) policies, particularly the inclusion of certain models in Lululemon’s marketing materials and the brand’s attempt to appeal to “everybody.”
In those comments, he told Forbes that he disagrees with the brand’s drift toward the “whole diversity and inclusion thing.” Continuing, he said he disagreed with the appearance of the individuals in Lululemon’s ads, claiming that some of them look “unhealthy,” “sickly,” and “not inspirational.”
Explaining why he thinks that marketing move is a mistake, Wilson said, “They’re trying to become like the Gap, everything to everybody. And I think the definition of a brand is that you’re not everything to everybody… You’ve got to be clear that you don’t want certain customers coming in.”
Continuing, Mr. Wilsono ripped into Lululemon’s decision to start selling fashion apparel, such as men’s dress shirts. He called that move “appalling,” adding, “[These clothes are] only selling at a high price because of the Lululemon technical products. It ends up being what I call bad profits.” His main grievance was that the dress shirts and like clothing are outside of Lululemon’s wheelhouse and supposed focus as an athleisure wear company.
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“Chip Wilson does not speak for Lululemon, and his comments do not reflect our company views or beliefs,” a Lululemon spokesperson told The New York Post. That spokesperson continued, “We have made considerable progress since launching our Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Action (IDEA) function, and we are proud of the goals we have achieved.”
Explaining the background of the brand’s name in 2004, Mr. Wilson said, “The reason the Japanese liked [my former skateboard brand, Homeless] was because it had an L in it and a Japanese marketing firm wouldn’t come up with a brand name with an L in it. L is not in their vocabulary. It’s a tough pronunciation for them. So I thought, next time I have a company, I’ll make a name with three Ls and see if I can get three times the money.”
Continuing and explaining the difficulty of saying the brand’s name with typical Japanese phonetics, he said, “It’s kind of exotic for them. I was playing with Ls and I came up with Lululemon. It’s funny to watch them try to say it.”
Featured image credit: By KensmRPM 22300 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=107727090