Ryan Gellert ('05) grew up in Cocoa Beach, Florida, a city known for its surfing and miles of pristine beaches. However, after spending years on the East Coast—he completed a bachelor's degree in finance from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and then an MBA at the Florida Institute of Technology—Gellert felt a pull to head west.
"I moved out to Salt Lake City to live in the mountains. It was not a career decision at all— it was a lifestyle decision," Gellert explains. "I wanted to snowboard and moved thinking I would be in Utah for at least a year. I ended up living in Salt Lake off and on for 20 years."
He began working at Black Diamond Equipment and volunteering with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), where he met Clinical Professor Jensie Anderson, who was then working as an ACLU staff attorney.
"I got involved in some work she and other attorneys were doing, giving legal advice to the homeless population on Sunday mornings downtown," he recalls. "She later joined the law school faculty, and I stayed in contact with her. I met other people at the law school through her as well."
Pivoting to attend law school
Inspired by Anderson's work, Gellert ultimately decided to attend Utah Law.
"Professor Anderson had a profound impact on me personally and professionally. I wish there were more professors like her," he says. "I hope law students and alums appreciate the lifetime commitment she and others have made to pursue issues that are important to them."
He also liked being part of a community that was separate from his professional life.
"What stood out to me pretty early on was this collection of people—from the professors to the other students—that was really different in their educational experiences, interests, and focus from the worlds I was running in at Black Diamond and in the climbing community," he says. "The three years I spent at the law school were really transformative for me because of the things I learned and the people I met. I also had the rare opportunity in my career to stop working full time, catch my breath and be a bit more decisive about where I wanted to go."
While he initially planned to become a public interest attorney, Gellert changed course soon after setting foot on campus. "It only took a few weeks of law school before I realized two things. Number one: I was really happy with the decision to go. Number two: I wasn't going to be an attorney," he says. "I felt through the work I'd done at Black Diamond that there was this big world out there and a number of things could be interesting. I didn't have a clue which thing I would pursue—and I certainly didn't see a straight line from law school to being the CEO of a company."
Because he was interested in travel and working abroad, and because he knew he wasn't going to practice law, Gellert recalls taking every class that interested him, including many international and business law classes.
"Law school teaches you how to think in a very structured way, and that was something I hadn't learned previously. I loved that immediately and found that I could apply that in a variety of concrete ways in business, even if it wasn't around legal topics."
Since Gellert had done some rock climbing and travel for work in Asia, he knew he wanted to live there. He studied abroad during both summers of law school, first in Europe due to the SARS pandemic, and then in China.
"Through that experience, I decided I was going to move to China after law school. I pitched an idea to Black Diamond to hire me to do that and developed it into a business plan," he recalls. "I spent five years straight out of law school in China."
Building the company's business presence in China allowed Gellert to put his new legal skills to the test.
"I was involved in everything from negotiating leases to getting licenses in place to hiring employees. It was a full suite of activities at the intersection of business and law," he says.
Finding a foothold at Patagonia
After five years in China, Gellert returned to Salt Lake City and became the president of Black Diamond, overseeing the company's transition from private to public. He then joined Patagonia, serving as general manager of the business in Europe for six years.
In 2020, Gellert was named the CEO of Patagonia and returned to the U.S. just months after the COVID-19 pandemic began. Though navigating the company through that period was challenging—and the outdoor equipment and apparel industry continues to be turbulent as a result, he says—Gellert also led Patagonia through its historic ownership transfer.
"About four years ago, the founders and prior owners decided they wanted to put a new structure in place to give more money to environmental causes. They also wanted to ensure that Patagonia could exist without them," Gellert says. "Ultimately, we put something extremely novel in place: a perpetual purpose trust that ensures the company is run according to their values and a series of 501(c)(4)s called the Holdfast Collective.”
Whatever Patagonia doesn’t reinvest in the business each year is granted to the collective, which gives that money to environmental causes.
“We’ve established an unprecedented structure in American business, and I'm proud of the founders' commitment, the employees who make this work possible, and to have played a small part in helping to steer from a privately owned business model to this new and novel one," he says.
With Gellert at the helm, Patagonia has also been involved in environmental causes in Europe.
"We co-created Europe's first wild river national park in Albania, which was eight years of work. It went from a pretty bold vision—convincing the Albanian prime minister and his administration to protect the river—to co-creating and signing a memorandum of understanding to create this national park," he explains. "Ultimately, the new national park was declared about two years ago."
Gellert says his job at Patagonia is to do the best work he's capable of doing and to leave the company in better shape for whoever follows.
"If I left Patagonia tomorrow or five years from now, the goal is the same: relentlessly building the best product we can. That's what we've been working to do for 51 years," he says.
One of those products—which isn't as well-known as the Nano-Air Light Hybrid Jacket, Gellert's favorite (and what he wears almost every day)—has made a literal splash in the outdoor gear space.
"Every company in the industry makes wetsuits out of petroleum-based neoprene. We spent years and years and advanced research and development dollars and time to develop the world's first natural rubber wetsuit," he says. "One hundred percent of our wetsuits are made from natural rubber, and we've open-sourced the supply chain to all of our competitors. That's a product I think embodies us at our best."
Landing a dyno with responsible business practices
Others often refer to Patagonia as a "leader in sustainable business." Gellert says this is the wrong idea.
"I don't think even today we meet the definition of 'sustainable.' We wake up every day thinking about how we can do better," he explains. "I want Patagonia to be a model for a more responsible version of business, for companies to take responsibility for their environmental impact and solving some of the big environmental issues we as humans have created."
That passion for problem-solving was also the catalyst for Patagonia Action Works, which connects individuals with groups the company financially supports to work on a range of issues throughout the United States and around the world.
"There are lots of volunteer opportunities available, and Patagonia funded and built it to be a place where people can get inspiration and engage with each other," he says. "Yvon Chouinard, our founder, often says that the cure to depression is action. Just do something. If you're feeling alone, find one other person to double the army. Then double it again. Before you know it, you can start building a community and momentum and support."
Reflecting on his career, Gellert is most satisfied that his work has always been about more than just a paycheck.
"I've always tried to do things I'm interested in and excited about and that feel challenging. I'm committed to doing that for however long I continue to work," he says. "I'm proud to look back over the last 30 years and say that I took a big swing."