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Patagonia Environmental Grants Program
August 31, 2015
Patagonia funds only environmental work. We are most interested in making grants to organizations that identify and work on the root causes of problems and that approach issues with a commitment to long-term change. Because we believe that the most direct path to real change is through building grassroots momentum, our funding focuses on organizations that create a strong base of citizen support.
We support small, grassroots, activist organizations with provocative direct-action agendas, working on multi-pronged campaigns to preserve and protect our environment. We help local groups working to protect local habitat, and think the individual battles to protect a specific stand of forest, stretch of river or indigenous wild species are the most effective in raising more complicated issues – particularly those of biodiversity and ecosystem protection – in the public mind. We look for innovative groups that produce measurable results, and we like to support efforts that force the government to abide by its own – our own – laws. Your efforts should be quantifiable, with specific goals, objectives and action plans, and should include measures for evaluating success. Because we’re a privately held company, we have the freedom to fund groups off the beaten track, and that’s where we believe our small grants are most effective. We support the use of creative methods to engage communities to take action, including film, photography and books. However, media projects will only be successful in our proposal process if they are tightly linked to a direct-action campaign on the issue, with specific goals that go beyond education and awareness.
One priority area for Patagonia grants is protecting and restoring native fish populations and the habitat on which they depend. Our World Trout Initiative addresses this. Click here for more information and to apply.
We fund work that:
- is action-oriented
- builds public involvement and support
- is strategic
- focuses on root causes
- accomplishes specific goals and objectives
- Our funding is limited to: United States, Canada, Japan, Chile, Argentina, United Kingdom, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, Spain, Norway, Luxembourg, Italy, Ireland, Germany, France, Denmark, Belgium, Austria, Australia and the Czech Republic.
We do not fund:
- organizations without 501(c)(3) status or a comparable fiscal sponsor
- general environmental education efforts
- land acquisition, land trusts or conservation easements
- research, unless it is in direct support of a developed plan for specific action to alleviate an environmental problem
- environmental conferences
- endowment funds
- political campaigns
- green building projects
Application Procedure
We accept one proposal per group, per fiscal year (May 1st – April 30th). Typical Grant Range: up to $12,000
Proposal Deadlines:
- If your work is located near one of our retail stores, your proposal will be reviewed by store employees. Our stores accept proposals on a rolling basis, throughout the year.
- If your work is not located near one of our retail stores, your proposal will be reviewed by an employee Grants Council at our company headquarters.
- There are two annual deadlines for this process:
o April 30 (all applications received in April will receive a response by the end of August)
o August 31 (all applications received in August will receive a response by the end of January)