Prana Living, Yoga Gear Maker, Is Sold to Columbia Sportswear

Interesting news today about one of my favorite companies:

On Tuesday, Prana Living, a yoga gear maker, was sold to Columbia Sportswear for $190 million.

Prana will join Columbia’s stable of sports apparel brands, which include its eponymous mountain gear line, the upscale Mountain Hardwear, and Sorel, the boot maker. Columbia, based in Portland, Ore., has a market value of $2.86 billion, but its shares were up 6.5 percent in after-hours trading on news of the deal for Prana, and good first-quarter earnings.

I’m not actually sponsored by any companies1, but I often like to joke that I am sponsored by Prana provided I ignore my credit card statements. I love their clothes and basically try to only engage in activities, be it work or play, where I can wear their stuff.

Knee jerk reactions to this kind of deal in the outdoor space are not usually met with a lot of optimism2, but I’m hoping for the best.

  1.  Hence the lack of gratuitous @-mentions and #hashtags in my Instagram feed
  2.  See the Black Diamond, Gregory Pack merger

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12 Responses to Prana Living, Yoga Gear Maker, Is Sold to Columbia Sportswear

  1. Tyler April 29, 2014 at 8:14 pm #

    I’m very sad about this. Prana is one of my favorite companies. I hope Columbia keeps prana true to it’s roots.

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  2. Jared April 29, 2014 at 8:49 pm #

    I hope Columbia takes this as an opportunity to learn from Prana as their clothing is generally considered vastly superior to Columbia’s. If they mess with the prana pant line I might lose it.

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    • Narc April 29, 2014 at 8:50 pm #

      You and me both

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  3. Adam S. April 29, 2014 at 10:17 pm #

    I’ve never understood why people get upset about these deals.. Prana was acquired only because Columbia sees it as a profitable opportunity. And it’s a profitable opportunity because of the products Prana currently sells. So it’s in Columbia’s best interest to continue making Prana products exactly as before – the only difference is that now they have access to more capital, which just means more products, both old and new, designed by Prana. The acquisition is good for Prana, it’s good for Columbia, and it’s good for climbers.

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    • kdog April 30, 2014 at 8:26 am #

      You’re right that it is in Columbia’s best long-term interest to let Prana continue making high quality products. My fear, and probably many others’, is that Columbia will take the near-sighted approach to increasing revenue: keep prices high but let quality drop.

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      • Yogiclimber May 11, 2014 at 4:36 am #

        Exactelly, this is what will happen. I just experienced it myself with my employer:-(

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    • todd April 30, 2014 at 8:29 am #

      Adam I hope you are right in this instance, but usually it goes the other way…
      Most of the time when a global entity buys something smaller like this, they are just trying to buy profit to keep investors happy. If Prana wanted to go global, they would have to invest millions of dollars and it would be several years of hard work before it became profitable to be global. But Columbia can use their existing factories, take prana’s existing line of products, and quadruple it. Then send it out through Columbia’s global infrastructure, and say “look, Prana is four times as profitable since we bought it” and investors are happy. When in reality the product line goes stagnant, and quality control will go way down…
      Like I said I hope this isn’t the case here, I hope they keep the current Prana team in place, and give them enough control that they can still keep making a wonderful product.

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  4. hempdaddy April 30, 2014 at 9:42 am #

    I don’t think the mountain hardware brand had its quality compromised in any way when it was bought by columbia. i don’t see why it would be any different with prana.

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  5. john April 30, 2014 at 11:50 am #

    It’s been a while since Prana was a small operation:

    2005 Purchased by Liz Clairborne:
    http://www.sagellc.com/article.html?a=40

    2008 Sold back to managment team + private equity firm:
    http://www.just-style.com/news/liz-claiborne-sells-prana-brand-back-to-founders_id99789.aspx

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    • Matt April 30, 2014 at 12:35 pm #

      Don’t forget that The North Face is owned by the same company that makes Jansport Backpacks and Wrangler Jeans!

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  6. GHalsne April 30, 2014 at 9:59 pm #

    Prana sold out long ago… Just another brand that REI customers can wear as a badge of “retail identity pride” …….. ” I’m a CLIMBER! Just look, i can prove it with a logo! “

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    • Narc April 30, 2014 at 10:00 pm #

      Ok

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