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FeedThe Duke of Down
For most of his 90 years, Aspen’s Klaus Obermeyer has made skiing his passion. And he’s not done yet.
Matt Schley
“Here. Feel this,” says Klaus Obermeyer, thrusting a tightly clenched bicep toward me. He is compact with thick white hair, wearing a shirt made from bamboo, part of a line of eco-conscious skiwear his company designed.
I do. The muscle beneath his sleeve is taut and solid. No surprise, considering a few moments ago I watched him tear through 10 reps with 140 pounds on a lat pull-down machine in his Aspen-based company’s gym, manhandling the weight like a wrestler tossing a lesser opponent to the mat.
Obermeyer works out frequently, swims laps when the sun is out, and skis nearly every day the chairlifts run. This summer, he learned to windsurf in Maui. This December, he turned 90 years old.
Have a down-filled ski parka in your closet? Even if it doesn’t display a Sport Obermeyer logo, it bears his imprint. He invented the thing in 1947. That first parka wasn’t exactly the stuff of high fashion. “It looked like hell,” he says. “It looked like the Michelin Man.” But a student who borrowed it was so impressed he offered Obermeyer $350 for it. “You could buy a new Buick back then for $1,250, so that was a lot of money.”
There’s more. He came up with a formula for high-altitude sunscreen that actually worked. He invented a dual-form boot, hard on the outside with a softer interior. He crafted sunglasses, using a mirror as the external surface to repel ultraviolet rays. He introduced turtleneck sweaters, popular in Europe, to U.S. skiers. Today, Sport Obermeyer is a $25 million a year company.
“We were always figuring out: What is it that is not working well?” he says. “You know, in life, there is always a way to make it better.”
And that, more so than the aluminum ski poles or the side-zip warm-up pants Obermeyer developed, is his real signature: maintaining faith in the positive, uncovering the Zen within the zipper, finding joy in carving a fresh set of tracks on the first run of the day. Obermeyer’s approach to business, and to life, reflects his approach to skiing. Ignore friction. Embrace momentum. Eliminate doubt. Never fear. Not on the mountain, not in life.
In winter, if it snows at least six inches, employees hit the slopes, no questions asked. “Shared fun is twice the fun,” he says. “So we want them to ski. Six inches, everybody can go in the morning. What the hell.”
This year has been tough, but Obermeyer sees an upside. He has used the downturn to woo talented executives who otherwise wouldn’t be available. “We’re bringing about a rebirth of the company,” he says. “No problem comes without an opportunity attached to it.” And he’s well aware of the need to innovate. His company marries function with fashion: ski jackets that stretch in every direction, built-in fleece chin protectors — all in the name of fun.
“Skiing combines the speed and the beauty of the woods,” he says. “The trees with snow on them, some look like little dwarves. It’s a fairytale land. The snow sparkles, and you can play in that beauty. Wow.”
