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In an era where fashion brands frequently pivot to chase the latest influencer trends, Carhartt remains an outlier by standing perfectly still. Despite the brand\u2019s explosion in popularity among urban \u201chipsters\u201d from Brooklyn to Berlin, CEO Linda Hubbard insists the company\u2019s compass remains fixed on the job site.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve really been about the worker \u2026 we don\u2019t try to be everything to everybody,<\/strong>\u201d Hubbard told Fortune<\/em> in a joint interview with Ford Philanthropy President Mary Culler, as the two Detroit-area brands join forces in a multi?year partnership to power what Ford CEO Jim Farley calls \u201cthe essential economy.\u201d <\/p>\n Farley estimated the essential worker shortage at more than 1 million factory, construction, and auto workers\u00a0in June. \u201cToday\u2019s essential economy faces a critical crossroads,\u201d Farley said in a statement to Fortune<\/em>: \u201cStagnant productivity and an outdated belief that a four-year college degree is the only path to success.\u00a0Given\u00a0these 95 million jobs are the backbone of our country,\u00a0we need to change that narrative.\u00a0To help do that,\u00a0Ford and Carhartt are joining forces in three critical areas: workforce development, community building, and the tools required by the men and women who keep the American Dream alive.\u00a0It\u2019s time we\u00a0all\u00a0reinvest in the people who make our world work\u00a0with their hands.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re not going to change it overnight,\u201d Culler told Fortune<\/em>, but Ford \u201clooked at ourselves\u201d and decided there are barriers that they can work to break down. \u201cThe tools are expensive. Transportation is a barrier. And so we have to really start to tackle those things.\u201d <\/p>\n Ford and Carhartt partnering has been \u201cso seamless,\u201d she added, thanks to sharing so many of the same values, and literally being neighbors in the same city of Detroit. Culler said the partnership personally resonates with her, having two kids who are graduating from college: \u201cAnd you see how tight the job market is.\u201d But of course, when her kids come back from college, she added, there\u2019s always a stop they request: \u201c[They] always love to go to the Carhartt store in Detroit when they come into town from school. That\u2019s always a stop.\u201d<\/p>\n The Ford and Carhartt camps know each other well from local volunteer efforts and a long history of collaboration, Culler said, but the cool factor is always undeniably on one side. This past summer, she recalled, she joined the Carhartt team for a volunteer project with Tool Bank USA, building benches for a big park. <\/p>\n \u201cAnd the only reason I knew who the Carhartt people were was because they were outfitted in the coolest overalls ever,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I wanted [to buy] them right away. And then the Ford people, of course, had their Ford blue volunteer shirts.\u201d<\/p>\n Culler described the partnership as a logical union, saying she sees Ford trucks and Carhartt gear on most job sites she visits. The two companies are using their combined scale to move beyond \u201cawareness building\u201d into actual \u201ctactics\u201d to solve the problem facing the essential economy.<\/p>\n This \u201cethos\u201d of giving back to the community and providing economic opportunity is what Hubbard believes makes the partnership so seamless. Whether it\u2019s redeveloping the Michigan Central innovation hub or building park benches for southwest Detroit, the two teams have found immediate \u201csynergy\u201d in their shared values.<\/p>\n Hubbard smiled knowingly as she was informed of Carhartt\u2019s hipster cache (GQ<\/em> wrote the \u201calways popular\u201d brand was \u201chaving a moment\u201d in 2023), but she waved it away, attributing the brand\u2019s crossover appeal to its unwavering authenticity, noting many consumers are drawn to the \u201cCarhartt DNA,\u201d often passed down through generations of blue-collar families. Form is temporary, she seemed to say, but class is permanent. To her point, the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce reported in 2020 Carhartt had produced more than 10 million pieces of workwear in the U.S., making it the largest maker of workwear in the country.<\/p>\n \u201cEverything that we make is work-worthy and we welcome anyone into the brand that wants to celebrate hard work,\u201d she said. \u201cSo the fact that people want to wear it and maybe they\u2019re not, you know, core workers is okay with us if they want to celebrate the people that work hard and celebrate a brand that tries to showcase that.\u201d<\/p>\n Carhartt\u2019s CEO added she never set out to run one of America\u2019s coolest brands, but her winding path from public accounting to leading a 137-year-old Detroit label now sits at the center of a new push to help young people launch careers in the skilled trades\u2014with Ford as her ally.? \u201cWe are a workwear brand and we don\u2019t try to be anything else.\u201d<\/p>\n Hubbard started her career in public accounting, far from the world of rugged jackets and hoodies now beloved by both job-site crews and Brooklyn twenty?somethings. \u201cIf you told me I was going to be selling T?shirts and hoodies at the end of my career, I\u2019d have been like, huh, what?\u201d she recalls, underscoring how unplanned her trajectory has been. She credited a series of opportunities, rather than a rigid master plan, with carrying her from spreadsheets to steering one of America\u2019s most storied workwear companies.?<\/p>\n \u201cThe other thing in public accounting,\u201d Hubbard said, pointing to her teal-green Carhartt work jacket. \u201cYou can\u2019t dress like this.\u201d<\/p>\n Culler seconded this, adding whenever she sees Linda around Detroit, \u201cshe\u2019s always in a cool Carhartt jacket, even on her own. I always wear her. It\u2019s so cool.\u201d<\/p>\n Hubbard shrugged off the compliment, making clear her decades of accounting experience enable her to be a good CEO. (She joined Carhartt as CFO in 2002, after 20 years as an audit partner at Plante Moran, a stint that included a decade and counting on the board of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. After 10 years as CFO, she served 10 years as president and COO before getting the top job at Carhartt in 2024.)<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve really been about the worker and focused on their core worker,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I think that the authenticity of that is maybe what attracts people to the brand\u2014that we\u2019ve stayed true to who we are.\u201d<\/p>\n That improvisational career path shapes how she talks to young people about their own choices. Asked whether she plotted out her rise, she was blunt: \u201cAbsolutely not,\u201d she said, emphasizing one opportunity simply led to another and the real goal is to stay open to evolving paths.? The advice she offered to young job seekers is to \u201ckeep an open mind and think about, you know, just listen to the facts about what the opportunities are out there.\u201d <\/p>\n But Ford and Carhartt are offering more tools to young job seekers through their partnership.<\/p>\n For a teenager unsure about college or a college student staring down debt, Hubbard and Culler said the key is both inspiration and practical support. Hubbard points young people to their \u201cJoin the Trades\u201d portal, built with the National Center for Construction Education and Research, which helps users map their interests to specific trades, find training programs, and see which employers are hiring right now. Ford, meanwhile, works through partners like TechForce Foundation to provide scholarships, wraparound support, and even basics like tools and transportation\u2014often the hidden costs that keep students from finishing technical programs.?<\/p>\n Both executives stress skilled trades roles often pay 25% to 50% more than the median wage and can serve as launchpads into management or even the C?suite. Hubbard said she engaged with many manufacturing leaders at Farley\u2019s Ford Pro Accelerate conference in September, even hearing some stories of CEOs who began as electricians and worked their way up.<\/p>\n \u201cI met a couple of folks who started in the skilled trades, but then wanted to start their own business and they realized they needed a business degree to really run their business,\u201d Culler said. \u201cBut that didn\u2019t come till like 10 years later, after they had been, you know, a plumber and electrician. And I thought that was really amazing, because now they\u2019ve they\u2019ve sort of evolved.\u201d<\/p>\n Hubbard smiled when informed of this editor\u2019s New York-area connection to Carhartt: his father\u2019s favorite store, the dadwear specialty shop in lower Manhattan known as Dave\u2019s. (Just like Carhartt, the unpretentious workwear shop has acquired a hipster cache, for example partnering with the sneaker blog turned fashion magazine Highsnobiety in 2023.) <\/p>\n \u201cI know Dave\u2019s,\u201d Hubbard said, displaying the instant recall of an executive in close touch with her footprint. \u201cI was just there, not about a month ago, visiting with the owners. They are a great customer of ours.\u201d She said the name is misleading, because \u201cthe owners of Dave\u2019s are actually Bob and Adam, but it was originally founded by a Dave, and it\u2019s just really great. It is a great Carhartt experience and just a New York experience for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n #Carhartt #CEO #focused #bluecollar #workersbut #hipsters #celebrate #hard #work<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In an era where fashion brands… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12096,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[4977,8683,3102,529,8682,440,3815,300,105,8685,522,1606,8684],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12095"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12095"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12095\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12095"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12095"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12095"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Ford and Carhartt share Detroit DNA<\/h2>\n
An unlikely path to Carhartt\u2019s top job<\/h2>\n