Avery Truffleman

It's really expensive.

It's really complicated.

And I found out, ultimately, it's actually the other way around, that at least in the case of Outdoor Research, who was kind enough to sort of let me in and show me how they work, it's actually the civilian clothes supporting the military clothes, not the other way around.

Like, it's mostly, like, we are supporting them.

Really?

Yeah, they were like, it's 20% of our work is military, 80% is outdoor industry, and they, like, take turns supporting each other.

And I was like, the metaphor makes itself right there.

It's, we are actually much more interconnected than,

than I thought, but there's something about making it this shameful secret that has to be hidden that ultimately, at the end of the day, I went to, for my research, I went to a lot of military conferences that were very upsetting and made me realize how everything in our lives is connected to the military.

But at the end of the day, these are jackets.

They're not bums.

And I think if you have to pick your battles of what to rebel against, there are way bigger fights than keeping people warm.

And so I just think this should not be a thing that companies hide.

I don't think this is something that people should be upset about.

Even though it does play into this larger system, it's not this evil, dark thing that I thought it was.

It's kind of fascinating.

And especially given how amazing a lot of the soldiers...

speak five languages.

They jump out of planes.

They're so smart.