If capitalism were a church, Yvon Chouinard, 67, would have been excommunicated as a heretic long ago. Not that it would have bothered the pioneering rugged-wear-maker, who has always been more comfortable on the rock faces of El Capitan than in the boardroom. Nicknamed "the Tiny Terror" by his friend Tom Brokaw, Chouinard approaches his business like a revolutionary, donating 30 percent of his annual salary to activist environmental groups and radicalizing Patagonia's corporate code with a promise to post bail for employees arrested for nonviolent civil disobedience (after receiving protest training) in support of environmental causes. And yet, by keeping up the quality of its products, Patagonia has stayed plenty profitable without losing its soul. It was the first U.S. company to print its catalogue on recycled paper, in 1984, and the first to make fleece jackets using recycled plastic bottles, in 1993.

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