Meet Jason Kibbey, CEO and Co-Founder of PACT Apparel

Here's another apparel line to add to the list of sustainability champions: PACT. Launched in 2009, the company sells responsibly manufactured, premium organic cotton underwear for men and women. All the while dishing up 10 percent of sales to their non-profit partners like Oceana and Global Green USA. The undies aren't just green; they're gorgeously sexy with big shot designers like Yves Behar creating the collections.

So who made the idea of eco-friendly intimates a reality? PACT's CEO and Co-Founder Jason Kibbey. As a first year MBA student at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley, Jason linked up with fellow classmate Jeff Denby. Sharing the belief that business could be both beautiful and give back to the planet in a positive way, they spent the next two years developing the PACT brand.

Planet Green: How did you get into this line of work?

Jason Kibbey: I've always had a bit of a schizophrenic career working for and helping to start businesses and working as a professional environmental advocate, often at the same time. These two worlds came together when I met Jeff Denby in business school and we started developing PACT.

PG: What was your "a-ha" moment?

JK: After heavy research, Jeff and I became convinced there was demand for a stylish and sustainable underwear brand, and nothing on the market currently met the needs of consumers. When Yves Behar told Jeff and I that he wanted to design underwear for us, we knew that we had to drop our long-term employment searches and start looking for money to fund what ultimately would become PACT.

PG: Who is your green hero?

JK: Huey Johnson. He is my environmental mentor and I worked closely with him for four years at the Resource Renewal Institute. Huey helped protect some of the most iconic places in the United States from the Marin Headlands to the Seven Sacred Pools. He also is a big thinker who put in place some of the most innovative environmental policies we've ever seen--including implementing a 100-year plan for managing California's resources. But he's also someone who never compromises his integrity, always speaks his mind and is a hell of a "salesman" for the environment. He's the only environmentalist I know who has never burned out or given up to get a "real job."

PG: What is your ultimate green goal?

JK: Every product we buy has some impact on people and the environment. I want to make beautiful products that people get excited about. Products that minimize negative environmental impact while making positive social and environmental impacts through embedded donations.

PG: What is your motivation?

JK: When I read things like the IPCC report, it honestly freaks me out. But despair isn't useful and it certainly isn't very fun. At the core of PACT is a commitment that we all have to work toward solutions to this environmental crisis.

PG: What is most important to you, ecologically speaking?

JK: I've worked on parks preservation, air quality and emissions and wildlife corridors. All of these are important, but what's most important is to think of all of the earth's systems as one, and this includes people, too.

PG: What is the most challenging part of your job?

JK: The most challenging part of my job is dealing with uncertainty. Every day we face decisions and challenges that, often, we just don't know how to solve, but we have to make a choice and move ahead with the confidence that we've made the right one. This often includes making decisions around sustainability issues when there isn't a solution available that we feel is good enough.

PG: What is the most rewarding?

JK: The most rewarding thing is seeing the joy and excitement from customers who love our products. Being able to give them a product that they love and celebrate that also dramatically reduces environmental impact--instead of a product that is only "less bad" for the environment, gets me out of bed in the morning.

PG: Of the people you have worked with, who impresses you most?

JK: Rick Ridgeway and I worked together at Patagonia while developing Freedom to Roam, which may go down as one of Patagonia's most ambitious environmental initiatives. Rick approached putting together a new environmental initiative in the same way that he approached climbing a mountain: there was no way he wasn't going to reach the top. I think we need more of these kinds of people working for the environment in everything from business to advocacy--we need to think big and we need to actually make it happen.

PG: What green thing do you do everyday?

JK: I try and ride my bicycle everywhere after I "gave" my half of the formerly shared Prius to my wife. (Not because I'm so righteous, but because I was tired of the responsibilities of a car!)

PG: What do you wish you could do?

JK: Eliminate waste in my day-to-day life--I just took out the trash this morning and had the thought I have every week: "why do I need to make any of this trash?"

PG: What is your biggest eco-sin?

JK: I have three: lots of airplane travel, buying too many bicycles (though generally used), and an unhealthy love of new technological gadgets.

PG: If you could change one thing in the world, what would it be?

JK: Campaign finance reform! While consumers, markets and companies have a big role to play in deciding our environmental future, all of that can quickly be negated by bad public policy. We need to make sure that our politicians represent everyone and not just their donors. Campaign finance laws have done more damage to the environment than oil companies ever will.

PG: What is your best green advice?

JK: Be comfortable with the fact that no matter how green you think you are, you will never be perfect. It's critical to understand your impact and then try and constantly improve it. Don't beat yourself up because you're not perfect yet--nobody ever is!

Sustainability is a practice, not a status or a destination. Any company or person who claims that they have "arrived" at sustainability is full of it.

Change Makers is series of interviews with people famous and obscure who are creating a more sustainable world through their work. Meet more Change Makers here.