it's in your nature

Employee Insights

Updates from the bottom rung

Karin Allen

Cabela’s Outfitter • Gifts & Fudge - Grand Junction • April 4, 2013

“IT’S IN YOUR NATURE                                                           to treasure the same world and relish the same experiences as our customers, so we can enjoy all that nature has to offer, share it with our families and our children and help it thrive for tomorrow.”

It’s in your nature

to believe the outdoors should be protected

CORE VALUE: EXCELLENCE IN PERFORMANCE

This is an expression of who we are as a company, and what we believe.

I don’t hunt or fish, but I have gotten up before light when it feels like 10 below wondering what the heck possessed me to do it.... until we finally launched the rafts and I felt the pull of the current and the silence of the wild.  I’ve huffed and puffed my way up to the top of the mountain, grumbling and aching, trying to keep up with the boys with 6 foot long legs. Why?  I’m a total sucker for standing at the top, seeing the rugged peaks stretch on for miles with no signs of human intervention.  I get it... it’s in MY nature.

So can we just recycle as corporate policy already??

I was filling out my compass survey last month.  At the end you can list ideas or suggestions and I put down what came to mind then hit the “done” button.  I picked up the 8 1/2  X 11 envelope and the full page card stock paper that had my several digit user code on it and placed it in the trash can overflowing with the same and  thought, “drat, I was going to put recycling on that list”.  It was too late, so I thought I’d mention it here.

Every day we toss a huge amount of plastic bags away from new product that comes in the back door.  Every day we use tons of non recyclable styrofoam cups, bleached paper towels, reams of paper, plastic and aluminum containers that just go in the trash bins.  We can do better than that.   A bottom line that is good for the planet, our souls, and our image of excellence should dictate that we buy recycled and recyclable products and that we recycle what we can.  I put cardboard in the baler every day, but I have no idea if even that is being recycled.  Every outfitter I’ve mentioned it to, rolls their eyes and sighs.  Yes, we should recycle, but I just work here and there isn’t a recycle bin so it goes in the trash. 

A Simple Solution:  Let’s get the corporate bandwagon to promote sustainability and recycling

It would be totally doable and not expensive, unless you want to make a big campaign out of it and print up a bunch of glossy cards and flyers and tell the whole world how great we are because we recycle.  Let’s just do it.

On a grander scale, we are building whole new stores all over the place.  Are these new constructions built with the future of conservation in mind?  Green building is the future and it can start now.  That would be something to toot our horn about - zero energy construction, low carbon footprints, etc, etc.   How hard would that be to sell to the customers or the shareholders?

I think it would be one more great reason to shop Cabela’s or to invest (if I had any money to shop or invest, but that is another topic).

P.S. -  If you prefer to have the Insight emailed instead of printed, just give me an email address.