As part of its brand mission to “make outside inclusive and accessible to all,” KEEN announced its “Making Waves” partnership with Outdoor Afro, a not-for-profit organization celebrating and inspiring Black connections and leadership in nature, and the YMCA, the nonprofit committed to strengthening communities. The national program, which aims to impact 100,000 Black youth and their caregivers over the next 10 years, launches with an awareness and fundraising campaign highlighting the alarming statistic that Black children are nearly 6X more likely to die from drowning than white kids, according to the CDC. A limited edition Outdoor Afro x KEEN sandal collection releases April 12 in support of the program and is designed to increase attention while helping to raise funds for Swimmerships, scholarships for swimming lessons happening primarily at YMCAs.

Outdoor Afro created Making Waves in 2019 with KEEN and The Y first supporting a pilot program in New York, Atlanta, Charlotte, and Phoenix in 2021. The expanded partnership will now help Outdoor Afro grow in key markets across the country in 2022. Kids and their caregivers may sign up for Swimmerships on Outdoor Afro’s website beginning this summer.  Each Swimmership provides a new swimmer with a full swim course of 8-10 lessons. Swim lessons take place at local YMCA’s and select community pools. Individuals may sponsor a swimmer on Outdoor Afro’s website. $10 = a lesson, $100 = a Swimmership, $1,000 funds a full class.

Retail Footwear prices rose 6.6 percent in March, according to the  Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America (FDRA). Children’s footwear prices were up 11.0 percent for the month, the second highest monthly increase for the segment in 33 years. Meanwhile, retail prices for men’s (+5.1%) and women’s (+5.8%) also spiked higher last month.

‍XTRATUF’s ongoing "I AM XTRATUF" content series  celebrates the spirit of those in its community of DO-ERs by telling their stories and sharing what makes them XTRATUF. The story of Florida charter captain Lionel James recently launched as part of the series, joining the previously released stories of professional skier and Alaskan commercial fisherman McKenna Peterson and Alaskan shellfish farmers and parents Greg & Weatherly Bates. View videos from the series here: https://www.xtratuf.com/pages/i-am-xtratuf/

‍Kahtoola, manufacturer of traction and performance-driven gaiters, announced that it has achieved carbon neutrality. In 2019, the brand began the process by working with the Outdoor Industry Association’s Climate Action Corps (CAC) to analyze its greenhouse gas emissions. Starting in 2022 and beyond, Kahtoola is offsetting 100 percent of its carbon footprint by addressing scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions.

With CAC’s guidance, Kahtoola implemented an emissions inventory including energy consumption, manufacturing, shipping, etc. and calculated the subsequent offset requirements. Once an emissions baseline was finalized, Kahtoola partnered with NativeEnergy’s Help Build program to purchase offsets.

The brand says its goal moving forward is to become part of an ambitious initiative set by the CAC to make the outdoor industry the first climate-positive industry in the world.