If you caught the Oscars last night, you would have seen that FREE SOLO, the documentary film featuring Alex Honnold's epic climb of Yosemite's El Capitan, won the Oscar for Best Documentary.
Dory Trimble, a long time member here at Work Hive, is the executive director of Alex's nonprofit, The Honnold Foundation, which is dedicated to addressing socioeconomic inequality by promoting solar power initiatives in underserved communities all over the world.
The Oscar win rides an already enormous wave of acclaim both for Alex himself as a professional rock climber as well as in the form of support for his foundation.
In her post as executive director, Dory faces that popularity boost as the nonprofit's one-woman marketing, PR, partnerships, and finance department. She is also the brand manager, spokeswoman, and outreach coordinator.
BEGINNINGS
Despite his many sponsorships and his celebrity status in the outdoor industry, Alex started the Honnold Foundation in order to talk about something other than climbing: his passion for equality, fairness, and environmental sustainability.
The foundation was created in 2012 as a small "family foundation" in a lean startup body until Alex's fame began to grow and more intentional infrastructure was required.
Dory joined the Honnold Foundation in 2017 with a background in creative writing, curriculum design, and storytelling, and is committed to making the foundation a much more strongly established organization with powerful impact plans.
"Of course the foundation is about expanding Alex's impact and promoting social justice," Dory says, "but more importantly and simply it is about people around the world having what they need to be happy and successful."
PRESENT
Dory is currently working on officially securing the foundation's 501(c)(3) status and boosting their campaigns to potential brand partnerships who would support the solar power initiatives that Honnold oversees.
"Now that our reach has ballooned due to Alex's climbing, we are focusing on transparency throughout the foundation, including all financial aspects and news about sponsorship recipients, as well as proactivity in response to the huge inquiries and support coming our way."
Dory says that she has had to be so much in reactive mode due to Alex's popularity and so many other organizations wanting to get involved. Her next step is to put proactivity systems in place in the realms of brand partnerships, the vetting of brands and recipients, and continued accountability and communication with all partners and brands going forward.
FUTURE
So far, the Honnold Foundation coordinates with initiatives in Malawi, Ethiopia, Zambia, California, and within the Navajo Nation.
With the success of FREE SOLO and the new gold statue bringing attention to the Honnold Foundation, the list will not end there.
If you would like to support the Honnold Foundation or find out more details about how they provide solar power around the world, head to www.honnoldfoundation.org. For more news and updates, you may follow both the Honnold Foundation and Alex Honnold on Facebook and Instagram.
