closing case in 1998, self-described snowboarder and surfer dude chip wilson took his first yoga class. the vancouver native loved the exercises but hated do- ing them in the cotton clothing that was standard yoga wear at the time. for wilson, who had worked in the sportswear business and had a passion for technical athletic fabrics, wearing cotton clothes to do sweaty, stretchy, power yoga exercises seemed inappropriate. thus, the idea for lululemon was born. wilson’s vision was to create high-quality, styl- ishly designed clothing for yoga and related sports activities using the very best technical fabrics. he built a design team, but outsourced manufacturing to low-cost producers in south east asia. rather than selling clothing through existing retailers, wilson elected to open his own stores. the idea was to staff the stores with employees who were them- selves passionate about exercise, and who could act as ambassadors for healthy living through yoga and related sports such as running and cycling. the first store, opened in vancouver, canada, in 2000, quickly became a runaway success, and other stores followed. in 2007, the company went public, using the capital raised to accelerate its expansion plans. by late 2017, lululemon had over 380 stores, mostly in north america, and sales in excess of $2.34 billion. sales per square foot were estimated to be around $1,560—more than four times that of an average specialty retailer. lululemon’s financial performance was stellar. between 2008 and 2017, average return on invested capital–an important measure of profitability–was around 31%, far out- pacing that of other well-known specialty retailers, while earnings per share grew tenfold. how did lululemon achieve this? it started with a focus on an unmet consumer need: the la- tent desire among yoga enthusiasts for high-quality, stylish, technical athletic wear. getting the product offering right was a central part of the company’s strategy. an equally important part of the strat- egy was to stock a limited supp