Raising minimum wage to $15/hr was one of my ‘proudest moments’: Patrik Frisk

Under Armour President & CEO Patrik Frisk joins 'Influencers with Andy Serwer' to discuss the company's decision to raise its minimum wage.

Video transcript

ANDY SERWER: I want to shift gears a little bit and ask you about pay because you guys increased minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour in May. Did that come in response to difficulty hiring amid the labor shortage? And if so, did it help? How's it going?

PATRIK FRISK: Thank you for asking that, Andy, because it's probably one of the most proudest moments in my management career when we were able to do this. And we worked for over two years to get to that point. And because we are doing better as a company, I felt, together with the entire management team and the HR team, that this was a moment in time where we could not just afford it, but also, it was just simply the right thing to do.

And it's been incredible because I've been out there. I've traveled across America throughout this entire pandemic. And the change, let's say, in how our teammates feel, we have supported them, not just through the pandemic, where I felt we did a fantastic job keeping our teammates safe, but also, what happened as we suddenly elevated minimum pay.

And it was a big move. It was a 50% move overnight and very unexpected. It changed lives. You know, when I'm out there, I'm talking to these young people very often. You know, they now had an opportunity to go for maybe two or three jobs to one job. They were now may be able to get a car lease payments, so they can actually get to work, right, which was tremendously important to them.

And more importantly, raising the minimum paid was only one thing that we did. We also looked more comprehensively at all of our benefits. Now they have a clear path also in terms of career with UnderArmour. So, yes, everybody is feeling better. Yes, our recruitment also benefited from that because we were able to recruit more easily, absolutely right.

But it wasn't the first reason why. It's something that we've been working on for two years. And we finally decided to stop being incremental and take the final step and make it all in one big go. And I'm incredibly proud of it. And I'm excited when I'm out there talking to teammates and when I actually physically see what it means to them. And I've done that across-- you know, I've been in Phoenix, Tucson, El Paso, Oklahoma City, Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis, and Florida, Orlando, Sevierville, Tennessee. And [INAUDIBLE] been incredible.