Ty Haney Is Back at the Helm of Outdoor Voices
Haney, who exited the activewear brand amid clashes with other executives and allegations of mismanagement, will hold the title of 'founder, partner and co-owner,' according to the company, which was acquired by private equity firm Consortium Brand Partners in 2024.
'It's very full circle,' Haney told The Business of Fashion in a Zoom interview, appearing from a Spartan office in Boulder, Colorado. Haney wore a black zip-up hoodie bedazzled with Outdoor Voices' original tagline of 'Doing Things' written in glittering cursive, a limited-edition item and part of the first post-rebrand drop. If one garment captures the feeling of Outdoor Voices' latest refresh, its a cropped hoodie with the brand's tagline 'Doing Things' paved in diamanté.
'We've pushed the product forward, to feel more bold, evolved and sexy in a way,' Haney said. 'Really, the intent is to reactivate the kind of OG OV lovers, but also introduce this philosophy of doing things and freeing fitness from performance to a younger audience.'
The first collection, shoppable from August 5 on Outdoor Voices' website, also includes aprés-sweat pieces like the striped Sun Shirt button-down, a short set in the 'OG OV fan-favourite' geometric Helios print, as well as performance separates such as wrap skirts and tube tops in what Haney calls 'iPod colours.' The new Outdoor Voices will also be available to shop on Haney's web3 community platform, Try Your Best.
The relaunch strategy, conceived by Haney over the past year, relies on a very careful calibration of new and old; a new logo, designed with the agency Little Plain, that favours script fonts over the former OV's sans-serif, and new styles that broaden the brand's identity beyond activewear to include a lifestyle and lounge offering. To better access the DNA of what made OV successful in the first place, Haney also reassembled key members of her original team including longtime creative director Tiffany Wilkinson, designer Jessica Guzman and general manager Mariel O'Brien. The team will be primarily based in New York; Haney splits her time between Boulder and San Francisco, where TYB is based.
Haney will oversee 'product, brand and creative,' according to the company announcement. She will also be the face and voice of the brand to its community of shoppers as well as in the press. Other new members of the company's C-suite have not yet been named; the brand does not currently have a CEO. Much of Outdoor Voices' first drop contains performance separates, like bike shorts and tube tops, cast in what Haney calls 'iPod colours.' (Outdoor Voices)
Once touted as the future of activewear, Outdoor Voices soared in the DTC era before falling hard amid leadership turmoil and financial missteps. Haney established Outdoor Voices in 2013, scaling the business to a peak valuation of $110 million by 2018. Then came a downswing as the company struggled to narrow losses. In 2020, OV received a lifeline funding round at a remarkably diminished $40 million valuation. At that time, Haney stepped down as CEO but retained some creative duties and a minority stake in the business.
The new board appointed Urban Outfitters alumnus Gabrielle Conforti as CEO in 2021, but the company's nadir was yet to come. It filed for bankruptcy in 2023, abruptly closing its web of 16 stores and marooning most of its employees without severance.
'Bringing a company like that into the world, and then obsessing every second around how it came to life for eight years ... it took some time to detach,' Haney said. 'I'm grateful to it all.'
She said she hopes the brand's new look and feel will reflect her own growth: Haney gave birth to her first child in 2019, months before stepping down as OV's CEO, and has since launched two additional ventures including Joggy energy drinks and TYB, which Haney says will remain her main focus. (In June, she announced she'd raised an $11 million round of Series A funding for TYB.)
A few months before Consortium Brand Partners announced its acquisition of Outdoor Voices in June 2024, its founder Cory Baker reached out to Haney. 'I found that quite kind,' she said. 'He had put no pressure on to even consider re-engaging, but teased the thought.' After months of meetings, she officially returned to her brand in August 2024.
Her comeback was all but officially announced earlier this month, when Outdoor Voices' Instagram page was wiped of its posts and all of its following, save Haney's personal account.
'When I started OV, the vision was to build the number one recreation brand,' Haney said. 'That lane still feels wide open.'
Learn more:
Outdoor Voices' Founder Raises Series A for New Start-Up
Ty Haney's rewards platform Try Your Best, which counts Rare Beauty and Glossier as clients, raised an $11 million Series A as brands rev up their community building strategies.
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Outdoor Voices 1.0 was earnest, it was friendly, it made the pursuit of health feel fun. It was, in many ways, an ur-millennial brand, free of irony and determinedly welcoming. But it worked the first time because it was — to borrow a then-buzzword — disruptive. Now Haney faces the tricky assignment of once again standing out in an athleisure market over which Outdoor Voices has undeniably exerted an influence. Back in 2013, workout gear was 'like, shiny black Spandex and superhuman-looking,' Haney told me this week. 'I wanted to go the other way, with neutrals and texture, things that would integrate nicely into your daily wardrobe.' So in the early years, Outdoor Voices' matte color palette largely consisted of light, creamy hues called 'oatmeal' and 'ash' and 'beach' and 'white sand.' Even the more saturated tones had names such as 'dandelion' and 'evergreen,' and the high neck- and waistlines of most OV garments gave even their body-hugging high-compression workout sets a sweetly modest affect. Today, if something gets described, or derided, as 'millennial-coded,' chances are it looks like Outdoor Voices: 'It definitely set the tone in a lot of ways for that era, in terms of, like, 'clean and simple,'' Haney said, then added, laughing, 'and sans serif.' At the time, its conviction that exercise didn't have to be punishing — Haney fondly remembers an ad campaign built entirely around dog-walking — won over legions of shoppers. More came into the fold when the brand began offering community events such as group hikes and fun runs. And still others, myself (25 at the time, married only to my gym membership, regularly washing sweaty yoga clothes to the point of disintegration) included, got converted just by the shocking durability of the clothes. Technical apparel for recreation, indeed. In some ways, 2025 America might seem like a perfect climate for the return of OG OV. Gen Z women are carrying their Owala FreeSip water bottles (gentle colors, sans serif font) to the Pilates studio after work instead of meeting up for happy hour. Now, though, the athleisure market is flooded with Exercise Dress copycats and candy-colored two-piece compression sets. (And the latter feel 'a little tired,' Haney quipped.) Not to mention brand-sponsored run clubs and yoga events. After the announcement of Haney's return, Outdoor Voices released the first preview image of her new collection: a black zip-up hoodie with a cursive, bedazzled 'Doing Things,' a notion that would have sounded like parody — or blasphemy — in 2015, given Outdoor Voices' famously understated look at the time. But a decade later, as Gen Z gleefully revives the gaudy, goofy styles of the early 2000s, the concept feels on-trend, if not on-brand. ('What in the Juicy Couture Y2K is going on right now,' replied a chorus of TikTok reaction videos.) Among the other new offerings are looser-fitting variations on the Exercise Dress in black and white, shorts and workout bras in vibrant canary yellow, and grass-green and pastel cardigans made of a cotton-cashmere blend. The collection's single style of leggings is a similarly Y2K-invoking black capri. This new Outdoor Voices has 'more details' and is 'more fashion-driven,' Haney said. 'I think the whole ecosystem of activewear brands has gotten a little bit boring and plain and bland.' In Haney's absence, Outdoor Voices was displaced from dominance by brands such as Alo and Vuori, whose workoutwear is frequently photographed in settings that suggest $300-a-month fitness club memberships and luxe beach getaways ('I am somewhat shocked that the '[fitness as] recreation' path is still so wide open for us to own,' Haney mused) and tend to offer a surfeit of earth tones alongside one or two bolder accent colors. Their muted 2020s color palettes, arguably, are a downstream effect of Outdoor Voices' muted 2010s color palette, though 2010s OV looks Lisa Frank-esque in comparison. Haney wants the brand to once again lead athleisure in a new direction. So rhinestones and capri pants and loud fabrics may be what's required for Outdoor Voices 2.0 to stand out in a post-Outdoor Voices 1.0 world. Still, a certain subset of women might be content to order those 1.0 staples from Haney forever if she were to keep making them, buying back pieces of their youth. 'Outdoor Voices is making a comeback. And it feels like 2019 again,' one New Yorker rejoiced on TikTok. In Los Angeles, another user mimed blowing cobwebs off a blue 'Doing Things' cap. And one woman who had posted in jubilation in response to 'Ty' 'rising from the ashes' posted again a few days later: 'Just dusted off this vintage, archival, authentic Outdoor Voices exercise dress,' read the caption. In a polka-dot version, she posed whimsically for a moment before slurping her iced coffee and pushing a bassinet stroller out of frame.
