At the beginning of the year, VAUDE started a campaign that called on all men and women who shared their love of mountain sports to try and become the VAUDE representative to the public. Albrecht von Dewitz is convinced that, “Martina Mrak is the ideal partner for VAUDE because she is confident and enthusiastic in all alpine sports, and shares our values convincingly”.

That a woman should come out on top fits right into VAUDE as a company where women carry at least as much responsibility as their male colleagues, both on the job or up in the mountains. The proportion of female employees at VAUDE is above average, lying at 65 percent.

The newly chosen VAUDE representative Martina Mrak is a passionate mountain climber and she loves nothing more than scouting out those gnarly climbing routes in all corners of the world. She has scaled the “Snake Dike” at Half Dome, climbed the Three Zinns, successfully encountered the North Wall of the Grandes Jorasses and mastered a variety of 9er routes on climbing walls. Smooth walls of ice and frozen waterfalls seem to magically attract this two-time champion of the Pitztaler ice climbing championships. Martina Mrak, sport climbing trainer for the Austrian Alpine Association and ski instructor for the Tyrolean Ski Instructors’ Association, teaches climbing at the Sport Science Institute of the University of Innsbruck, Austria.

In VAUDE’s 2004/05 winter marketing campaign, Martina Mrak will be brought out in style and can from then on be seen in all catalogues, orderbooks and advertising spots. She will also be VAUDE’s woman on the scene, appearing at tradeshows, mountain sporting events and retail meetings. As a mountaineer who puts VAUDE equipment to the test on a daily basis, she will be able to contribute valuable suggestions for the further development of products. In so doing she will pay extra attention to the women’s collection, ensuring that it meet female demands. And maybe she will also serve as an inspiration for other women to lead that next face climb, and go for the moves to claim their rightful place on the wall.