VF Corp. was ranked 12th out of 300 companies on Forbes’ list of “World’s Top Female Friendly Companies 2021,” a ranking compiled by Forbes and market research firm Statista Inc. For the list, 85,000 women in 40 countries were surveyed and asked to rate their employers on criteria such as equal pay and parental leave. Statista also asked women to rate how companies use their platforms and marketing messages: to promote gender equality or to perpetuate negative stereotypes. Representation at the executive and board levels was also considered.
In an article accompanying the ranking and explaining the motivation and methodology behind it, Forbes states that the Covid-19 pandemic has hit women around the world particularly hard. “By January 2021, nearly 3 million women had dropped out of the workforce in the U.S. alone. Worldwide, women lost more than 64 million jobs and at least $800 billion in earnings last year. As a result, the time it will take to close the global gender pay gap has increased from 99.5 years to 135.6 years, according to the World Economic Forum.”
Other companies from the wider sporting goods industry that made it on the list are Puma (rank 41), Zalando (43), Nike (92), Adidas (97), Newell Brands (117), Garmin (129), Hanesbrands (142), DuPont (183), 3M (225) and Decathlon (252). The top 3 companies on the list are The Hershey Company, Southwest Airlines and Miele Gruppe.
