20 Years | By Katie
20 years is an excellent song by Placebo. June 18 was also when I hit my 20-year milestone at REI. I remember it well—landing a career at the age of 18, fresh out of high school. In my senior year at SOTA, I was assigned to REI's photo studio for my 3-week internship. In January of my final year in school, I headed down to Sumner—on antibiotics for walking pneumonia—and filled out waivers, got my picture taken, and printed on a badge that gave me access to the photography studio. I sat on stools behind photographers taking precisely lit pictures of shoes and air mattresses. One photographer even let me model my hand for a sterilizing pen in a glass of water. I watched an environment set come to life as stylists stood around using white sand, dirt, branches, and sticks to make a table look like it was on a sandy shore—all to take photos of a credit card with REI's logo on it. An entire day would be spent by three people hovering over computer monitors, making sure the highli...
