JoAnn Demarc’s 7-year-old JanSport is barely blue anymore.
But Demarc, 51, who uses her backpack to carry items like her diabetes test kit and coffee cup, said it’s still as sturdy as ever.
She attended the JanSport: Telluride Film Festival on Tuesday night in hopes of winning a new backpack and learning more about the company she is so fond of.
The event, hosted by Reitz Union Board Entertainment, featured three documentaries and giveaways such as water bottles, backpacks and T-shirts.
According to Abby Swartz, co-director of the RUB Entertainment film committee, about 100 people attended.
Two of the films shown, “Bag It” and “Man Alone on the Wall,“ were part of the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado this year. The third was a biography on Jansport co-founder Skip Yowell, who was at the event.
JanSport is a sponsor of the festival, which offers grants to environmental filmmakers to produce documentaries they otherwise could not afford to do, Yowell said in an interview.
Yowell started the company in 1967 with his cousin when they graduated from college.
“The idea of starting a business that incorporated our passionate outdoors lifestyle was very appealing at the time when we didn’t want to get a real job,” he said.
