Hong Kong environmental entrepreneur Doug Woodring’s serial start-ups, in his own words
- The founder of Ocean Recovery Alliance talks about being the first among his friends in America to visit Asia and why his background in business is pivotal to his plastic-reduction efforts
My grandfather on my dad’s side was a judge in Pennsylvania. He and his wife travelled the world on cargo ships. They played checkers and dominoes with the crew, visited different ports of call and sent us postcards. Following his adventures gave me the travel bug. I was born in California and grew up in North Bay near San Francisco. My dad was in private financial planning and very outdoor-centric. He took my younger brother and me camping a lot. I was a sporty kid and got into swimming when I was 12. I went to Redwood High School in Marin County and swam and played water polo there.
Going East
Most kids I knew went to Europe for their holiday; no one went to Asia. But I’ve never been interested in following what everyone else is doing. In the early 1980s, when I was 13, my younger brother and I visited our uncle in Hong Kong. That trip got me interested in travel. I was the first of my friends to travel and live overseas. When I was 17, I went to school in Canberra, Australia, as an exchange student and played water polo for the under-18 state team.
Keep moving
A lot of kids that get into swimming start when they are about six and burn out by the time they get to college. I didn’t really get serious about swimming until I got into college, so I was still improving. I went to the University of California, Berkeley and graduated with a BA in political science and economics. At college, I played water polo for a year and swam for a couple of years. The training was incredibly demanding. We did two or three workouts a day, training eight or nine hours. Most swimmers who are really good are tall, so I could never compete at the highest level because I’m not that tall, but I did well when I was young. That inspired me to keep moving.
Intern turns
At university, I joined AIESEC (the English translation from the French is the International Association of Students in Economics and Business), a not-for-profit youth-run organisation that develops leadership through overseas exchange. In my junior year, I got an internship with the Trade Development Council in Hong Kong. After I graduated, in 1989, I got a three-month internship through AIESEC in Tokyo, at Keidanren, the most powerful economic organisation in Japan. I lived with a Japanese family in a homestay. They were great and suggested I stay on and find a job.
