Tell Kate Oldham to take a hike and she will gladly take you up on the offer.
Oldham, the senior vice president and general merchandise manager of beauty, jewelry and home at Saks Fifth Avenue, is an alpinist who heads to the great outdoors when she’s not hard at work in the canyons of Manhattan.
Oldham first started hiking seriously after overseeing the reinvention of Saks’ flagship beauty floor in 2018, when the retailer moved the department from the first floor to the second. “I felt I had accomplished something professionally and I wanted a personal challenge and reset for myself,” said Oldham. “I felt a great sense of accomplishment when it was done, because it was such a monumental task. When we finished, I had a sense of relief that we were able to do it and do it so well, and it made me think — what am I doing for myself personally?”
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Oldham came across a story in Departures magazine about The Malibu Ranch doing a residency in the Italian Dolomites and decided to give it a go. Her training consisted of walking 10 to 12 miles a day in Manhattan in her tennis shoes, and while that regimen didn’t necessarily prepare her well for the arduousness of the walks involved (“I was the last person up the mountain every single day,” Oldham laughed), she was hooked on hiking.
Since then, she’s covered a lot of ground, from climbing Toubkal in Morocco, the highest peak in North Africa at 13,671 feet, to the Lake District in England, to Durango, Colorado. (Most recently she did the Fisherman’s Trail in Portugal’s Algarve region.) Oldham relishes the challenge and isn’t afraid of an ascent. “I’m a goal-oriented person, not surprising for someone in my job,” she said. “I like to have something that is going to be a reward. When you get to the top and see a beautiful landscape — that’s fabulous.”
On trips, Oldham swaps her Manolos for a pair of Merrell or Salomon hiking boots and believes less is more when it comes to gear. Her favorite place to kit up is REI (“they have great customer service and expertise,”) but she brings her skin care products wherever she goes. “I may be a minimalist when it comes to equipment, but not my beauty routine,” she joked.
Oldham often travels with a group of moms her son went to school with, and she thrives on the camaraderie, too. “There is a positivity that you get from being with your friends in nature. It’s very peaceful and restorative.”
As with business, there are challenges. Oldham suffered from the effects of the high altitude at Toubkal, but she didn’t give up. “It’s like in business. When you’re faced with something that you don’t think you can do, it’s about taking that first step, and then another and another,” she said. “It’s about not looking too far ahead, and instead focusing on what you’re doing in the moment.
“When I first started the project at Saks, I struggled with that. I looked at the whole picture, and thought, ‘I have to take every brand I’ve ever carried and move them and not everyone is going to be happy,’” Oldham continued. “But we did it systematically, one brand at a time, and it was fantastic.”