Archive of "Questions" Category
Building a brand
This is not an easy task…
Lately I have spent most of my time telling the story of one village coffee and sampling to people who have yet to tasted the brew.
Here is what I have found:
People want to support something more than a product. The people who use their spending power to buy One Village are doing it out of a desire to build a community of change.
When I was a youth pastor I was trying to build a brand of my own image, I now find myself working inside a market around the idea of using commerce to solve social problems. The problem we are directly involved with is that of poverty.
The question that pleagues people much smarter than me: Why does Capitalism not work in underdeveloped countries?
I have my beliefs which are limited to my experience an understanding, coming from a white middle class perspective. Although my struggles have mostly been interpersonal or pyschological, I have had the luxury of such a challenge, when most of the world is looking for food.
Now a large majority of Americans are looking for work.
The tension I feel in building a brand that represents social change + value given to poor communities. Life valued as human dignity and value quantitatively given outside the realm of the traditional bottom line.
This is the tension of building a brand like One Village Coffee. A brand that needs others to believe in outside of myself. People who purchase the coffee and tell the story is a desire. The role I play in our collective, is becoming increasingly important and here are the questions I have:
Who are the people who want to do this with us?
Where are the channels of networks that will help to grow this cause across our country?
How do I mobolize, those who are involved and want to be involved in a greater way?
Random thoughts for the way home
I drive three to five days out of the week for my job. I go anywhere from Lehigh, Princeton, Philly, and Wilmington.
I see a lot of changes when drive…
Today I noticed several business’s closing. One of them was a theater, the other was a furniture store. (Why do furniture stores always go out of business?)
My answer is, IKEA.
Recently I furnished my living room with the gift from George Bush for all of those who support the war or pay taxes. Actually I do not know why we got money, but like a consumer I went and spent it.
This is the first time in my life my wife, Andrea and I furnished a room in one of our space with stuff we like. In the past we would fill it with stuff we thought we should buy, like a good married couple. Tonight one of my friends was over and he said, “your apartment does not feel like a married couple lives here. It feels like one of you are single.” I later commented that I am not sure if he meant that is a positive or negative. I guess we no longer fill our space with “married” peoples stuff.
Space matters, and if I am going to live in it, I would like to enjoy where I live. (hey look I am even blogging because of the space I am in right now)
Let the “No” define you and the “Yes” inspire…
I can not stop thinking about how good it felt after a sales meeting when a president of a local grocery store said, “I can not go with your coffee because It would be like shooting myself in the head.” What he was saying in my perspective is: you do not represent what I want.
Stop for just one min and contemplate that:
“Your product is not what I want.”
This is a phrase communicated though out the day in the economy of people. We are communicating all the time about what we want and what we do not want.
“Let the No define you and the Yes inspire you…” rang in my ear as I walked out that meeting late one night.
What people want defines who they are. When we cloud what we want with words from another vocabulary we miscommunicate to people. When we do not say what we mean we miscommunicate and confuse others. Then we become frustrated by the no, the passive aggressive no.
The metaphor of product as people is a bit controversial, and I enjoy entering in the conversation of consumerism a “buzz” word that interests me.
Here is what I hear when I listen to people talking about consumerism as bad.
I hear:
“you must watch what you buy”
“scrutinize every purchase”
“become a conservationist”
“don’t buy certain things”
I hear a generalization of the natural order of society, which is production and consumption.
I am a producer and people I sell to are consumers or customers. In order to make a transaction I need to connect to the basic need of that person, to consume what I produce.
What I am saying is this, most people are extremely picky about what they buy or do not buy, and in doing so, put people in catagories intentionally or unintentionally by what they buy. The conversation I have been apart of is more about categorizing people than it is about responsibility.
Here are some questions:
Is it more sustainable or socially responsible for a low income family to shop at Walmart?
Can the only middle and upper class families shop green?
A reflection on communion as talked about in the gospels/acts.
Jesus used the consumption language in communion and it dumbfounds me to this day.
Are we suppose to consume relationships?
Are we missing the point of relationships by categorizing people by what they consume?
For example:
Do we love overweight people less? (they consume a lot of food, right?)
Do we judge someone who wares a t-shirt that represents something we resent.
Have our judgments become resentments leading to categories for people? Affect they way we treat others.
Here is what I have observed.
People are starting to judge others and make cases against others,
The question being asked is who is in and out of their community.
Who is lost and does not get it?
Are they worth talking to and listening to what they say?
Is what they represent not what you are looking for and therefor like shooting yourself in the head?
Here is what I know:
Jesus brought those outside of the religious community in, and he even consumed or took part in unholly things, like wine and healing on the sabbath. I like how confusing Jesus becomes when we put him in our context and I like how simple the gospel becomes when we look at the gospel story literally.
Side note: I hope this was as fun to read as it was to write
