Dom and Her MBA: Year of Learning Summarized

Purpose in life: 
To empower those around me to be healthy and inspired individuals through creating opportunities for community engagement.

Constraints: 
none.


How will I measure my success: 
Smiles and love surrounding me.

The SINGLE bottom line is...

...PURPOSE. 

This weekend was full of presentation both in our COR 530 class as well as the Madonna League presentation. There was a lot of talk of the triple bottom line and even the quadruple bottom line. I kept thinking of Jill's Ted Talk. There is only one bottom line that we should be using to measure our success and that is purpose.  Financial, environmental, and social goals and targets are all set to guide to achievement of our purpose. As Jill Bamburg says "what you measure is what you mange" 

I believe the new regenerative economy will demand transparency of purpose. Purpose is how we will evaluate the businesses in our lives. If a business’s purpose is the highest financial returns to its shareholder this is not wrong or right. It is up to the stakeholders to evaluate that purpose and how it fits into their own lives. If the highest financial returns to shareholders is not what the community of stakeholders desires the business will not achieve its purpose and find that is no longer needed in the business community.

In this Forbes Article (http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/2011/12/21/why-a-firm-has-only-one-bottom-line/)  Steve Denning writes that only a single goal can be maximized. Often the de facto bottom line is returns to shareholders. He challenges business to adopt a bottom line of delighting customers and by doing so business will be making decision that are better for their employees, the environment, and creating financial gains. 

I look forward to reading Jill's future paper on the NEW single bottom line! 

For those that haven't seen this: 

http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/Purpose-in-Business-Measuring-W

Let's take a short break from food and food systems today to talk about bikes. Why bikes, here in Seattle bike-to-work month has just come to a close. Thousands of Seattlites put on their helmets and pedaled to work. This is the 3rd year I've actively logged miles and participated in this event. The first time was probably 5 years ago and boy have things improved in those 5 short years.  I loved seeing all the progress Seattle has made making biking a safe activity! I don't claim it is perfect but it is a lot better. I also think we are getting to a critical mass of bikers. I no longer feel like the odd ball biker that drivers are not used to seeing but rather I'm one of 10 bikes at each intersection. In mass numbers we are more visible and car drivers are getting more used to looking for a biker. I know I feel that way as a car driver.

The advancements in Seattle biking infrastructure hasn't been without cost. The 10-year bike master plan has a price tag of $240-million. While that sounds like a big price tag it really if you spread that over 10 years it is about $24-million a year. The SDOT average yearly roads and infrastructure total budget is around $374 a year. Another way to say this is that only 6% of our yearly budget goes to building and expanding our infrastructure for bike transportation in Seattle. Keeping up the road and the system, we currently use to get around the city is expensive and as the infrastructure continues to age and wear out. It will only continue to cost more!

Many educated people have researched and proven that investing in bike infrastructure is well worth the investment.



Here is a short list of the community savings cities can capitalize on when investments on made on bike infrastructure.

Individuals and families reduce their monthly expenditures on gas
Individuals and families increase their activities levels improving overall health
City save on reduced costs of road maintenance
Retail business near bike lines have increased sales
Car commuter spend less time in traffic saving both time and money spent on gas

This is a short list but adds up to millions of yearly savings easily paying back the initial 10 year investment. Check out these resources of folks who have blogged about and done some of the research around putting numbers to these claims. It's not speculation anymore!


Here are a few blogs that spell out nicely the cost and benefits of investing in bicycle infrastructure as well as a report recent report done by League of American Bicyclist.

http://issuu.com/bikeleague/docs/economic_benefits_bicycle_infrastructure_report

http://www.seattlemag.com/article/10-year-bicycle-master-plan-1

http://bikeportland.org/2008/04/30/magazine-editor-blames-bike-lanes-for-portland-fatalities-7388
http://bikeportland.org/2012/10/25/money-talks-the-economic-impact-of-livable-streets-79306
http://dc.streetsblog.org/2012/05/01/fhwa-small-investments-in-bikeped-infrastructure-can-pay-off-in-a-big-way/

And this is a book that I would love to check out: Bikenomics: How Bicycling Can Save The Economy. http://microcosmpublishing.com/catalog/zines/3664/

Lastly to just bring this all back to food the more we rely on human powered transportation the more we get to eat, the more money we have to spend on good food, and the more we can choose to support a healthy regional food system. bam!

Who is the SEC and why should you care?

My team this quarter is diving head long into the world of securities. For a bunch of die hard foodies this is a new world.  Yes, we even had a conversation that when something like 'what exactly is a security'... For those of you courious a security is a broad term to explain financial investment tools that include debt, equity, and derivitives.  These securities that are created can then be sold and traded on primary and secondary markets.

So when the foodies set out to help farmers get access to more capital through connecting them with investors our has been to make sure we follow the federal rules set by the Securities and Exchange Commision. A quick visit to their website and you quickly learn this a beast of an organziation. Information is layed on information and finding clear cut set of rules you must follow is not very straighforward (and this doesn't even cover any state regulation).

For me it was helpful to take a step back and think about the SEC first in a historical context and why it was created in the first place. The story of the SEC begins with the stock crash of October 29, 1929 and the subsequeant great depression. Shortly after Congress passed The Securities Act of 1933 and The Securities Exchange Act of 1934. Under the act publicly-traded companies were now obligated to disclose investment risk and information about the state of their business. Also, companies in the buesiness of selling and trading securities were now legally required to put the interest of their investors first.

The SEC misison is stated as "is to protect investors, maintain fair, orderly and efficien markets, and facilitate capital formation." Also stated is "all investors, wether large or small institution, or private individuals should have access to certain basic facts about investment prior to buying it and so long as the hold it."

There are four divisions of the SEC overseeing key participants in the securities world. (1) coporate finance, (2) trading and markets, (3) managment (dealing with mutual funds, proffisional fund manager, analysist), (4) enforcement and (5) risk, strategy, and rinancial innovation. The SEC has five appointed commisioners who serve five-year terms. The chairman of the SEC is appointed by the president. Interestly only three of the five commissioners can belong to the same political party.

The years since have seen several amendmends these include:

The Securities Act Amendments of 1975 created the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB) which writes rules governing broker dealers engage in municipal securities transactions.

Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2020 set new stanards for public company boards, management and public accounting firms.

Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 is finanical regulatory reform legislation passed in repsonse to the late 2000's recession. The Dodd-Frank Act focused on these seven three areas: (1) Regulating credit cards, loans and mortgages; (2) stopping banks from gambling with depositors' money; (3) regulate risky derivatives; (4) bringing hedge funds trades into the light; (5) overseeing credit rating agencies; (6) increasing supervision of insurance companies; and (7) reforming the Federal Reserve.

The Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act includes provisions that require the SEC to undertake various initiatives, including rulemaking and studies touching on capital formation, disclosure and registration requirements.

So when I mentioned layers and layers of information when you go to the SEC website it's the layers of these Act's and Amendments makes it hard for the novice to sift through and find the information. There are acts, rules, regulations and exemptions for almost everything that has to do with securities. The most helpful for our project was a section of the SEC focused on small business. In this section we found a lot of regulations and exemptions meant to help small business overcome some of the high cost barriers to presuing capital formation mechnisms.

So I bet you are asking about now what happens if you don't follow the SEC rules. The SEC will either bring a civil action again individuals or organization or enforce administration sanctions. With the recent rise in crowdfunding some platforms because of their structure where forced to register as broker dealers and until they complied with these regulation had to halt opertions.

But don't be fooled SEC is a law enforcement division and will act accordingly if there investigation warrent civil prosectution. There website reads "First and foremost, the SEC is a law enforcement agency. "


So friends that is who the SEC is and why you should care. They rule the land of securities and exchange and yes, you should care what they think. If you don't like what they do or think they should do something different it is proably advised to push for a change in the laws rather than just ignoring them. But hey, who am I to tell you want to do :)

The Farm is a Community Asset

It's a sunny afternoon here in Boulder and I've found myself a cozy coffee shop with free wifi in hopes of sharing some of the reasons I find myself in this outdoor hippie haven called Boulder.

I'm here for the 4th annual Slow Money gathering happening this Monday and Tuesday. Are you're unsure of what Slow Money is all about go check it out!! (http://www.slowmoney.org). Slow Money is about bringing money back down to earth: literally. Both in the speed in which it is invested and deinvested and in the kinds of things we invest money. Slow Money's website starts off with this statement “In order to enhance food security, food safety and food access; improve nutrition and health; promote cultural, ecological and economic diversity; and accelerate the transition from an economy based on extraction and consumption to an economy based on preservation and restoration, we do hereby affirm the following Slow Money Principles....”

I spent some time on the plane ride today reading Marjorie Kelly's book Owning Our Future. The first half of the book is a engaging narrative of how we got to the current state of the economy. While this was much of my course work in the first quarter of my BGI MBA I still enjoyed Kelly's story telling narrative. Once she establishes the big pictures, she goes deeper and finds alternative models of doing business that are happening right now. These included cooperatively owned business, cohousing developments, and community banks. She claims the future of business will be one of generative business. I agree. She claims generative business follows these five principles. Living Purpose, Rooted Membership, Mission-Controlled Governance, Stakeholder Finance, and Ethical Networks. I won't go into detail here as this wasn't the original point of my post, but I think it frames so well why I am here. I want to find ways to create generative business. Especially business focused on creating a healthy, stable, generative and engaging regional food system.

When I think about what is wrong with our food system and why the regional food system is lagging, one of the things that I continually come back to is that small to mid size farmers are not making money. Most farmers I've talked with don't want/need to make a lot of money and do not want luxurious lifestyles but they do want to have enough money to continue to farm and maybe make sure they themselves, and their families have health insurance. This seems to me a reasonable expectation.

One of the issues my project team identified in the first quarter was the lack of capital for farmers. I've spent some time researching this further and what I find interesting is there are actually a lot of fairly low cost capital options for farmers. Anna Richter identifies some of them in her blog http://sustainablepickle.wordpress.com/2013/04/24/financing-your-agricultural-dreams/ when she discusses how a first time farmer might fund their dreams.

I was specifically drawn to two models of financing that are currently available to farmers. The first is a large national network called Farm Credit Network. Our Northwest branch is called https://www.northwestfcs.com/. They are very progressive and funding many local farm business throughout the region. The Farm Credit Network is all lender-owned. Meaning if you borrow money from the Farm Credit you become a member with stakeholder rights and patronage yearly benefits. This is pretty cool and from what I've been able to research they are making a lot of positive impacts in the local food movement as well as simply keeping farming in our region. One thing I noticed they didn't talk about was sustainability. Which is interesting but also not surprising. I think sustainability for traditional farmers may mean a variety of different things, but when you get past the jargon you often find out most farmers are passionate about their soil, animals, and the health of the environment; it is their livelihood. Sadly, the current economic system puts such economic pressure on their business they are forced to make short term decisions to keep their farms operating. If farmers were making more money maybe these decisions would be non issues.

I think that while the Farm Credit is great I can't help but wonder how farmers can pay even low interest rates. With thin to nonexistent profit margins even low interest rate loans can be a burden.

I truly believe that for our regional food system to be healthy and vibrant we need local community engagement and investment. An investment that is made that is about preserving our current and future food not strictly about stock market return rates. What if it become cool to invest or even own a share of your local farm. Something beyond the common CSA weekly box model. In some parts of the country getting a weekly CSA box or shopping the co-op are cool so why not take it to the next level. With increasing fuel cost, environmental degradation, peak phosphorus, etc it is a good idea to hedge our risk and invest in regional food systems. Small farms in our region exist but how do we create community wealth through these farms? This is a questions we need to be dealing with.

I'm brought back to a quote from Marjorie Kelly about ownership. I wonder if some of the answers are around how we think about ownership of our food system. Who is our farmer and who owns the rights to the community benefits farms add to the local citizens. In the same way we as a society continue to push business to internalize negative externalitities like pollution why can't we as a community internalize the positive value of sustainable regional farms.


“..The idea that ownership is a bundle of rights, which can be unbundled and distributed in novel ways. They show that the problem is not the disaggregation itself but the purpose behind it. When the Haroldson's gave a twig of ownership rights to a mortgage lender, which wielded it against them, extractive purpose was the problem. With the community land trust and catch shares, twigs of ownership are given to parties with Living Purpose and in some cases, disaggregation helps create solutions” -Marjorie Kelly

There are conservation programs such as Equity Trust (http://equitytrust.org/) that help farmers, communities, and cooperatives keep farmland in community ownership. While these models are not perfect they do keep the farm as a community asset protecting the lands from the pressures of developers or becoming someones second home.

Farms are community assets and I'd be willing to pay/invest just to ensure regional farms are their for the next 10, 20, 100 years. My reward for my investment is simply the community benefit. I'm in grad school right now and have no money to put my money where my mouth is so this is all very theoretical to me. If I had money to invest how much would I be willing to invest with only a community return? What if there was a slow financial return? or none at all at the community farm stopped farming?

Can we work with farmers to rethink the ownership of farmland that empower the farmer and engage the community?

This is why I am at Slow Money, I don't know the answer but I'm inspired to hear what others are doing and how they are thinking about this important issue.

B2B Marketing: How it is Special

Currently in school we've been learning about marketing strategies. The business that my team is profiling this quarter is a produce distributor, OGC. Since OGC is in the business of selling to other business I've wondered if there is any significant difference in marketing to businesses versus directly to consumers. I found a white paper called “Why is Business to Business Marketing Special?” by M. Harrison, P. Hague, and N. Hauge of B2B International. I found it informative on some of the differences between marketing to consumers versus Businesses. I've summarized the 10 differences the white paper identified here.

1) B2B Markets Have a More Complex Decision Making Unit
The decision making unit in a business to business (B2B) model can be made up of one person acting on behalf of an organization, but it can also be made up of several individuals on a committee or is a decision that will need to be vetted through several layers of an organization that usually involves several different experts i.e. finance specialist, operations specialist. As a result of this complex decision making process a business to business marketer needs to demonstrate a high level of expertise to adaquetly address the multifaceted business decision making unit. B2B marketers also need to be diligent and patient as decisions often take longer to vet. Not every decision a business makes must be vetted through multiple levels of a company. The Risk-Value Purchasing Decision Matrix below represents relative risk and value decisions a business must make. Marketers in the high value & high risk quadrant must often be the most knowledgeable and diligent.

low-risk, low value: Decisions in this quadrant are made often by one person, possibly more junior in the organization. Relatively little thought goes into the decision as there is low risk if the decision is wrong.
low risk, high value: Often this quadrant is raw materials and involve a mixture of technical and purchasing personnel. A low price without impacting quality is important.
low-value, high risk: This quadrant includes items such as office insurance. Purchase decisions are usually made by specialists and purchases. Purchasers in this quadrant are required to have the expertise, such as a lawyer, to assess risk in each unique transaction. Price is not the driving factor in this quadrant.
high-value, high risk: Plant equipment or other high priced infrastructure would fall in this quadrant. Company leadership would be involved in this type of decision making including possibility a CFO, R&D director, Production Director, Purchasing Director, Head of Legal, CEO, etc.

2) B2B Buyers are More ‘Rational'
Business to Business buyers are more rational and less whimsical about purchasing decisions. Business purchasing units are less susceptible to whims and indulgences and more critical about price, quality, and return on investment. While emotions are still relevant for a business to business buyer a B2B marketer is best served focusing on trust and security.

3)B2B Products are Often More Complex
Business to Business products are often customized and need to be integrated into the business systems. As a result B2B marketers need to be fully informed about their product or services. B2B sales, while not always, rely heavily on the technical sale. B2B sales staff should strive to be extremely experienced and knowledgeable.

4) Limited Number of Buying Units in B2B Markets
It is not unusual for even the largest B2B companies to have 100 or fewer customers. This concentration of key accounts means that B2B marketing is very relationship based. Today many business purchasers are looking to create partnerships with their suppliers. B2B are well served to align themselves with businesses that share similar values.

5) B2B Markets Have Fewer Behavioral and Need-Based Segments
While the consumer products to have 10-12 market segments, it is not uncommon for the average business to business market study to produce only three or four. Typical segments include: (1) Price-focused segment - These are often business with low margins and service/product of low importance. “Extras” are not often important. (2) Quality and brand-focused segment - These business purchases are made on best product available information. Often these businesses have high margins and are usually medium-sized or large. They regard product/service of high strategic importance. (3) Service-focused segment - Businesses in this segments require product quality and range. These businesses are often in time critical industries, small to large with high volumes. (4) Partnership-focused segment - Business in this segment seek trust and reliability and regard the supplier as a strategic partner. They are often large, operate on relatively high margins, product/service is of strategically important.

6) B2B Personal Relationships are More Important to B2B
Personal relationships are very important in the B2B markets. It is not uncommon for B2B suppliers to have loyal customers. As a result B2B will spend a large amount of their marketing budgets on developing these personal relationships and retaining knowledgeable technical staff. The B2B sales person is focused on a limited number of quality-driven relationships often focused on face to face contact.

7) B2B Buyers are Longer-Term Buyers
Business are often making expensive and long-term purchases including capital expenditures and technology upgrades. These purchases are both of high value but often require routine follow-up. B2B marketers are also motivated to ensure lasting relationships as there are fewer business accounts about. Again, relationship building with a technically focused sales team is the focus of a B2B marketing.

8) B2B Markets Drive Innovation Less Than Consumer Markets
Business to business companies are much more responsive to trends rather than seeking to predict (unlike the consumer markets). This is because their customers are more clearly defined and trends easily identified. B2B customers have accessible data from upstream that allows them to carefully assess their options before making decisions. This does not imply there is no innovation rather it is driven by upstream data and complete market intelligence.

9) Consumer Market Rely Far More on Packaging
Simply put, packaging is functional and for the consumer. B2B companies resources are better spent on developing relationships and expertise.

10) Sub-Brands are Less Effective in B2B Markets
It is thought that B2B branding has increased over the years. A while a strong brand is important, sub brands and multiple brands can be confusing and even insulting to business purchasers. Values transmitted. B2B marketers branding should ensure its business values and recognize that less is more, and it is better to have a coherent brand that all can relate to rather than sub-brands.

The "Why is Business to Business Marketing Special?" reports highlights the importance of relationships in business to business marketing. Much of the other reading we are doing this quarter about operations and supply chains also highlights the importance of the relationships. When we relate this back to OGC we discover that OGC continues to foster long term relationships with customers. OGC is not a flashy consumer brand but rather has a dedicated sales staff that provides customers with one on one customer service, reliable information and a trustworthy product.

OGC has recently started a ‘brand' of produce called Ladybug that is exclusively grown in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. The Ladybug brand is often joint marketeted with OGC's retail clients. Currently the joing branding includes in store displays that highlight the farmers. This presents a unique opportunity for OGC to add value to its products. While this type of joint marketing does not neatly fit into the 10 highlights of a B2B company above, produce (and food in general) has a unique opportunity for this type of innovative partnership. It is a marketing strategy that highlights the whole supply chain creating transparency, trust, and reliability not only for the business purchasing the produce, but for the consumer who will eventually eat the produce.  






M. Harrison, P Hague, & N. Hague. 2013. Why is Business to Business Marketing Special? retrieved from: http://www.b2binternational.com/publications/white-papers/b2b-marketing/

A day with the Organic Elders....

Last Thursday I attended the Next Generation all day intensive at Organicology. It was a star studded event of the organic movement. I enjoyed getting the opportunity to listen and talk with folks who have been in the organic trade movement for thirty plus years. I was continuously struck by the passion and dedication that these folks have for the organic movement. Many organic leaders spent the first part of their career making little or no money and being told they were hippie activists with no real cause. Now many of them are the experts in their field continuing the fight for organics as business owners, policy advisors, and farmers. Here is the list of the organized leader (there were also many other leaders in the room besides these folks):

Anne Schwartz, Owner, Blue Heron Farm & Executive Committee of Washington Tilth;
Bob Scowcroft, Founder & former Executive Director of the Organic Farming Research Foundation*;
Bu Nygrens, co-owner, Founder & Director of Purchasing, Veritable Vegetable;
Lynn Coody, Founder & Principal of Organic Agsystems Consulting;
Mark Lipson, Organic & Sustainable Agriculture Policy Advisor, USDA, Office of the Secretary*;
Dag Falck, Organic Program Manager, Nature's Path
Michael Funk, Chair & Co-Founder of United Natural Foods Inc*;
Roger Blobaum, Organic Research Coordinator, The Ceres Trust;
Theresa Marquez, Mission Executive, Organic Valley/CROPP Cooperative*;
Zea Sonnabend, Policy Specialist, CCOF & Organic Farmer, Fruitilicious Farm*
*Recipient of Organic Trade Association's Leadership Award - the highest honor given annually to an individual who has shown leadership and vision in furthering goals of the organic movement.

I found it interesting that at the beginning of the day I wasn't as passionate about organic as the leaders in the room. Organic, in my opinion, is a step in the right direction but are not to be confused with sustainable agriculture. What I learned after listening to the leaders (or Elders) was how the association I have with organics is only a fraction of what these Elders believe organics stand for, as well as what they believe the should stand for. We had some inspiring conversation about the values of organics. We all share the same values for our food system: health, social equity, environment, and community. But the USDA certified ‘organic' is currently only addressing the farming practices that pertain to chemicals. This is great, but as I mentioned it is NOT sustainable farming. USDA Organic doesn't address fuel in tractors, how the produce is packaged, living wages for farm workers and the water used. Organics are also not creating equity in the food system. It could even be argued that because organics are sold at a premium they create less equity. One of my big take-aways from this all day intensive was that as part of the next generation of champions we need to continue the fight for both sustainability and equity in our food system. Maybe it will be new certifications, maybe it will be new government regulation, maybe it will be new social services, or new innovative business (and maybe, or rather hopefully, it will be all of these things). We need to accomplish something as and possibly more meaningful than the USDA organic standard in the next thirty years.

One thing that came up often as well was the idea of Organic as a transparent movement. I think our entire food system needs some serious transparency. If transparency is the future, then how do we get folks to take the first step? Who is going to be brave enough to admit their weakness, and the areas that need improvement and risk their competitors taking advantage of their weakness. The business world is historically cut-throat after all.

The Intensive structure allowed folks who have been in their professional careers in the organic food industry for 30 plus years to talk about not only the organic movement but talk about leadership. Questions we got to ask included: (1) what were the characteristics they thought were assets to their career, (2) what where some of their biggest mistakes, (3) what were some words of wisdom they had to pass on, and (3) what they thought they could learn from the next generation. Dag Falk's words of advice stuck with me; to be fearlessly transparent as the biggest asset to his career and the biggest suggestion he has for the next generation. He talked about a current challenge in the industry that is in need of some fearlessly transparent champions. It was around this idea that we need to make sure consumers understand that the USDA organic standard is a practice standard (as in the fruit isn't tested rather farms are inspected). He believes that if this isn't clarified to consumers there could be a backlash and hurt the movement. He also talked about why he was part of the Non-GMO project. It is a project that tests produce and products to insure there are no GMO's contamination. Some of his peers in the Organic movement thought it best to not address the issue of Organic products being contaminated with GMOs. He didn't agree. He thought it was best to be transparent and then provide another tool. The non-GMO project provides customers a verified scientific quantified certification that the product is below a certain GMO contamination. It is actually a consumer tool that pairs nicely with the USDA Organic certificate if you ask me.


Fearlessly transparent. I like it. 

Organic. Humane. Local.

Organic. Humane.  Local.  These are words that are finally seeping into our collective consciousness.  Our food systems problems are becoming a dinner table conversation, a topic over a beer, and conversations with our kids. Big business hasn't let this go unnoticed.  Safeway is requiring all the organic eggs it sells to be ‘certified human.’ In Brooke’s blog last week she posted the about Marriot’s commitment to eliminate the use of gestation crates in its pork supply by 2020(http://bgi-blog-brookebutcher.blogspot.com/2013/01/week-3.html). McDonalds former CEO is creating a new chain of fast food restaurants focused on healthy local food.  Chipotle continues to increase its commitment to locally sourced food.  And these are just a few examples of some of the trends in the 2012 big business restaurant food industry.  While I find it frustrating  that it will take Marriott 7 years to change its suppliers practice or that Safeway isn’t requiring ALL the eggs they sells to be humanly certified I have to step back and remind myself that all work is good work.

A locally supported regional food system will likely depend on these big name convenience and fast food restaurants getting on board with regional. Much of our American diet is based on this idea of convenience (which is another cause I hope someone takes up, Americans need to SLOW down).  In a report done by Andreyeva in 2010 “Food away from home” demand was the most elastic (.81). Meaning a small increase in restaurant/fast food meals and we are likely to just eat at home.  This makes sense when you think about the price wars between major fast food retailers; who can have the biggest $1 menu. But then again, I’m reminded of Burgerville, a Portland fast food chain, with the motto “Fresh. Local. Sustainable.”  It’s a little bit more expensive than choosing the Burger King but I would pick it every time.  I don’t think I’m the only one.  It’s not my ideal food situation. It’s still fast so we miss out on the culture part of food. It’s still delivered to you in one time use compostable containers.  Not everything is locally sourced.  BUT when I used to travel for work and found myself in Portland I loved their bean burger served up with greasy fries and a side of Dr. Pepper!  How do we convince other fast food chains that the price elasticity numbers they see historically are only that, history. Americans are changing their eating habits and providing the cheapest food to ensure you sell the most and make the most money is not the trend of the future.

So while my passion is and will continue to be finding ways to connect people with food I need to be open to ways that the current system can help support and grow the system of regional food that I’m so passionate about. The leaders of the food movement before me helped make local, humane, and organic conversations in McDonald’s board room.  I’m committed to picking up that torch and finding ways that our entire food system is sustainable. It will take combinations of approaches; a multiple of micro solution; and a dedicated bunch of future foodie leaders.


References
Tatiana Andreyeva, PhD,  Michael W. Long, MPH, and Kelly D. Brownell, PhD. The Impact of Food Prices on Consumption: A Systematic Review of Research on the Price Elasticity of Demand for Food. retrieved from: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2804646/

Wong, Venessa. September 2012. Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Former McDonald's Executive Serves Up Healthy Fast Food
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-09-14/former-mcdonalds-executive-serves-up-healthy-fast-food

Salazar, Dennis. 2012. Capitalism Is Alive and Well in the Green Community. Environmental Leader.   Retrieved from: http://www.environmentalleader.com/2012/07/03/capitalism-is-alive-and-well-in-the-green-community/

Safeway Requires All Cage-Free Eggs to be Certified Humane. December 2012. Environmental Leader. Retrieved from: http://www.environmentalleader.com/2012/12/27/safeway-requires-all-cage-free-eggs-to-be-certified-humane/

Vijayaraghavan, Akhila. June 28, 2012.  Chipotle Moves Toward Local Sourcing. retrieved from http://www.triplepundit.com/2011/06/chipotle-moves-local-sourcing/

Agriculture 2050

What will Agriculture look like in 2050 when?   Demand for food is expected to roughly double by 2050 because of population growth and increasing consumption of calorie- and meat-intensive diets. (Mueller 2012). When you consider that agriculture is currently the number one source of environmental degradation continuing with agriculture as usual for the next 40 years could have some significant and unchangeable consequences to the earth.

I’m a bit of an optimist, I do think that by 2050 we will have made some progress towards our looming agriculture crisis. What I’m most interested in at this moment, 2012, is what are the most impactful steps regarding our agriculture practices that will change our current trajectory towards climate crisis. As Mueller suggested in his report we need to stop expanding the footprint of agriculture and become more efficient in our agriculture practices (2012 Mueller). In an article in GreenBiz Gunther reviews some of the short coming of Organic; it takes up more land contributes to deforestation, water is not addressed, and organic cost more. In other words, he (and other researchers) are suggesting organic alone is not a sustainable way to farm.  Maybe the future of agriculture is indoors and up as suggested in an article in the The Future of Agriculture May Be Up.  It is also possible the future of agriculture will rely on convincing the growing population to eat a plant based diet.

As the two artciles written by Gunther in Greenbiz, One titled Why organic food isn’t as green as you think and the other The organic farming debate is about more than just yields, he presents both sides of why organic may not be enough to safe us  but also why organic may be the only way to proceed into the future. I think in the end he is correct, the solution is probably a combination of multiple solutions.  Feeding the hungry of the world is more complicated than just growing more wheat, corn, and soybeans which are the crops that when grown organically yield almost 25% less. Just making us more productive in growing these commodity grains is, in my opinion, not the solution to feed the world in 2050. It turns out for vegetable farming there is less of a difference in yield between organic and conventional. Vegetables are the foods that will provide nourishment (not just calories) to the future world. Food is medicine. If we go down that path of just increasing commodity grains in order to feed our world we are likely to to see increased hunger in some part of the world and obesity in others. Future agriculture should be sustainably grown and nutritious food. Each region needs to take more responsibility to grow their own food. If Americans ate local first, we could relieve the stress that is being put on other parts of the world. I don’t think every item eaten needs to be regional but we need to change the paradigm. What if we each of us adopted the reality that food from other regions is a treat, a splurge, and not what we should feed ourselves every day.  I still struggle with how to market the idea of constraint to a general consumer. It seems telling a consumer you should have less choice is a hard sell. That said, I don’t think it is an impossible sell. It is a path to health and personal empowerment.  Some of us are already trying hard to find  ‘food rules’ that allow us to function in our world of abundance (take for example every fad diet out there: Paleo, South Beach, Vegan.. these are all modern day solution to an abundance problem and often unethical practices in our food system). All this abundance for some while sadly others do not have enough to eat. The future of our food system must be one that values feeding individuals rather than it being cheap. Cheap, high calorie foods are designed to appeal to our animal instincts and look where that has gotten us so far.  And let me be clear, I believe we go here through no fault but our own.

As we’ve heard time and time again feeding our world is not about production (even with a growing population) it is about distribution. I, as well as others, would also argue it is about reducing waste in the system, changing American and emerging economies eating habits (yes, I’m talking about more plant based diets), creating food resilient and food dependent regions, and reducing water and nutrient waste in agriculture practices. Just growing more on more land to meet the current and future demand is only going to hasten our global warming disaster.

 My last thought for today is about empowering women around the world to be part of the agriculture of 2050. This infographic speaks for itself.  

Oh wait, one more. I also haven’t made it all the way through this series made by UC Davis but so far a fair representation of f current and possible future agriculture.  http://www.uctv.tv/series/9-Billion-Mouths-to-Feed-The-Future-of-Farming-652 


Mueller, N. D., Gerber, J. S., Johnston, M., Ray, D. K., Ramankutty, N., & Foley, J. A. (2012). Closing yield gaps through nutrient and water management. Nature, 490(7419), 254-7. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1124363860?accountid=1038

Head, Lee Ann (2012). Why 'organic' needs a re-brand. Retrieved from: http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2012/08/03/why-organic-needs-re-brand?page=0%2C1

Gunther, Marc (2012). Why organic food isn’t as green as think. Greenbiz.com. Retrieved from: http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2012/05/09/why-organic-food-isnt-green-you-think

Gunther, Marc (2012 May) The organic farming debate is about more than just yields.  Greenbiz.com Retrieved from: http://www.greenbiz.com/blog/2012/05/14/organic-farming-debate-about-more-just-yields

Fletcher, Own (2012 Oct) The Future of Agriculture May Be Up. Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443855804577602960672985508.html

Backyard Chickens: Cost Analysis

So in early 2011 my housemates and I got chickens. We got them as little chicks, raised them, made them a coop, continue to feed them, and in return we get eggs. See the post on my other blog (that i don't use often) Edible Dirt:  http://www.edibledirt.com/wordpress/  You'll find some fun pictures and some of the decisions we made when our chickens where just chicks.

Top 3 questions I get about the chickens are:
(1) Do the eggs taste different?
(2)  How much does it cost to get started?
(3) How much does each egg cost you?

Questions one: YES, the taste way better. They are richer and full of flavor. Our chickens get super fancy local feed and they get to run around in the yard eating bugs so the eggs are full of good stuff. Nothing like the store bought.

Question two and three: The following graph is my attempt  to answer questions number two and three. And for fun I've also posted screenshots of the excel spreadsheet I used to calculate the information non the graph.

Some of the biggest assumptions to note are:

• Depreciation and Cost of Money are not factored in my analysis
• Buying new chickens to augment the flock as the current hens age, while a real possibility, is not factored in this analysis
• My value of the eggs is based on the most expensive eggs I can buy at the CoOp ($7 dozen) 
• Labor cost are not factored in the graph (although they are addressed as an alternative break even in the excel spreadsheet) 

Below is how I came up with the numbers.

(if anyone is interested in seeing the excel spreadsheet pdf just let me know and I'll be happy to email it to you.  Below are screen shots of the calculations if you zoom in you should be able to see the numbers, sorry they are not the easiest to read)

Economics in Context

I think economics is a great tool for understanding business and business behavior but I get frustrated when it is taken out of context. Economics is a new social science and had is kind a fluffly science at best. Economics shines when it is used as a tool to better understand our behaviors around choice AND put context. I've always thought of economist sort of like meteorologist. A meteorologist spends his educational years learning about all the different clouds, pressure systems, psychical land structures  etc and how they will affect the outcome of the weather. If you live in Southern California on the ocean you meteorologist often predicts your weather fairly accurately. They can see the storm and there isn't a whole lot of things that are going to change the outcome. But it gets more complicated when you add mountains, other bodies of water, shifting convergence zones, etc. All this applies to the economist.

The fact that if you ask 5 different economist what they think about a given situation and you get 5 different answers is something that as future business people we need to understand. I believe successful business not only considers the economics of there situation but of the psychology, history, science, etc that will affect heir business. I mean really,  McDonald put a lot of psychology and science into that Big Mac meal and super sized the fries!

Economics is not accounting. Accounting's purpose is to track and provide financial information to evaluate past performance and make future decision. Economics is a social science dedicated to figuring out how we as a complex individual make decision regarding scarcity. When an economist makes a prediction or interprets a series of recent events they have imperfect information and as a result their own belief system and education translates informs their predictions or interpretations. Accounts can spin their information as well but it is based on numbers that have been tracked and collected. Yes, 'creative  accounting' is a realy thing but somewhere there are real number gathered. The point is economist are often smart people but they are often interpreting imperfect information gathered from imperfect sources.

I'm excited to continue looking at economics through the lens of sustainability and in the context of everything else that makes us human. Keynes in 1930 thought by 2030 we would have done away with this obsessive drive to collect and gather wealth. I'm excited to continue this search for ways to use wealth as a tool for our overall well being. Economics is just a tool to be used in context.

The Good Life: Ikigai and Mortality ("well being" and mortality)
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-good-life/200809/ikigai-and-mortality

Dan Buettner: How to live to be 100+
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_buettner_how_to_live_to_be_100.html

What is the point of our Food System Anyway?

Is our food system meeting our expectations? What are our expectations? Do we have any? How do we measure and rate the system’s success? Is it a successful system?

I believe these are important question to ask at the individual level, at the city level, at the national level and at the global level.   If we do not put intentions behind our food decisions we are defaulting to create a system that is good at providing cheap, convenient, and shelf ready foods because that is what we are buying.  Unlike many industry sectors you can chose if you participate or not but most of us are not farmers growing everything we eat and thus are using the food system to provide for us.  As individuals we can influence the way business provide us foods and we can influence the priorities that our city and state governments set regarding food, and as cities and state can influence national policy and so on and so on up to the global level.

In the article The City that Ended Hunger (http://www.dailygood.org/view.php?sid=351) the City of Belo Horzonte in Brazil city administrators made a policy that food was a right that everyone should have access to. When the city shifted its goals around food it was able to help facilitate increased access not buy providing more handouts but encouraging direct farmer to city marketing. The City administration subsidies selected healthy produce at the farmers stands. They also created local People’s Restaurants were anyone could come eat regardless of need.  While I have gone into great detail here the shift from quantity of food to the right of everyone to had profound effects on the City. Belo used many creative and innovative ideas because it was tasks with the responsibility to ensure everyone’s right to food.

Restaurante Popular in Belo Brazil

In Norm’s blog The Processed Food Industry And Coronary Capitalism
(http://abnormalecon.blogspot.com/2012/02/processed-food-industry-and-coronary.html) he mentions that a system of “pure capitalism” doesn’t exists because if it did we wouldn't have the big market failures we see in the food system  i.e. obesity and hunger.  If pure capitalism isn't the solution because we live in the imperfect world than it is up to us as evolved human thinkers to set goals for our food system and provide it the intention and direction that it needs. It turns out that just not thinking about it and letting the magical world of business do it for us hasn't worked. This isn't to say business doesn't play a role, it actually plays a huge role it will be the driver and the foundation of the new food system but it will be guided by a higher goal that we as individual have imposed on it.

Imagine if we all decided that our food system was only successful if everyone had access to quality, nutrient dense, sustainability grown foods.  We currently would get a big fat F on our grade card. We would need to create new creative solutions to reach this goal. Food would undoubtedly become more expensive because we would begin to pay the true cost but if we pair this with the idea that food is a right and hunger is unacceptable we will get creative. We are a capable and innovative species... when we decide it matters to us.

THE FARM BILL: policy on your plate

I just got back from grocery shopping. I’ll soon be fixing a meal but first I want to take a moment to explore this idea of business and policy in the context of the Farm Bill.  After all the products available and the prices I paid at the grocery store are directly affected by this 79 year old bill. 

I am currently on the Food Team but I admit I am not intimate with every detail of the Farm Bill and doing a little research for this blog I realized why;  the 2008 Farm Bill was 1,770 pages.  The Farm Bill is a very complex policy document that covers many aspects of our food system not just farming.  The Farm Bill is updated and re-enacted every 5 years. The first farm bill was in 1933 and started by Henry Wallace, President Roosevelt’s Secretary of Agriculture. The original idea was to help mitigate the low prices of crops during the Greet Recession. The government would take of the market the commodities when prices where to low and then resold later when prices recovered. The government was able to make money on this program and many farmers benefited. This also led to farmer instituted grain reserves providing flexibility of when they sold their crops. Today the government pays directly to the farmers the difference of what food processors pay and what farmers need to be economically viable. 

The current and proposed Farm Bill covers many topics, called titles. These include: 

• Title I, Commodities : Payment and loan programs for 20 farm commodities.
• Title II, Conservation : Conservation programs, wetlands protection, grasslands protection, farmland protection and incentives for farmers to improve environmental stewardship.
• Title III, Agricultural Trade and Aid : Food aid 
• and meeting World Trade Organization obligations.
• Title IV, Nutrition : Food stamps, child nutrition and supplemental food.
• Title V, Farm Credit : Farm ownership loans and emergency credit.
• Title VI, Rural Development : Grants for rural businesses and small communities, expanding rural broadband access.
• Title VII, Research : Agricultural extension services, research on all areas of food production including biotechnology and organic production.
• Title VIII, Forestry: Funding for various U.S. forest service projects including community forestry.
• Title IX, Energy: Funding for bioenergy projects and research as well as federal procurement for biobased products.
• Title X, Miscellaneous : Includes crop insurance, disaster assistance, animal welfare/inspections and country of-origin labeling.

The largest part of the Farm Bill is our food assistance program (SNAP). The second highest funded title is the commodities support (see the info graphic below). This support of commodities has many hidden cost including the increased obesity rates in our country. (see info graphic provided by takepart.com)

Another thing I was interested in regarding this current Farm Bill was the expansion of Farm Insurance Programs.  In an article, A Risky Proposition: Crop Insurance in the Face of Climate Change, Julia Olmstead talked about the missed opportunity to tie insurance coverage and sustainable farming practices. Most farmers are interested in their soil health and long term sustainability but often the current system is working against those goals. Tying government backed insurance to the sustainable practices a farmer as incentive for farmers to take the appropriate measures to protect soils, water, and general environment.  This is currently not part of the 2012 Farm Bill.  This is a missed opportunity and hopefully we can figure out other ways to create this sort of incentive. 

There is also, although small, continued local food systems support and recognition of the value of small to mid-size farms in the current version of the unauthorized 2012 Farm Bill. These included programs to diversify crops, support small farmers marketing with marketing, creating infrastructure to help small and mid-size farmers reach urban centers, data collection regarding local food system, and programs for beginner farmers. 

The recent news around the passing of the next Farm Bill suggest it will either be passed by the end of the year as part of the larger budget discussions or the Farm Bill will not be passed until April 2013. The 2008 Farm Bill is currently expired and has not been renewed. 

References: 

A Fair Farm Bill for America: A series of papers on the 2007 Farm Bill. The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy.  Found at http://www.iatp.org/files/258_2_97623.pdf

Infographic reference: http://www.takepart.com/article/2012/06/07/farm-bill-infographic

A side by side comparison of the 2008 and the new 2012 Farm bill can be found http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R42552.pdf

A Risky Proposition: Crop Insurance in the Face of Climate Change. Julia Olmstead. Found at http://www.iatp.org/documents/a-risky-proposition-crop-insurance-in-the-face-of-climate-change

NYT Articles: http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2012/11/10/us/politics/ap-us-fiscal-cliff-farm-bill.html?ref=farmbillus&_r=0 & http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/11/05/business/05reuters-usa-politics-farmbill.html?ref=farmbillus

Creating Community does NOT equal Social Equity

so·cial

of or pertaining to human society, especially as a body divided into classes according to status: social rank.

eq·ui·ty

the quality of being fair or impartial; fairness; impartiality:the equity of Solomon. Synonyms: disinterest, equitableness,impartiality, fair-mindedness, fairness, justness,evenhandedness, objectivity; justice, probity. Antonyms:bias, discrimination, inequity, injustice, partiality,partisanship, prejudice, unfairness, unreasonableness;injustice.

com·mu·ni·ty

a social, religious, occupational, or other group sharingcommon characteristics or interests and perceived orperceiving itself as distinct in some respect from the largersociety within which it exists (usually preceded by the  ): thebusiness community; the community of scholars.

I remember not too long ago sitting around at a staff meeting with my boss and talking about our office values, goals, etc. We are a community based architecture firm on Capitol Hill. A lot of our conversation focused around our connections to our neighborhood. How we, as designers, wanted to created spaces that foster and encouraged community. We wanted to create community that was open to all and full of diversity. As a quick exercise my boss asked each team member to talk about what community meant to them. The answers were as you might expect; support, trust, shared values, shared proximity, shared goals, shared history, etc. She pointed out after we all shared that community and creating community does not equal social equity. Creating community was about finding people that often had shared values and social equity was about making space for everyone within a community.

Let’s take a moment here for a quick history lesson. Social equity is a newer word in the sustainable vernacularly and is popularly defined as equal opportunity for all in a safe and healthy environment. It has gained popularity after the President's Council on Sustainable Development, in 1996, defined Social Equity as "equal opportunity, in a safe and healthy environment" in their report.  Today it is considered vital third element in the three legged stool of the sustainability.

So if a community is people with shared histories, things in common, a family, or a group of friend then it is clear that just by creating community we are not ensuring all human beings social equity.

Creating community can foster social equity but there needs to be awareness and intention to allow all human beings to participate in the new community. I think we as future leaders in the new sustainable economy need to be aware of our own mental models of community as we strive for social equity with in our communities. I believe social equity can be at odds with our personal ideas of community. Community by its definition is about creating an ‘us’ and ‘them’ which is the opposite of a club that everyone can belong to. Before I go too far let me be clear there is absolutely nothing wrong with creating communities based on common histories, shared values, geographic location, etc., we just can’t call that creating social equity. A truly social equitable community would not be comprised of all like mined individuals or individuals who have shared histories.  In the end a truly socially equitable community would likely take many of us out of our comfort zone and challenge our mental models of community. It would be the community of the globe.

I think as individuals and as a society we need to be aware the communities we create and the barriers we place on who is allowed into them. Again, I don’t think we must always have socially equitable communities at every level of our life or at every level of society.  What we need is that every individual and every discrete community has the same social opportunity to have expression in our society.  

I realize this is a long rant for what some might consider not a big issues but I challenge you to listen to the how ‘social equity’ and ‘creating community’ are often used interchangeably. They are not interchangeable.

Oh, and how the heck does this relate to economics you ask.. well let me tell you! Fostering both communities and social equality (and understanding the difference) for individuals, groups, and communities to express themselves will develop positive human capital. Empowered expressive people are no longer liabilities but rather assets to society. They contribute to society as equals making the whole system stronger.

“Social Equity is the cornerstone of Social Capital, which cannot be maintained for a few at the expense of the many.” (wikipeda.com)

EcoDistrit Summit Recap: will it pencil out?

This week I attended the EcoDistricts Summit Tuesday and Wednesday of this week and I can’t tell you how many times I heard the phrase “it may be a good idea but will it pencil out.”  Coincidentally this week’s BGI topics centered on the bottom line and the metrics we use to evaluate a successful business’s bottom line. The EcoDistrict Summit experience has definitely  renewed my desire to not only understand personally the metrics for a projects or business financial success but also to continue to empower others to learn these tools and use to use them for good! The next paragraphs are a brief recap of the EcoDistricts Summit in context of the bottom line.

While I haven’t personally attended a lot of conferences I felt this one was pretty good. There was a diverse global representation of people, an engaging keynote speaker, a wide variety of professionals, and a pretty good diversity of topics and issues addressed in the breakout sessions. The Summit’s one weakness is the broad overarching topic itself: EcoDistrict but I’m not sure that can be helped.

EcoDistrict is loosely defined as an area that is more than one building but not more than a city sharing resources in the collective pursuit of sustainability. You can immediately see how this gets messy.  Sustainability is a complex idea; it is more than just protecting our natural resources it also includes fostering social equity and financial security for all.  On a building scale the ideas of sustainability are more focused on the environmental footprint of that building; example metrics/certifications include Living Building Challenge, LEED, Evergreen Standards, etc.  But when you move to the neighborhood scale a collection of LEED buildings does not automatically make a neighborhood sustainable.  We can all agree that if a neighborhood has social inequalities and financial disparities it is not sustainable.  The good news our human brain is capable of dealing with complex ideas and issues. This one is no different.  As I ranted about in my blog las week complex messy problems are the spark of innovation!

“Fix the cities fix the world.” This is maybe my favorite quote of the weekend. It represents this idea that if we can make changes for good in our own communities we make changes for good in our nation and our world.  We have to remember there is no cookie cutter option that can be applied to every city or every neighborhood. Each ‘district’ has to come up with what works for them socially, financially, and environmentally. At the summit we learned about some great Swedish examples of EcoDistricts planning and implementation.  Malmo’s Wester Harbour is one of their shining examples (http://www.malmo.se/English/Western-Harbour.html).  One fact I think is worth passing along is that Sweden has continued to increase their Gross National Product while reducing Carbon Emission. They've learned lessons and improved their technology and now share it through their special Swedish Sustainable brand SymbioCity (http://www.symbiocity.org/en/). It is both informative and inspiring, and I recommend checking it out.  But again, the big take away from their presentation is this is not a ‘plug and play’ way to build a sustainable neighborhood. Sweden has much higher energy prices and is an important trigger point to spur developers towards high energy efficiency. In the U.S. we need to get creative and find different triggers.  We need to find triggers that get us to the place where the bottom line still ‘pencils out.’ My opinion our trigger may be valuing the human and environmental capitol in the bottom line. If human and environmental capitol are valued upfront as investments in the project those investments will pay off later with financial rewards. But a few individuals need to think outside the box and take a few risk to prove to everyone this kind of bottom line thinking will pay off.

The keynote speaker at the conference Carol Colletta, executive director of ArtSpace, talked about place making. The top three things she listed that create place for people are (1) the social fabric, (2) the aesthetics of the place, and (3) it’s distinctiveness.  I want to take a moment to expand on her third point as it was a topic that came up a lot at the conference as a way to engage the community. Example after example project success depended on citizen involvement. Citizens felt more engaged when they had a sense of place and that sense of place was derived from something distinctive about their collective neighborhood.  One example given was a web platform that citizens could engage public agencies by posting what they thought should be done to enhance the city in different location. When the city acted on one of the unique ideas by adding a spray park to a neighborhood park it instantly became a place of pride for the neighborhood. It then spurred even more citizen involvement, continued funding and innovation in the neighborhood.

I was struck at the conference by a few participants who are still hoping for the magic bullet that will make their idea reality. This magic bullet is often either some public or private grant money. This type of waiting around hoping for funding is a function of the grantor/grantee system. It is not an empowering way to think about creating change. A great example of creating change that is not grant dependent is ioby.com. The co- founder of ioby.com, Erin Barnes, spoke at the conference and she shared some great examples of small demonstrative projects that got citizens excited about change and used crowd sources as a tool to start the momentum. I won’t go into examples here but again check it out (ioby.com) along with this great pdf guide about Tactical Urbanism (http://issuu.com/streetplanscollaborative/docs/tactical_urbanism_vol_2_final?mode=window&backgroundColor=%23222222). These are both powerful tools to get beyond the doom and gloom of ‘we have no funding, so I can’t make a change.’ Start small, demonstrate, and make a case for your idea by showing people exactly what is so awesome about your project!

Another speaker at the forum was Mark Edlen of Gerding Edlen, a Portland based developer company. Mr. Edlen said the formation of his company was based in his own personal ethic not about the profit.  In fact many of the decision his company has made over the years went against conventional wisdom but years after those decision were made they are considered the new standards. Today Gerding Edlen is a successful development company that is asked to participate in projects across the nation. I think this is a great example of the benefits Bob Willard talked about in his book The New Sustainability Advantage. It’s a company that is not only profitable because it manages risks, invests wisely but because its foundation is rooted in sustainable culture; their tag line is People-Prosperity-Planet.  As a private property developer they are truly benefiting from their sustainable advantage in all 7 of the advantages Willard addresses: (1) increased revenue and market share, (2) reduced energy expenses, (3) reduced waste expenses, (4) reduced material and water expenses, (5) increased employee productivity, (6) reduced hiring and attrition expenses, and (7) reduced risk.  I think Gerding Edlen is a great example of several innovative thinkers with passion and ethics  made it ‘pencil out.’

I think too often the saying ‘it just won’t pencil out’ is a cop out. It’s a way of saying, yes, that is a brilliant idea, but it is too hard to think about ways to make it happen.  Often as individual or communities groups with great ideas we can be talked out of our idea by someone the bank, grantor, financial consultant simply saying ‘it won’t pencil out.’ This is why we all need to take control over our own knowledge. If we have a basic understanding of bottom line metrics we can challenge the experts by pointing out non-traditional revenue streams and sustainable savings helping them realize that our brilliant idea will ‘totally pencil out!’