Author: Shel Horowitz—Green/Ethical Business Expert

A lifelong activist, profitability and marketing specialist Shel Horowitz’s mission is to fix crises like hunger, poverty, racism, war, and catastrophic climate change—by showing the business world how fixing them can make a profit. An author, international speaker, and TEDx Talker, his award-winning 10th book, Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World, lays out a blueprint for creating and MARKETING those profitable change-making products and services. He is happy to help you craft your messaging and develop profit strategies. Learn more (and download excerpts from the book) at http://goingbeyondsustainability.com

By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, language, Shel's Personal Life, travel Tagged with , , , , , , , ,

mosque-sunset-jeddahStaying in the Embassy Suites in Kissimmee, Florida. Inside the usual Guest Services manual, I found this remarkable document (spacing and centering in original):

To Our Guests

In ancient times there was a prayer for

“The Stranger within our gates”
Because this hotel is a human institution to serve people, and not solely a money making organization, we hope that God will grant you peace and rest while you are under our roof.
May this room ad hotel be your “second” home.
May those you love be near you in thoughts and dreams.
Even though we may not et to know you, we hope that you will be comfortable and happy as if you were in your own home.

May the business that brought you our way prosper.
May every call you make and every message you receive add to your joy.
When you leave, may your journey be safe.

We are all travelers. From “birth till death” we travel between the eternities.
May these days be pleasant to you, profitable for society, helpful for those you meet, and a joy to those who know and love you best.

Wow!

As both a frequent traveler and a professional marketer who focuses a lot on values-based businesses—green and ethical ones, specifically—I invite you to walk with me as I analyze this document a bit.

  1. This says to me: here’s a business willing to take a risk and say what they stand for. They’re willing to alienate the militant atheists and say that God is important not only to them personally, but also to the way they run their business.
  2. They did it in a way that was very inclusive. Most of the time, when I come across religious messages in the US heartland, they tend to be specifically Christian. I’m a non-Christian who was raised an Orthodox Jew until age 10. I consider myself fairly spiritual but not very religious. I’m often turned off by religious messages that assume my Christianity (or, for that matter, assume I’m Muslim, Buddhist, Jewish, whatever). There was nothing in this message embracing any particular religious tradition. If you accept the idea of God (and not everyone does, of course), there’s only welcome here, not exclusion.
  3. The content of the message is wonderfully positive. It’s about peace, prosperity, safe travels, and joy. How could I not feel better about a business that takes the time to draft a document conveying these various blessings in my direction?
  4. Never be your own editor. OK, not many people are such grammar nuts that they’ll notice the language flaws—but what if they host a convention of English teachers? I’m actually here with a conference of people who teach business communication, and I’m betting a high percentage of those attenders who saw the message will pick it apart for its sloppy writing. It’s so easy to avoid the problem in the first place.
  5. Most importantly, being greeted by this message sets a tone for all my interactions with the hotel. I’m going in to any conversation with the attitude that they care about me. This perception is reinforced by the very helpful nature of every staffer I’ve dealt with so far (even before I opened the services notebook and saw the memo)—and would, of course, be destroyed if their personnel were rude, etc. But it certainly creates a good flow of positive energy.
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By Posted on Posted in Business-general, Customer Service as Marketing, General Commentary, localism/locavore, Networking, People Helping People, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , , ,

Thursday was full of extremes, with both positive and negative encounters.

On the positive side, I had two amazing one-to-one meetings: with the former mayor of a nearby town who just took a job with a green energy company, and then a few minutes later, with a life coach friend of mine. With both, we each brainstormed marketing ideas and helpful contacts for the other.

Then, a brief call with my own coach, Oshana Himot, who continues to amaze me with her sheer brilliance. My business is engaged in a major shift toward much deeper work, and she can take much of the credit. And finally, a Chamber mixer where I managed to have several substantive conversations. I was introduced to a gentleman I didn’t know who’s partnering with an organic farmer friend of mine to make tortillas using local corn. As a local food advocate, marketer, and foodie, I’m eager to help him succeed. Then was my friend who runs the local TV station, on his capital campaign and new building they’re going to construct. I offered him a resource about building deeply green, and he, out of the blue, offered to shoot a promo for me. And finally, a woman in my own town who will bring a much-needed progressive and articulate voice to the Selectboard.

But on the same day, I had three encounters with enormous stupidity.

1. We’d been contacted by a charity some time back to see if we had any goods to donate. We did indeed, and in the intervening two weeks, we’ve filled three large boxes with books and a huge trash bag of clothes. Originally, we were going to put all this in front of the garage for pickup, so we wouldn’t have to wait around. They’re not allowed to actually open the door. But since that was set up, it’s snowed several times and our garage is completely blocked off. So I called to explain that the crew would have to ring our bell, since we couldn’t put things out by the garage and we didn’t want to ruin it all by putting it right in the snow. And then I asked for a two-hour window for the pickup, so we could be sure to be here. No can do, she told me; they’ll be there any time between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. I told her that I wasn’t going to be stuck in my house all Saturday waiting for them. Finally, after about ten minutes of back and forth, she gave me a phone number to call Saturday morning where they’d be able to narrow it down at least a little. Not exactly customer service heroism—especially considering WE’re doing THEM a favor by donating goods.

2. Between my two morning meetings, I had to walk in a busy, narrow street in the central business district of a nearby village, because one gas station owner hadn’t shoveled his side walk. I poked my head in the office and mentioned the problem. The owner growled, “It hasn’t been 24 hours.” Yet every other property owner had managed to clear the sidewalk, Guess where I’m never buying gas again as long as I live (and yes, I have been a customer there, in the past).

3. My wife and I were the only customers in a restaurant except for one person picking up a takeout order, for about 40 minutes. Just as we were about to leave, a woman showed up prepared to make a large takeout order. It was 10 minutes to 8 and they sent her away, saying they were closed. It probably would have delayed their 8 pm closing by 10 or 15 minutes and more than doubled their take for the hour. (The owner was not present). And it would have kept that customer coming back.

In all three cases, all I could do was scratch my head in amazement. I will not beat you over the head with the obvious customer service lessons from these three encounters with stupidity. Unlike the three perpetrators, you’re smart enough to figure it out.

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By Posted on Posted in Business Ethics, Marketing Trends/News Tagged with , ,

If you get a note like this and wonder, where do I know this person from–you don’t.

When are these jerks going to realize that the Internet is a powerful way to make an honest living and they don’t have to stoop to these ridiculous frauds?

Hi shel I know you were expecting to hear back from me much earlier but I didn’t want to get back to you empty-handed. I finally found the perfect stock for you and I am confident that it will make you some serious profit. Remember the one I told you about in November of last year right? You did very well on it and I think this [TICKER SYMBOL REMOVED TO AVOID PUBLICIZING IDIOTS] stock will do the same for your portfolio again. I have to let you know though that I’m not the only one who found out about [TICKER SYMBOL REMOVED] today. A few of my colleagues are aware as well and they are telling their friends and family about it so I must advise you to move fast if you want to buy it. I think it’s trading at just around 15 cents right now, if you wait too long it might be at 30 or even higher and at that time I won’t be able to safely advise you to buy it. You can buy as many shares as you can first thing at market open on Friday or worst case scenario buy it on Monday but move fast. I know you don’t care about what the company does because you know I’ve done all the due diligence for you already but [TICKER SYMBOL REMOVED] is actually amazing and I think it will do much better than even the one I told you about a few months ago. One of the company’s divisions offers mobile software solutions for the gaming industry. The mobile apps allow customers to play lottery and other games of chance and skill on their smartphones. The software is extremely advanced and could be the backbone of all mobile casinos in the future. It is expected that the US will legalize online gaming in the near future and this could catapult [TICKER SYMBOL REMOVED] to new highs however even without that the company’s software is extremely valuable in the rest of the world and could become extremely profitable. Something big is definitely brewing at the company. I heard something about buy out rumors but I don’t have all the details yet I will keep you posted over the coming days or weeks. Anyway I won’t bore you with much more blabber, but if you have a second do check out [TICKER SYMBOL REMOVED]. By the way I will be expecting a nice gift from you once you make fat bank on this one and a nice dinner with the wives is in order. It’s been too long since we last spent a good evening over a bottle of wine. I was going to call you to tell you about [TICKER SYMBOL REMOVED] but I figured youre probably asleep now with those crazy shifts you’ve been working. Take care and call me if there’s anything. Talk soon Your favorite friend and only broker 🙂

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By Posted on Posted in Abundance and Prosperity, Democracy, Environment, language, Politics Tagged with , , , ,

As Barack Obama delivered his State of the Union speech last night, I found myself agreeing with upwards of 95 percent of it—something that NEVER happened under his predecessor. And it’s good to be reminded in very concrete terms of how much progress has been made on the economy, and in drawing down the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (one of the few bits of foreign policy that made it into the very domestically focused speech).

Of course, some of why I agreed with such a large percentage was because of what he chose to omit: government spying, drone attacking civilians, support for highly dubious massive energy projects, and other things that I find strongly objectionable. He did mention the disgrace that Guantanamo is still open.

And he left out other things that should have been in there. I’m still waiting for him to call for a Marshall Plan-style conversion to clean, renewable energy. I’ve been waiting for that for years. He talked briefly about energy independence and the success in switching much more to US-based power sources—but failed to put it in context of solving environmental problems as we change our energy sources.

But the real question is: How will he get it done? Despite his calls to the Republicans’ higher selves, and his pointing out repeatedly that he could have moved a lot farther if he’d gotten some cross-party cooperation, implementation is the problem. He needs to motivate his base to be heard in the halls of power, to be convincing their Senators and Representatives that it’s in their own self-interest to end the gridlock.

With less than three years left in his presidency, he still has time to claim a place in history as one of the great presidents. But he’d better get started with that.

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By Posted on Posted in Activism, Democracy, Eco-friendly, Environment, Green Living/Green Lifestyles, Peace and War, People Helping People, Politics, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , , , , , ,

To lose Pete Seeger so soon after Nelson Mandela–two great champions of justice and democracy! If you want to know the true definition of an American Patriot, it’s spelled P-e-t-e  S-e-e-g-e-r. Not only was he an extremely talented musician and a devoted rabble-rouser on a host of social, labor, and especially environmental causes–for which he suffered greatly in the 1950s and ’60s–and not only can he claim a major role in cleaning up the Hudson River and co-founding the amazing Clearwater sloop and organization and folk festival…he was one of the most humble people I’ve ever met.

I used to see Pete Seeger at the Clearwater Revival, wearing a volunteer shirt and picking up trash. I got to bang a few nails with him once as he was building the Woody Guthrie (one of I think three small boats he built along with the Clearwater and the Sojourner Truth). And I interviewed at least once, saw him perform dozens of times live and numerous more on TV–growing up as a public television kid in New York City, where once the blacklist was lifted, he was frequently found on Channel 13–and hung out with him at some People’s Music Network conferences. He helped start PMN, started Sing Out! magazine, the Newport Folk Festival, a bunch of environmental and peace organizations, and many other ventures for the public good.

His 1963 Carnegie Hall concert is one of the 10 albums I’d absolutely insist on having if I were stranded on a desert island with one CD holder. Among other things, it contains the best of his dozen or so recordings of Wimoweh, long before that other group made it a top-40 hit. I own many other of his records, but that one is a standout.

 

And Pete walked his talk. Though he could certainly have afforded much grander housing, he lived for the last many decades in a small cabin outside Beacon, New York, on his beloved Hudson River, heating with wood he chopped himself. Though he could have gotten all wrapped up in ego, he spent his entire life championing newer musicians. He helped bring Bob Dylan and Tom Paxton to the world’s attention, as well as later songwriters like Dar Williams and many others.

Pete was one of three amazing lifelong activists born in the spring of 1919 who I knew personally. Miriam Leader (not much known outside of her various home communities) passed about a year ago. And Frances Crowe continues her active work for peace, justice, and the environment. The world is richer because these three people with giant hearts walked its ground. Goodbye, Pete, and thanks for all you’ve done to make my life richer. You’re probably already starting to organize amongst the angels ;-).

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By Posted on Posted in Abundance and Prosperity, Diversity, Eco-friendly, Environment, Frugality/Frugal Fun, Green Living/Green Lifestyles, People Helping People, Shel's Personal Life, travel Tagged with , , , , , ,

One of the books I’m currently reading is Charles Eisenstein’s Sacred Economics—which makes many fascinating points about the interplay of money, attitudes, and relationships. (I’ll be reviewing it in my March newsletter; if you don’t already subscribe, please do so in the upper-right corner of this page.)

Early in the book, he talks about the gift economy, and the difference between reciprocal giving and circular giving. Reciprocal giving is closer to barter than to a true gift economy: you give something to someone, and that person reciprocates either right then, or at some future time. Until the gift is “redeemed” by the second gift, it creates a sense of obligation—kind of like what the Millionaire Mindset types call the Law of Reciprocity.

But circular giving is a completely different framework. You give something to someone, either because that person needs something you have or simply because you want to give a gift. That person will make gifts to other people who they can help. You may or may not be among the recipients. But when you have a need, someone will step forward and enable it. It’s more Karmic.

I’d never really thought about the distinction before, but I realize I’ve lived the parts of my life that are in the gift economy on the circular model. A great example (among many) is homestays. We’ve been members of the international homestay network Servas for more than 30 years, and Couchsurfing since 2009 (Note: Servas link is to the United States site, as the International is down at the moment). People stay at our house. We stay in private homes when we travel. No money changes hands. When we travel, we usually bring a small gift: a bottle of wine, a loaf of good bread, a copy of one of our books—but this is something we choose to do and is not required by either organization. Some of our guests bring gifts, some don’t.

This is not just about saving money, though that’s certainly a factor. It’s about having a visit in a place where you didn’t know anybody. Having a human connection in a private home, instead of an impersonal hotel room interchangeable with others all over the world. It’s about going someplace as a traveler and a visitor, not as a tourist—experiencing a place, if just for a couple of days,  through the eyes of people who live there. Eating their food staying in their neighborhood, playing with their kids or pets, listening to their music.

It’s very rare that our homestays are reciprocal. I think there have been about five people in all these years where first one of us visited, and then the other return the visit—and the motivation in those cases was not “you owe me,” but “we enjoyed you so much, we’d like to see you again.” It’s actually very common for people who visit us to invite us to visit them,and vice versa. If we ever make it to Berlin, we already have half a dozen families who’d be delighted to host us and see us again.

And this goes back to Eisenstein; he makes the point that money not only commoditizes goods and services (and drives uniformity over craftsmanship)—but also commoditizes relationships. We build relationships with many of the people we meet through these homestay networks. We’re on each other’s Facebook friend lists or e-mail humor or political alert lists, we send copies of our annual letter, we stay in touch if we return to those locations. In short, we’re gaining friendships—not with everyone, but with the ones where the chemistry is good, and that’s most of them.

Even in the most hospitable Bed & Breakfast, with the most delightful innkeepers, this doesn’t happen; money creates a different dynamic.

And circular gift economies are only one facet of the evolving economy. I could do another whole post on paid shared-resource economies like Zipcar and Airbnb. And one thing all of you should consider is how much more eco-friendly these are than everyone buying their own car, their own lawnmower, etc.

I haven’t gotten to the part of Sacred Economics where Eisenstein lays out his ideas for money economies that don’t devalue and dehumanize. I’m looking forward to it, and might write again here when I see what he has to say about that.

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By Posted on Posted in Abundance and Prosperity, Environment, Green Living/Green Lifestyles, Shel's Personal Life Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The concept of cellular memory was made very real and personal to me today, in the woods.

Yesterday, it happened that I chose a very icy location for my daily hike, slipped several times, fell twice, and banged myself in a few places. I even iced one of the spots when I got home. Those areas were still a bit sore for a couple of hours but were OK by the evening.

Today, I went to different nearby woods, free of ice, just a thin and not-very-slippery coating of snow. And as soon as I got out of the car, two of the spots I banged yesterday—below my left knee and above my right wrist—started to hurt! They’d felt fine all day.

I am convinced they “remembered” that the snowy woods had caused pain the day before.

Even more remarkable: once they “realized” that the conditions were, in fact, different, the pain subsided quickly. Within about three minutes, my leg was no longer hurting. Another couple of minutes and my arm felt fine too.

If I’m reading the signals correctly, the implications are that any body part not only has a memory, but has emotions and even thought.

Since the mid-1970s, I’ve paid at least some attention to the way bodies react to stress. I’ve explored a number of modalities, from Re-evaluation Counseling (all about releasing rapped emotions that often manifest as tension) to rolfing to yoga to Network Chiropractic to Alexander Technique (and several others). And I’ve explored uncountable numbers of audios, books, and articles about our ability co influence our own fate and to manifest what we desire–often called the Law of Attraction (LoA). Many of these work on releasing stored tension in the body that stems at least in part from emotional distress.  Thus, my discovery today actually makes a good deal of sense to me. (And by the way, I have been enormously helped by the Alexander work, which I’ve done steadily since around 2005,  with a very skilled practitioner, Ruth Rootberg of Amherst, MA. Any Western Massachusetts people reading this might want to try her out.)

While I recognize that this may seem off-topic or too “woo-woo” for this blog, I’ll put out the idea that it’s actually very, very relevant. Changing oneself is key to changing the world. Understanding how much power we have to shape our own destiny helps us create the planet we’d like to live on—and looking at cellular memory might be a part of that. If we can have Prosperity Consciousness or an abundance mindset, can’t we also teach our bodies to de-stress?

Have you had any experience with this sort of cellular memory? Please share by posting a comment.

 

 

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By Posted on Posted in Advertising, Business-general, Diversity, Entrepreneurship, Marketing Techniques and Philosophies, travel

Two weeks in Turkey, not speaking the language, with my marketing radar wide open. Here’s some of what I noticed.

  1. A surprising number of Turkish TV commercials remind me very much of US commercials from the 1960s and 1970s: housewives demonstrating the superiority of some cleaning product, dancing chocolate bars, and so on. At the same time, some are totally state-of-the-art, with special effects and much more modern concepts about marketing. But as in America, often these forget to actually sell the product.
  2. At least during the slow season of our visit, most shopkeepers and hospitality business owners (and the general public) are very friendly, and eager to meet special requests.
  3. Personal service in the hospitality industry seems to be a Turkish hallmark. We repeatedly experienced people going the extra mile for us or plying us with gifts. As an example, one hotel proprietor arranged our public bus tickets to the next town, had the tickets delivered to the hotel, booked on us two tours at the next destination we were going to, and even paid the minibus fare from his gleaming hotel to the bus station, some 12 km away. Another one saw that we were making sandwiches and she supplemented our bread and cheese with a huge gift of fruit, olives, and better bread. An enterprising travel agent across from the bus station had his agency open hours before the others, in time to meet the early morning arrivals from the night buses. Offering a warm room on a cold morning and help communicating with hotels, he was doing a healthy business selling tours, balloon tickets, and lodging.And yet, some of the basics are neglected. One hotelkeeper never cleaned our room on a three-day stay (though all our other hotels cleaned regularly and thoroughly). A restaurant owner who served an excellent meal and whose dining room was beautifully decorated had not bothered to fix a long-broken door latch in the bathroom or his leaky toilet mount. Nonsmoking laws are violated constantly (almost every adult male Turk seems to smoke).
  4. The Turkish business community seems way behind in its use of the Internet. Vast numbers of businesses don’t have a website, and if they have an e-mail address on their business cards—many don’t—it’s Hotmail or maybe Gmail. Of those that do have a website, a surprising percentage have a useless brochureware site that gives nothing you can’t get out of a phone book—sometimes in multiple languages. And yet, the two-room hotel we chose in Goreme had a very professional English-language website, even though its owner speaks no English.
  5. My willingness to do business with someone is inversely related to how much pressure they exert—and I’m sure I’m not the only one. Despite this, in all the tourist locations, touts are everywhere, some of them quite obnoxious. Those with a different approach really stand out. In one souvenir craft shop whose owner gave us all the time we wanted to browse his offerings, answered our questions but otherwise left us alone, we bought five different items. Often, however, we were prepared to buy, but left without buying as the pressure increased. Yet the behavior continues.
  6. We saw very few beggars; much fewer than in the US. In Turkey, it seems the economically marginal eke out a living by trying to sell something: a glass of fresh-squeezed juice, a bagel, a bag of roasted chestnuts, a shoeshine, a song—or, of course, earn a commission from one of the rug or craft merchants. Particularly in Old City Istanbul, male strangers will approach you, chat you up, give some bit of genuinely helpful advice, and steer you toward their particular rug shop.
  7. There is a great deal of competition among nearby businesses, but also a great deal of cooperation. Merchants respect their neighbors and will work together to make a sale for someone. Tea shops in the Grand Bazaar do a thriving business ferrying chai to the rug merchants who offer it to their prospects.
  8. During the slow season (such as our December visit), many businesses hang on by the slimmest of threads. One restaurant owner told us he’d had one table to serve the previous day and we were, at 1 p.m., the only ones that day. He was quite excited that he already had a reservation for the following day.
  9. The sampling economy is so taken for granted in Istanbul that locals will simply reach in to a bulk food bin and try something without asking. If they like it, they buy. We didn’t have a chance to observe these kinds of markets outside of the Istanbul region, so I don’t know if that’s true elsewhere.

Crafts will vary enormously in quality and price. If you plan to go beyond Istanbul, get a sense of what the items you like cost. You may find them for half as much in other regions, or you may see them higher and want to pick them up before you fly out. If you want to make sure you’re buying Turkish goods, check labels carefully

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By Posted on Posted in Eco-friendly, Energy & Sustainability, Entrepreneurship, Environmenl, Environment, Frugality/Frugal Fun, Green Business, Green Living/Green Lifestyles, Innovation, Peace and War, People Helping People, poverty, Technology Tagged with , , , , ,

Watch this video about the Copenhagen Wheel, a device that captures and stores energy from cyclists pedaling and coasting, and supplements pedal power on the uphills or over long distances. And then read a few of the comments.

To me, this is brilliant technology! First, it makes biking—and particularly bicycle commuting over distances of 20 to 50 miles—an attractive option for tens of thousands of people who’ve felt unwilling to try it before. That, in turn, reduces the number of cars on the road, which has dozens of advantages to the planet and to our pocketbooks. Second, it makes it possible for the moderate cyclist (like me) to go much farther by bike.

A lot of the comments are angry that this will disrupt their exercise. I think they’re not thinking about it the right way. Instead of blaming a machine for interfering with their workout, think about the ability to bike instead of drive to good riding places some distance away, or to bike much farther distances to explore an area farther out.

I do ride for exercise. And I do face a BIG hill when I go out my door. I’ve learned to manage it, but when I first moved to that area, it was very tough. Something like this would have been a nice transition as I learned to conquer that tough hill.

And for the exercise-only bikers, I have one more suggestion: write to the company and tell them you want a manual override option: an off switch, in other words. Then you have the boost when you need it.

Let’s apply this kind of creativity to every aspect of our lives! We could not only solve climate change but war, poverty, and other global issues. I wish this company much success!

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By Posted on Posted in Events, General Commentary, localism/locavore, Shel's Personal Life, Social and Economic Justice Tagged with , , ,

I choose not to participate in the always-crowded and frequently violent orgy of consumerism called Black Friday. I do my best to shop locally most of the time, I don’t like crowed craziness, and I know Black Friday is not really a help to local small businesses that can’t afford to deep-discount.

There’s an alternative celebration on the day after US Thanksgiving that resonates more with me: Buy Nothing Day: 24 hours without any purchasing activity. I can’t always do it; sometimes the gas tank is empty or I’m flying home from Thanksgiving in another part of the country. But this year, I see no reason to spend any money today.

Wikipedia has a nice page on the history of Buy Nothing Day and some creative incarnations of anti-consumerism.

Meanwhile, society at large is going in the opposite direction. I was really hoping that the big-box store openings would be a flop. Unfortunately, there were big crowds leaving their families to chase down bargains. This, I see as a blow against workers’ rights. I very much doubt that all the employees working yesterday were volunteering to work on a holiday. In fact, there are demonstrations at Walmarts all over the country today, protesting this encroachment on workers’ family time. In my area of Western Massachusetts, it’ll be 3 p.m. at the Walmart in Hadley.

 

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