The cof­fee indus­try has always been respon­sive to the needs of oth­ers, espe­cially in the coun­tries that grow our prod­ucts. This is par­tic­u­larly true around the Christmas hol­i­day sea­son. However, it is some­times dif­fi­cult for small com­pa­nies to cre­ate a mean­ing­ful mes­sage for giv­ing that brings out the best angels in employ­ees and customers.

Recently, at an event hosted by Fonté Coffee Roasters at their down­town café at the Harbor Steps (in Seattle), I was sur­rounded by happy, cup­cake filled pre-schoolers. They were from the Pike Place Market Day Care Center just down the street. The rea­son for all of us being there was to cel­e­brate a dona­tion of $11,000 to cover the costs of sup­plies for the school for a year! Fonté con­tributed a part of their sales dur­ing the Christmas sea­son toward this gift. The size of the check even sur­prised Paul Odom, the owner of Fonté, who was alive with pride at being able to help this local non-profit serve its students.

What sur­prised Odom was the enor­mous jump in sales at the café. It was a direct result of his cus­tomers’ favor­able response to sup­port­ing this neigh­bor­hood day­care cen­ter. “We have never had hol­i­day sales like this ever before,” said Odom.

Fonté is not a giant com­pany; it has lim­ited resources made all the more scarce by the abid­ingly high cost of green cof­fees. Odom has inten­tion­ally not sought the big-time instead dri­ving an insa­tiable need for extreme qual­ity for a truly dis­cern­ing audi­ence. This sea­son, Odom wanted to give some­thing back to the com­mu­nity but was con­fronted by a ques­tion of scale.

“Why the pre-school?” I asked Odom.

He thought for a moment, then he said that every­one in the cof­fee indus­try wants to give back in some way, but that most com­pa­nies, espe­cially roast­ers, are faced with choices that often are so big, so dis­tant, and so daunt­ing that small com­pa­nies sim­ply feel that their con­tri­bu­tion would be too lit­tle to make a dif­fer­ence. The money that Fonté would poten­tially raise would not make a dent in a water project in Zambia, or a health care project in Guatemala. And, even though those types of projects are wor­thy and all con­tri­bu­tions help, it was not soul sat­is­fy­ing for Odom and his small com­pany. The scale was all wrong.

Odom is a cere­bral guy; talk­ing with him is like hav­ing a con­ver­sa­tion with Steve Jobs. His thoughts range eas­ily across the past, the now, and the future as if he might be strolling on a cat­walk that is above our heads. You can­not lead a micro roaster for 20 volatile years with­out hav­ing a vision few oth­ers can fathom. The path­ways he chooses to fol­low are often instruc­tive, so a ques­tion like “Why the pre-school” can lead to new and valu­able ideas for the rest of us.

It is that ques­tion of scale. We all want to make a dif­fer­ence, to move the dial a lit­tle toward a vis­i­ble pos­i­tive out­come. Odom saw that his small con­tri­bu­tion would not have a last­ing impres­sion on his employ­ees and him­self if it were only a drop in the bucket toward some grand goal. He wanted to make a real impact, so when a retail cus­tomer approached him about sup­port­ing the Pike Place Market Pre-school a light went off. Here were pos­si­bil­i­ties. By focus­ing on buy­ing sup­plies for the school, Fonté would make a firm pos­i­tive impact on the lives of these small kids for the entire year.

It goes with­out say­ing that orga­ni­za­tions with global reach and with large goals…alleviating poverty in Guatemala, malaria nets in Tanzania, and oth­ers also need con­tri­bu­tions and help from every­one. They require our ongo­ing sup­port and year-round con­tri­bu­tions. But, dur­ing the hol­i­days, is this the kind of con­tri­bu­tion that will moti­vate local cus­tomers and employ­ees of small com­pa­nies? Maybe not.

By stop­ping and look­ing around at his own com­mu­nity, he dis­cov­ered folks right here in Seattle that would think that his effort was huge and would have a last­ing effect. By think­ing local, Fonté was able to have a real and imme­di­ate impact. I think that this idea of look­ing for the cor­rect scale for a con­tri­bu­tion is impor­tant, not because it gives great press but because it gives mean­ing to the effort. Employees at the roast­ery and the café have a clear pic­ture of what was accom­plished, cus­tomers knew that kids right in the neigh­bor­hood would ben­e­fit from each cup of cof­fee, these urban kids will have a bet­ter qual­ity of edu­ca­tion and, who knows, maybe one day one of them will find the cure for malaria.

For small com­pa­nies, maybe we should not only buy local and sell local, but also give local. Who knows…something to think about. Looking at these very much alive three and four year olds eat­ing Holiday cook­ies, I have to say yes.

Cheers,
Miles & Kerri