A new movement puts eco-conscious consumers in the driver’s seat
Omer Mutashar wants to change the world, one beer at a time.
He is organising Canada’s very first “carrot mob,” or “procott,” in Vancouver, where he hopes to leverage the power of conscientious consumers to change the way businesses operate.
The premise is simple: Instead of boycotting businesses that do bad, why not reward the ones that do good?
And rather than boosting their profits by a small margin over months and years, how about flooding them with traffic on one day—giving them a burst of well-deserved business, making a dramatic mark on the balance sheets and demonstrating that it really can pay to be green?
Once upon a time
The Carrotmob movement began in San Francisco with Brent Schulkin, an activist “who accepts the premise that corporations will nearly always continue to keep profit as their top priority,” as its website puts it. So if the problem with our economy is that corporations “will do anything for money,” as Schulkin writes, “couldn’t the solution also be that corporations will do anything for money?” If protests and boycotts—sticks—aren’t working, why not try carrots?
So in March 2008 he asked two dozen general stores how much they were willing to spend, as a percentage of their profits from a day’s business, on upgrading the energy efficiency of their buildings if he swarmed them with customers?
The first store offered to spend 10 percent of its profits. The next upped the bid to 15 percent. Finally, one topped all others with an offer of 22 per cent. So the message went out, and when the day came, people lined up around the block for a chance to shop and put their money toward good use (and create some permanent change). Total earnings: US$9276.50, more than double what the owners thought they would make. See for yourself in the video here.
After San Francisco, other carrot mobs in Kansas City, Seattle, Chicago, Finland and Switzerland—a total of 19 so far—have inundated deserving shops with business. Tarzian Hardware in Brooklyn netted more than $12,000 in one day by going for the carrot. Not bad.
In short, carrotmobs have lots of lustre. Consumers get to do something easy for a good cause. Businesses are rewarded for setting a positive example. And together we make an impact on waste and energy use, and get to demonstrate the unappreciated power of the almighty consumer to boot. What’s not to like?
Not much, as far as Mutashar is concerned, which is why he’s trying to organize a mob in Vancouver. His first target? Liquor stores, “because the easiest thing to do is to get people to buy alcohol—all you have to do is buy booze and you can do a bit to save the planet,” he says. If successful, he wants to broaden the mobs to restaurants and beyond.
A hitch in the plan
Sounds great. But there’s a problem: None of the stores he has approached so far have been interested. “They seem to think this is some kind of scam,” he says. He approached more than a dozen liquor stores around Kitsilano, “near the beach, a chilled out area, the first place I thought had potential, but shop owners were not welcome to the idea at all,” he says.
He can’t figure out what it is he’s doing wrong, but he’s going to keep on trying. “I’m kind of surprised. Building the consumer network has been easy, but I’m still having to work on the business side of things.”
Who knows—maybe Green Living readers can help. Check out the Facebook group here and if you think it’s a good idea, join the 97 people who have already signed up for Canada’s first official carrotmob.