While Whistler may have accomplished global brand recognition thanks to the Winter Olympic Games, there's nothing quite like a global economic meltdown to take the sheen off your afterglow. Especially when you discover that your enduring reputation is as an expensive place to visit.
"Price is what you pay," says Warren Buffett, the recession-proof Oracle of Omaha. "Value is what you get."
And Whistler guests aren't getting it.
Value for money consistently ranks the lowest of any category on Whistler visitor satisfaction surveys. In boom times, one could shrug this off. "Well, we're number one. What do you expect?" Not now.
The fault-lines from capitalism's drunken bender continue to send shears and tremors around the world. Local awls are getting a workout, punching new holes in belts as the hits keep coming, HST, pay parking, property tax hikes, Hydro rates on the rise.
Canadians suddenly find themselves in the bizarre position of having a debt-to-income ratio higher than Americans'. Consumer debt is growing faster than income. (Didn't anyone get the memo?) If interest rates move up or house prices drop, the Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney has warned it is likely to trigger a spate of personal and corporate bankruptcies. How far things can continue to stretch before they snap, no one knows.
But we all know this: there's no longer any such thing as business as usual.
A month ago, American Express commissioned a report from Europe-based consumer insight and trends consultants The Future Laboratory to find out what is going on.
The official response: "Consumers across the world are changing, reassessing a model of capitalism that has driven unparalleled growth in the world's economy over the last 50 years."
We're flying into an uncertain future, two generations blind.
"The global economy faces an unprecedented series of challenges over the next decade as it recovers from financial shock," claims the report.
A decade long recovery?
82 per cent of American consumers believe we are still in a recession and 54 per cent believe the economy will be the same or worse in a year's time. We're not looking for quick fixes anymore. It's time to dig in for the long haul. And to pay real attention to our consumers, the guests who say "meh."
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The challenge with "value" is that it's like pornography: you know it when you see it.
Price does matter. Coupon redemption, according to Brand Key's Customer Loyalty and Engagement Index earlier this year, is up 25 per cent. But value is not just about price. The well-established correlation between price and "objective quality," means that often, the more we pay, the better quality we presume something to be.
So what is value?
From the Latin valere (which also branched into the French valoir) the roots of the word lie in the concept of being of worth, being of merit, being strong.
Was it worth it? Was your visit to Whistler worthwhile? You told us you had a good time, that you were satisfied with the experience. But about the value? Do you come away feeling good about your trip to Whistler?
If we hear the question this way, then what does it mean when visitors say, "Not so much"?
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When it comes to spending money, value and values aren't so far apart.
After analyzing customer relationships with 518 brands in 71 categories, marketer and brand loyalty expert, Dr. Robert Passikoff reported for his annual Customer Loyalty Engagement Index that "what makes goods and services valuable and, therefore, worth spending money on, will increasingly be what's wrapped up in the brand and what it stands for."
For consumers questioning the ethics of consumption, a brand that acts as an extension of their own personal values will retain their loyalty.
One of the top five consumer spending trends identified in the American Express Consumer Spending Futures report was "give-a-nomics."
Call it "microactivism." Consumers are choosing purchases that give them more bang for their buck and the bang is philanthropy.
26 per cent of Americans describe themselves as ethical consumers. 83 per cent of Americans want products, services and retailers to support worthy causes. A product or experience that is associated with a worthy cause is like a free pass to spend money. It lets the consumer feel they're contributing to something bigger than just a bottom line. It makes the purchase worthwhile. Of merit. Of value.
"Consumers are increasingly interested in and engaged with social causes and will show their ethical credentials in how they spend. They will expect philanthropy as part of what brands offer and will seek out brands whose actions resonate with their personal beliefs," states the report.
Value is some place, then, where price and personal values coalesce.
Whether it's called clever marketing, corporate social responsibility or conscious business, major corporations are embracing the overlap of price and personal values, and injecting a strategy of social good into their modus operandii. These corporations are at the vanguard of creating a new business model, according to Supercorp author Rosabeth Moss Kanter. They've discovered that "a commitment to tackling societal problems can be one aspect of creating a corporate culture that leads to high performance and profits."
The Pepsi Refresh project, Dulux's UK Paint for Change initiative or Levi's "We Are All Workers" urban regeneration campaign are three examples of mega-brands engaging in sustained philanthropic initiatives that speak to the soul of their companies. And it's resonating with consumers.
Which raises the question, in what ways does Whistler resonate?
What does Whistler stand for? What kind of philanthropic initiative would speak to the soul of the Whistler "brand"? Is there a place for "values" in Whistler at all?
These questions are worth asking, as a community and as a resort, because our present approach of confronting macro-societal problems by sticking our fingers in our ears and singing louder is not making the problems go away.
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Gerhard Gross wasn't sure people would want to take their heads out of the sand. The 10-year Whistler resident moved to Toronto in 2008 to take on a gig as Associate Editor of Snowboard Canada magazine. This season, he quietly neutralized the carbon footprint of the magazine's 2010-2011 travel features.
The magazine, Oakley, Salomon, Billabong, Sandbox, Ride, Rip Curl, Quiksilver, The North Face, Alterna, Rome and Elan, all anted up to purchase carbon offsets, to reduce the footprint of the stories and photo shoots across this season's four issues.
But it nearly didn't happen. Gross confesses, "I kind of procrastinated on reaching out to the brands. I was scared of what their responses would be. And when you have something you want to happen so much, you don't want to be shut down. But everyone got back to me really quickly. Ninety per cent of the brands were totally stoked, totally on board, so that was really exciting. I don't think off-setting is the be-all and end-all, and that's the conundrum we face as a society. Can we continue to live at the current rate of consumption? You don't have to be any sort of expert to know we can't. Purists could say that offsetting carbon doesn't help at all, that it's a guilt tax. But for me, the question is, is it better, even incrementally, than doing nothing? Absolutely."
Gross drove the project, despite the extra brain-draining hours it took at the calculator, because it reflects his values and passions. In the Passport Issue, he calls the connection out even more blatantly, writing, "Which resorts, worldwide, follow the best environmental practices? After snow conditions and price, this is something that should influence your choice of where to go. After all, if you could travel to two equally good resorts - one was working to protect future pow days and the other dismissed responsibility for their role in the changing climate and sustainability - which is the better place to spend your money?"
Gross is urging snowboarding fans, most of whom believe Whistler is the Promised Land, to vote with their feet, and patronize the destinations that are trying to make a difference, are giving back in some way, who aren't just "taking your money."
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There are a lot of ways Whistler businesses are trying to "add value" and make a difference.
Isabelle Ranger is one of them. Namasthe, her empire of tea, operates from a small office in Function Junction and a leased garden plot at Riverlands farm in Pemberton.
A trained herbalist, who often prescribed medicinal teas that were so nasty that clients wouldn't drink them, Ranger wanted to make tea that tasted good and create a business that would allow her to spend more time with a young family. Today, she grows, sources, dries, blends and packages several tons of tea a year, distributed across Canada, and there is no decision she makes that is purely about the bottom line.
"For me, my decisions come down to 'are my kids going to be proud of this if I do it for 50 years?' It has to be ethical, ecological, make business sense, but it has to make sense in the long term. I won't do something I don't believe in," says Ranger. "I can be a little annoying with that."
Every ethical decision she makes costs money. Namasthe's packaging uses 100 per cent post-consumer paper, printed with vegetable and water based inks. The "plastic" envelopes each tea bag is sealed in are actually wood pulp, a clear transparent paper made from fast-growing trees like eucalypt and alder. They're 100 per cent compostable. The company is 100 per cent wind-powered. The teas not grown locally are fair trade. Instead of benefitting from cheap labour overseas to pack the teas, as is industry standard, Namasthe packs their own tea, investing in their own packing machine.
"With every choice we make, there's not one where I just go for the cheapest, just for the bottom line, because my bottom line is the ecological factor. And if we do everything in China, we lose our capability to make the things we consume. There's something going wrong with the whole chain if you can't make what you consume in your own country."
Ranger made a commitment to dedicate eight per cent of profits to service and charity. Even through the start-up phase of her business, she estimates that Namasthe has contributed three-five per cent of total sales to causes close to her heart.
All these decisions affect Ranger's margins. "We're trying to give the best value for the best product. It's not a luxury product. We're about sustainability and reality."
Does that connect with the Whistler visitor? "We get a lot of response from people who've come to Whistler and ask if they can get the tea at home, who will order it online. When you go somewhere as a visitor, you love to have food from that place. In Quebec, you want to go and try hot cheese curds. I think the tourists appreciate knowing something is artisanal."
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It's not just CEOs (or TEOs as Ranger dubs herself), who are embedding their values into the business operations. Supercorp author Rosabeth Moss Kanter noted that values-driven businesses also empower and engage employees. "And not surprisingly, these employees are more inclined to be creative when their company values innovation that helps the world."
Max Silverson is the 23-year-old manager at Mt Currie Coffee Company in Pemberton. When Silverson graduated into a flooded job market with a degree in international political economics, he found himself stuck between the mailroom jobs (too qualified) and the positions being filled by the ranks of the recently laid-off (not qualified enough). So he came skiing.
To acknowledge International Human Rights Day he suggested to his boss and colleagues that the café's staff donate their Dec. 10 tips to Kiva.
"I think charity is awesome but I don't really know how to do it most of the time," explains Silverson. "Microfinance was my favourite type of development that I studied because of the values it represents, empowering people to do the things that they want. Kiva loans people money without interest, they pay it back and we can loan it out again. A tiny little one-day fundraiser immediately results in four to six loans that we can redistribute again and again."
In fact, the tiny little fundraiser generated $145, which owner Chris Ankeny matched, and has already been loaned to 12 entrepreneurs in Honduras, Nicaragua, the Philippines, Bolivia, Peru, Uganda, Lebanon and the Dominican Republic, who people can follow through the Mt. Currie Coffee Co's Facebook page and website.
Explains Ankeny, "We try and help on a local level with fundraisers and events as much as we can, but I thought it would be cool to help on a more global level. For me, as an entrepreneur, I know how hard it is to run a business, and I'm lucky enough to live in a first world nation."
But business has been pretty slow lately. Silverson admits he wasn't sure how successful the initiative would be. "I had low expectations. But it was awesome. People were sneaking $20 bills into the jar when we weren't looking."
Recently, the café also sourced biodegradable to-go cups, organic teas, free-range local eggs and a new supplier of quality meats that meant investing in a new slicer. "I'm taking a hit in my margins," explains Ankeny, "to try and make a better product. And it's my values, too. Do I want to be eating meat injected full of hormones? Do I want my child to? My customers? Hopefully it will help the business, as well."
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Creekbread All Natural Pizza has been open in Whistler for just over a year. It's one of 10 locations for the organic flatbread restaurant. Managing partner, Nicole Jardis, has worked at six of them, from Massachusetts to Maui, and has just landed in Whistler.
And it turns out that the cute and quirky Community Benefit night, in which Creekbread offers proceeds from every Tuesday night's business to a different local charity, isn't just a clever Grand Opening marketing strategy. "Actually, it's one of the 10 commandments of the Flatbread company," explains Jardis. "Our company's values and purpose is to support the community. The purpose was to build a place people could renew their spirit, come together, have healthy food and at the same time, give back to the community. It's part of what we do."
The Community Benefit Night is a Tuesday night tradition at all 10 of the Creekbread/Flatbread restaurants. Explains Whistler local Nicole Thomas, who is leading Creekbread's Community Outreach charge, "With all of their other restaurants, they have month-long waiting lists from local non-profits to get on. In the last year, they generated $11,000 back to the community here. There's no angle. It's just their way of being able to give."
Non-profits and community groups from Squamish to Pemberton can host a Benefit Night and use the evening in whatever way they want. Host a slideshow, bring in live music, sell T-shirts, run a raffle or silent auction. Creekbread donates a portion of the proceeds for that evening to the group - not just the proceeds generated by the group, but from every single pizza sold that evening.
Which makes a Tuesday night pizza an easy way to give back. For Jardis, as well. "When you work so much, it's hard. I wish I had time to volunteer. But when I'm hosting a benefit, I'm working and helping at the same time."
• • •
It's weird to mix poetry with profit-talk, but maybe we need to be less averse to that. As Isabelle Ranger says, "If I look at somebody in the business world, I don't normally think of 'good', and it's time for that picture to change."
The financial crisis, according to a recent piece in the Economist , was triggered by "a bout of corporate social irresponsibility on a massive scale... Now corporate leaders have a chance to show that they are not just motivated by short-termism after all."
Woody Tasch, a venture capitalist and entrepreneur, is arguing in favour of a revolution. A slow money revolution.
"We need to stop thinking about money as lubrication for a machine that is everywhere and nowhere and at no given moment, and to start thinking about money as irrigation for the field of our intentions, which are expressed right here, right now, where we live and where we work," writes Tasch in Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money.
Slow Money is both a movement and an investment strategy, a shift of the financial system towards something that serves people and place as much as it serves industry sectors and markets. He has no idea how to do it. But he's willing to say: we should connect these dots. Between our wallets and our hearts.
Consumers are starting to make the connection. Will Whistler?
