Give up your dream...
"Give up your dream, it may work for others, but it’s clearly a pipe dream for you..." - customer in response to a Boloco email that he received.
At 9:57am the other day, while on yet another Zoom call, I was scanning email and caught one from Boloco that said "FINAL: going out at 10am". I glanced at it quickly, and it immediately failed the "squint test" I've talked about for way too many years. If you want to know if what you are about to put out into the world has any chance of being effective, squint your eyes and tell me what you see. Nothing special? No main message? The first words don't capture your attention? Then there's little chance it will have impact.
I dropped into Constant Contact and stopped the scheduled send to 65,000 customers with 60 seconds to spare. Oh shit, I thought to myself. Now its all on me.
Fifteen minutes later, now completely inattentive to the Zoom call still going, I had come up with a parody of Lennon's Imagine. The song had popped into my head for no reason earlier in the day, and it just stuck there as I was trying to come up with something memorable to say.
Here's how it ended up (full post here, if interested)
Imagine there's no Grubhub,
It's easy if you try
No DoorDash or UberEats
Lets distribute that big pie,
Imagine all the people living for today
Imagine there's no Postmates
It isn't hard to do
Higher wages and benefits
And vacation too
Imagine all the people, for once, living real lives
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one
Imagine no commissions
I wonder if you can
No need for strikes or protests
Solidarity at last
Imagine all the people sharing all the world
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope some day you'll join us
And the world will be as one
Ever insecure that it wasn't any good, I passed it around for approval or mocking, and essentially got a thumbs up from everyone. They knew the risks, they knew it could backfire BADLY, but if you are going to say what you believe, now is the time. SEND.
For the most part, it went well. Got some media attention, a few interesting conversations, some extra sales (we were only down about 60% as a company last week 😬) and reinforced to our team and our core fans that we continue to put people first and keep livable wages for all as a top priority in all that we do.
But then came the email from above:
"Give up your dream, it may work for others, but it’s clearly a pipe dream for you..."
Ouch. Seriously.
It was sent to our general mailbox which I happened to check. And then, horror of horrors, it turns out I know the gentleman. In fact, quite well. Worse, he's an accomplished CEO and leader in his own right.
While getting ready to go camp out in the old Airstream for the night with Bo, our 6-year old, I tapped out a quick response, feeling my blood flow shifting and trying to increase in temperature.
Sorry you were included.Hope you and the family are well.
To which he wrote back shortly after:
Didn’t mean to send that to you. It was actually for another topic. Hope all is well
The song and the parody talk about being a dreamer. And now he is saying he didn't mean to send a message about a dream to me, and it was related to another topic. I was just floored... and yet at peace.
He may actually be right. Maybe its all a pipe dream. Using business as a force for good. B-Corps. Triple Bottom Lines. People-first. Even a burrito aspires to be more, all that shit.
But pipe dreams are still dreams... and succeed or fail, dreams give people hope and courage to carry on, to persevere in the face of challenge, and to search longer and harder for impactful, sometimes exciting, solutions.
I may not succeed as this gentleman has succeeded. And the dream of Boloco won't ever be what it once was... we forfeited our chance to make the major leagues of business long ago in well-documented fashion. But give up a dream that business, large and small, won't enrich a small percentage of the population at the expense of the majority? I'm not worried about it "working" for Boloco. It may not. But that's not a dream I'm giving up anytime soon, no matter what the cynics say.
After all, you may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us, even you Peter. And the world will be as one.
