Sara and I have been finalists in five startup competitions, looking to raise capital for Ajiri Tea. Most of the time we are beat out by someone promising change driven by "cutting-edge" technology and huge growth projections. Employing women to handcraft the packaging, supporting small tea farmers, and sending orphans to school---why, there wasn't anything new about that. Time and time again it seemed like potential grant givers were so blinded by the idea of newness and disruptive change that they couldn't see the value in something tried-and-true. Or maybe they couldn't see the value in something handcrafted in "Africa." Or maybe it all just seemed like women's work.
Making it to the finals but never winning is starting to feel like "always a bridesmaid, never a bride." But we now know that a marriage to these good-looking grants isn't our destiny. While others are reaching up to catch buzzing flies, we are reaching down planting seeds.
Thirteen years later, these seeds are pushing through the red clay ground of generational poverty. Reuben is employed as a secretary in a hospital because of his computer skills learned through Ajiri. Christine is using her Ajiri earnings to send her children to school and started a hair salon.
So here is my pitch to you. Stop thinking about value. We both know that a life worth living isn't based on ROI. Maybe our company is revolutionary. Or maybe our company is ordinary. But we know that a good life is made up of kindness and risks and sunrises and energizing growth and the sound of cicadas in the afternoon and a shared pot of tea.
amen!!
letâs not be daunted! the money will come. itâs an avenue the Universe can easily work thruâ itâs set up so nicely, so humanely, so efficiently, so beautifully. the Truth will win here, iâm sure of it!
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Angela, Wesley, and Damacline were now hopelessly off course. They had managed to scale that final fence and were walking down toward a forest. I wanted to run to them, set them on the right course, explain scale and direction and how they should put the compass on the map. But instead I watched them from the top of the hill. They were now making pretend owl calls to each other, quite literally hooting from one group to another and then bursting into laughter.
See, there is this tip-toeing around issues in business. No company should align itself too "political" for fear of alienating customers. But to have opinions and emotionsâwell, that's just human. As a society, we've become too corporatizedâtoo sanitized to believe that companies shouldn't have a voice. Of course politics affect our business. Tariffs on tea! The war in Iran means higher costs of shipping our tea. The elimination of USAID and its direct impact on our community in Kenya. But more so than something directly affecting us and our business, we still care about policies that affect our neighbors and people across the world.
At Ajiri, we feel so lucky to be on this earth at the same time as all of you. Your purchase of tea holds a lot of that elusive power of art. Sure, your purchase is the transference of physical money that goes to support women and children. But your purchases of tea, time and time again, transfers this feeling of belief. You believe in these women. You believe in these kids. You believe that the world can be a better place.Â
Kate Holby
Author