a note from our president

Our president, Rick Aubry has been in Davos, Switzerland over the last week participating in the World Economic Forum. Better than anything we could write to let you know what he has been up to, get the info straight from the horse's mouth...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfKxYiFd-fs&feature=email

http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-204161?ref=email

Who knew what you could you do with a MATTRESS?!

Turns out, mattresses are a perfect recyclable item: they are large, easily identifiable items that landfills don't particularly like as they are difficult to compress and they damage equipment such as tractors and backhoes. To dispose of them, they often require special delivery to landfills where even still they actually "float" to the surface, even when covered with dirt. If recycling was an option, people's disposal behavior would barely need to change. The problem? To date, there are few uses for mattress components - creating little market justification for the expense of the recycling process.

Until now.

In September, RNSI partnered with Architecture for Humanity to release the Discarded Dreams mattress recycling design competition. The competition challenged designers to re-envision a world where used mattresses and box springs are turned into new, useful, and commercially viable products that RNSI could test in a new mattress deconstruction facility that we are partnering with Goodwill Silicon Valley to launch in San Jose.

See the results this Thursday, January 22 from 6 - 9 p.m.
We are hosting a reception, with sponsorship from Keetsa and the International Sleep Products Association, to take place this Thursday at the Keetsa Mattress Company (271 9th Street in San Francisco, CA). The design reception will showcase the winning entries as well as over 20 entries from around the world.

This event is open to the public.

Guest Spot- A Quick Q &A with Allison Kelly

Allison Kelly is the Statewide Director for Employee Onramp Initiatives at Pacific Community Ventures based in San Francisco. We asked a few pointed questions of Allison recently about her sector switching, why she works in the social change movement and the results her program is having in the workplace.
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We understand you recently left the for profit world to enter the nonprofit world. Please describe your path to getting here and what motivated you to do change sectors?

I started my career with a tour in the Peace Corps. I served in Mauritania, West Africa from 1996-1998. When I was there, I realized that if I could figure out how to equip people with assets, the power to make their own decisions about health care, education, food choices, etc., that would be the most meaningful work I could do. So I returned from the Peace Corps and worked in the private sector for 2 ½ years to get the necessary experience to get into business school. I graduated from Thunderbird in 2002 and took a job back in the non-profit sector with Population Services International (PSI). This was my first foray into health, by way of marketing. At PSI, we did social marketing for public health products in developing economies all over the world. The behavior change communication we were involved with was really impactful and interesting. I ultimately decided to move back to the West Coast, however, to be closer to family. Upon my move back to San Francisco, I took a job back in the private sector doing product marketing for a biotech company in South San Francisco that had a product which did HIV resistance testing. I ultimately stayed in pharmaceuticals and biotech for about 4 years doing product marketing and strategic planning. Although I enjoyed the work and my colleagues, I felt I had more to give and wanted to get involved in a social enterprise. When Pacific Community Ventures called me to see if I’d be interested in taking on the leadership of our Employee OnRamp initiatives, I couldn’t refuse. This is a very smart, driven and innovative organization and I couldn’t be happier to me here.

Describe the products/services you are working at PCV. How are they helping to change the workplace?

My responsibilities at Pacific Community Ventures include overseeing our health policy work, our economic self-sufficiency initiatives and launching VidaCard, our first healthcare product. PCVs work in health policy is to help engage the companies in our network in the policy debate. There are many organizations advocating for companies larger than the ones we serve, and many for smaller sole proprietorships, but our networks’ voice has been under represented. We hope to bring our perspective to the policy debate and contribute towards favorable policy for our network of companies. With regards to economic self-sufficiency, we engage our companies to offer financial literacy trainings at their work place during business hours. Additionally, we partner with sister organizations (such as TaxAID) to help promote the services available to the low/moderate income workforce that we aim to serve. Finally, our work launching the VidaCard has been really exciting! We have a health care product that operates like and HRA whereby an employer who can’t afford to insure their workers, or can’t insure part-time workers can offer a health benefit in the VidaCard. VidaCard can be used anywhere MasterCard is accepted to access health care. Additionally, we have a partnership with the only licensed discount dental network in the state of California to offer reduced rates for dental care. We are in the pilot phase of our roll out right now but will be launching to the market Jan 1, 2009. It’s a very exciting time.

How do you measure success within your organization for your particular area of focus?

We measure success in a variety of different ways. There are very quantifiable measures that we track as a company such as annual budget and headcount. Then we have more specific measurements for each of our lines of business. For example, for our Social Evaluation Consulting arm, we measure # of clients and earned income. For my line of business, Employee OnRamp, we measure # of employees accessed and # of VidaCards sold, for example. From a qualitative perspective, we measure levels of engagement at events that we host. We keep track of testimonials that we get from folks who benefit from our products and services. For example, I was at Farmacia Remedios in the Mission District a couple of weeks ago as they received their VidaCards and the gratitude and pride that was demonstrated both from the employees receiving the health benefit and the employers who were able to give it to them, was an incredible measure of success.

What are you looking forward to in this field?

I’m looking forward to continue to track and contribute to the innovation that’s going on within a lot of organizations right now to help bring economic self-sufficiency, of which I see healthcare being a big part, to low/moderate income people. I think the industry is getting smarter and more efficient about our work and it’s really rewarding to be part of it.

What do you do when you are not working to change the world?

Lately I haven’t done much but work! However, I am a member of Net Impact, which is a great organization of business leaders who want to use business to change the world. I have volunteered for their Service Corps program which provides pro bono consulting to non-profits in our community. I’ve found my involvement in that to be quite rewarding. I also try to ride my bike to work whenever possible!

If it’s Thursday, it must be Dubai?

In order to get the word out about RNSI to potential funders, partners and others, we have adopted a very active public speaking schedule. We will be talking about Rubicon and scaling of social enterprise at a variety of venues and conferences over at conferences all around the world in the next 60 days.

• Social Capital Conference in San Francisco – “Future of Social Enterprise” (Jonathan) – This is a gathering of 100’s of social investors who we hope will be interested in our work.
• World Knowledge Forum Korea (Rick) – We have been invited to present the RNSI work at an international gathering of business and government leaders interested in the model that we have created at Rubicon.
• World Economic Forum Conference Dubai (Rick) – WEF has selected from amongst Schwab Fellows a “social entrepreneur’s council” of the leading social entrepreneurs and Rick has been asked to serve as the Chair of this Council. The first meeting is being hosted jointly by the WEF in Dubai; the goal of the council is to present a proposal to the WEF in Davos in January of a more substantive way for the work of social entrepreneurs to be supported by the business community.
• Net Impact Conference, Philadelphia – “Scaling of Social Enterprise” (Jonathan) – As reported above, we are co-sponsoring a major national competition with Net Impact and we will be featured at their annual conference in November.
• Social Entrepreneur Conference France (Rick) – The President of France is sponsoring a gathering of the 50 world leading social entrepreneurs in Evian and we will be presenting our work to the business community interested in ways to scale impact.
• The Economist Magazine business summit San Francisco (Rick) – We have been asked to be a principal presenter on a panel on social innovation at t he Economist Magazine conference in San Francisco.
• Time-Fortune Magazine’s CNN conference of “The Principal Voices”: NYC – (Rick) Last year, Time-Fortune and CNN did a special article and show about our work as part of their “Principal Voices” series focusing on new models to end poverty in the world. The magazines are sponsoring a one day gathering of all the selected “principal voices” in New York

Collaboration and Partnerships:

RNSI has been busy on the phone crises-crossing the nation formalizing our local collaborative partnership agreements, including on-site visits to Philadelphia, Newark, and Baltimore to develop local collaborative partnerships throughout the country. We now have commitments from 18 organizations in 14 U.S. Cities to review business ideas with RNSI for potential fit. We are focused on both social enterprise employment models (supportive employment) and social franchise models with these partners.

Rubicon RNSI Open House:

People keep asking us where we are located, and now we have a productive answer – come visit us—October 2nd 4-7 pm We have sent out invitations and are looking forward to seeing friends and Rubicon board and staff members at the October 2nd Open House to share in person an update on the latest RNSI happenings.

Social Enterprise needed more than ever?

Unscathed by the declaration by the Wall Street Journal and Republican pundits of the failure of social enterprise and social mandates (in response to the demise of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac), we’ve just been keeping our heads down and aggressively pursuing our work to create nationally scaled social enterprises that we will be able to bring to market and pilot within the next year.

Here is some of our progress over the past three months on the development process:

Evaluated eight new “phase I” businesses that entered our pipeline for compatibility and fit with our social enterprise feasibility criteria for phase II. Two of these businesses passed through for phase II analysis and are being evaluated in our pipeline.

Completed two complete feasibility analyses for a mattress/bulk item recycling business and a payroll advance business.

Developed significant relationships with waste haulers, recyclers, mattress and carpet retailers and other key partners to create competitive advantage within the mattress business

Conducted numerous interviews with necessary business partners for the alternative to pay day lending program

Leveraging Volunteer Resources To Make Our Workplan Possible:

We have leveraged a significant amount of pro bono resources in support of our work. We’ve creating four critical partnerships with organizations that believe in our work and which have contributed significant amounts of resources to support our team. Our four key partners are Bain & Co, Net Impact, the design firm IDEO, and our co-tenants in San Francisco, Architecture for Humanity.

• Managed 3 Net Impact teams: The first phase of our Net Impact partnership is their working with us to find 9 Net Impact business management volunteers to work with us on three critical teams. We focused the three teams on mattress recycling, employer based payroll advances, and deconstruction/waste management services.
  
• Bain and Company Brainstorming Sessions: We have had two high engagement meetings with potential partners, industry experts and philanthropic partners facilitated by Bain & Co. Travis Pearson, a partner at the SF Bain office, has been an invaluable and hard working additional member of our team. In preparation for, and at these meetings, Travis brought in other Bain associates and partners with content knowledge in the industries we are examining. This week, we received an additional commitment from the firm of a “virtual team” of Bain associates to work with us.

Idea Generation Competitions and Gatherings:

• Architecture for Humanity and our Mattress Recycling Design Competition – We are currently running a national competition online in partnership with Architecture for Humanity to encourage product designers, students, and others interested in innovative ways to improve the environment through finding a re-use of the stuff inside mattresses we all throw away.


• Discarded Dreams Mattress Competition - Lead Mattress Sponsor: Keetsa Eco Friendly Mattresses - Lead Sponsor: ISPA - Hosted by Rubicon National Social Innovations and Architecture for Humanity

• IDEO, the award winning national design and planning firm, has been brought on board to facilitate a pro bono brainstorming session focused on “the next big social enterprise” and we’ve invited 50 folks from the social entrepreneurial and business community to help us think through some new ideas.


• The Net Impact/Rubicon “Next Big Social Enterprise” Challenge invited 10,000 Net Impact members to submit their ideas and expand on others in an online competition focused on RNSI’s national scaling strategy. Results and further brainstorming will be reported out at the Net Impact National Conference in Philadelphia by RNSI staff.

Interview with Joe Alexander from Keetsa Mattress

Joe Alexander is Director of Sales and Marketing for Keetsa Mattress here in San Francisco. Keetsa is a leading manufacturer of green mattress and bedding products, using recycled and sustainable materials to produce high quality bedding for its customers. Keetsa is the bedding sponsor for the Discarded Dreams Mattress Recycling Competition, cohosted by RNSI. Jonathan Harrison, Director of RNSI, posed the following questions to Joe:

1. The mattress industry has a bad reputation for confusing pricing structures, deceptive sales tactics, and renovated product that is sometimes passed off as new. Is that reputation deserved?
I would have to say, in my experience, it is an earned reputation. Before the advent and accessibility of the internet, customers were subject to the marketing of the mattress giants. Shopping for a mattress was similar to the process of buying a car. In the "old days", you would go from dealership to dealership, listening to salespeople, collecting brochures and getting pressured to buy now. When the internet gave customers the ability to research, price and compare, it changed the landscape. The same thing is now happening for mattresses. Customers are now coming into the market informed, asking the right questions. Because of this, the old sales tactics many companies rely on are now accounting for a rise of alternative bedding companies. It's why you see so many of the major mattress manufacturers suffering in this economy and many alternative companies thriving. Mattresses are a perceived need. Good or bad economy, people still need mattresses. And if you give the consumer respect for being intelligent and savvy, if you give them value, they will buy.

2. Your company is pretty green in the scheme of things? But what are you doing that is different from other mattress companies?
What we are doing is pretty radical from most mattress stores. We do not spend tons of money on radio and TV. We don't blanket newspapers with ads. We live off word of mouth and the internet. This helps us keep our pricing affordable. In respect to being green, we are constantly challenging ourselves by searching for new innovations. We have lots of customers who cannot afford latex or are allergic to it. We make a healthy version of memory foam. In fact, we just pioneered the world's first castor oil foam. We replace over 10% of the oil with castor oil, a natural plant oil, for lower dependency and reduced VOC. We are also about to unveil our first natural latex mattress with organic cotton and wool. By packaging our mattresses in boxes that can fit in your car, we are able to send customers home in their car, taxi or BART with a new mattress.

3. Keetsa is growing fast. This might present a few challenges in your day . . . what keeps you up at night?
First, I am daily innundated with emails from customers, potential customers and inquiries from media. It amazes me how passionate people are about their mattress! But the one thing that keeps me up at night are the people who attack us. When you are on the forefront of change you are a target. I work very hard with our staff to educate customers about how our mattresses are different from other mattresses. And yet, to some people, it is not enough. Fortunately though, you are right, we are growing very fast. We make a great mattress for a great price.

4. What is Keetsa going to look like in 10 years?
In the year 2019 we will have flying mattresses! No, just kidding. Actually, if all goes according to plan, Keetsa will be a household name in ten years. I personally would like to see us making 100% biodegradable mattresses that last 25-50 years. That way waste and disposal are things of the past when it comes to mattresses. These are some of our goals.

5. Tell us the story about a customer experience that made you proud?
Our staff works tirelessly to make our customers happy. I try to remind them all the time that you never know the circumstances of why someone is shopping for a mattress. A young lady came into the store the other day and fell in love with our mattresses. She was distraught because she had been to some big retailers and could not afford a mattress. Her family came back an hour later and bought the mattress for her. It seems her husband of 5 months had run off with another woman and took all the furniture. She was so grateful for her new mattress!

6. Why is reducing your companies' carbon footprint so personally important to you as an manager?
As an avid surfer and runner, I enjoy the outdoors. Before Keetsa I had lived in Hawaii for two years and Tahoe for a winter. We have such an amazing planet! I want my three kids to be able to enjoy this place long after I am gone. With Keetsa, I get to contribute on a daily basis.

Discarded Dreams . . . Coming Soon

In our journey to find a scalable social enterprise, we've been looking long and hard at the potential of mattress recycling. Hmm, you've probably never thought of it. Neither had we, but it is starting to make sense. We've just finished a feasibility study complete with location analysis on the potential for co-locating pilot facilities with local collaborative partners with strong social service delivery models for the "hard to employ" target clients that we seek to help most. Things look promising. During the pilot phase,the business looks marginally profitable as a single stream bulk item facility that brings mattresses in the front door and breaks them down to their commodity parts (cotton, wood, steel, shoddy, etc.) and tries to find markets for these core components.

Even at large volumes, the markets for mattress parts are not very financially attractive. So we got to thinking . . . what if we created a line of products developed from 100% reclaimed materials, in large part from the mattresses we are breaking down. This was the question that we asked the creative folks at Architecture for Humanity who, among many other things, run international design competitions on their Open Architecture Network. After a few conversations with Director Kate Stohr, we were slated to run a mattress competition that will ask the best and brightest product designers that age old question- "When a mattress falls in the dumpster, does anyone hear it fall?" That is, what are we going to do with all these mattresses besides pulverize them and re-landfill the resultant waste?
Thanks to help from Kate and lead sponsors at the International Sleep Products Association, we may have an answer to that question.

On September 1st, the Discarded Dreams Mattress Recycling Competition will officially open and we'll invite entrants to create innovative ways of converting used mattresses into useful products (which are 75%+ mattress components.) The competition aims to encourage entrants to form groups capable of creating a consumer product, instructions detailing how to make the product, and a plan for production on a larger scale. Entrants must create designs that take into account the volume of mattress waste generated each year. Groups are encouraged to utilize local resources, including existing manufacturing facilities and other waste products.

We know the problem. Without a line of commercially viable products to develop at the end of the life cycle for so many products including computers, hair dryers, carpet, Styrofoam, etc, the business of recycling them is a marginally profitable one, especially give the nature and construction of products like mattresses. They often end up in landfills because they cannot be broken down and their component parts are hard to utilize.

Until now.