526. Building a Modern Movement + Activating the Next Generation of Changemakers (NMS Replay) - Ben Collier | Otter.ai

526. Building a Modern Movement + Activating the Next Generation of Changemakers (NMS Replay) - Ben Collier

Andie Murphy47min

Jonathan McCoy

00:01

Hey friends, we've got an incredible event coming your way on May 7 through ninth. We're so excited to co host the Responsive Nonprofit Summit alongside our friends and partners and growing generosity Virtuous.

Becky Endicott

00:12

This free virtual event is an opportunity to dig deeper into the challenges you're facing, and discover how responsive fundraising can unlock a world of possibility.

Jonathan McCoy

00:21

You can join Becky and me on the conversation stage to hear good humans talk about how they're tackling the retention crisis. They're managing change building donor journeys that go engagement and being whole leaders in this work. Really don't want to miss this.

Becky Endicott

00:33

Register today at weareforgood.com/RNS. We'll see you there friends.

Jonathan McCoy

00:42

Hey, friend, let me ask you something. Why do some social impact brands thrive while so many others fail to get traction, build support for their cause and make meaningful progress toward their mission?

Becky Endicott

00:51

Our friend Eric Ressler over at Cosmic explores this question in his new brilliant podcast Designing Tomorrow. Each episode is a deep dive into the strategies mindsets and behaviors that top social impact brands used to play and win in the attention economy.

Jonathan McCoy

01:08

It's not just a podcast, it's this modern playbook for navigating a rapidly changing digitally driven world that you can use to reach your true impact potential. New episodes are dropping every Tuesday.

Becky Endicott

01:18

Follow and subscribe to designing tomorrow on your favorite podcast platform, or catch the video versions on YouTube. We've dropped the links in this episode's description, we'll be listening right alongside you.

Ben Collier

01:32

Transformational funding is something we're starting to talk about what is the story that we can tell people that's going to really build a movement around not just believing that we can move a lot of food, but believing that we can move the needle on hunger as a whole. And to that end, we've spent so much of our time over the last few months thinking about how can we create something that lasts and is self sustaining?

Jonathan McCoy

01:54

Hey, I'm John.

Becky Endicott

01:55

And I'm Becky.

Jonathan McCoy

01:56

And this is the We Are For Good podcast.

Becky Endicott

01:58

Nonprofits are faced with more challenges to accomplish their missions and the growing pressure to do more, raise more and be more for the causes that improve our world.

Jonathan McCoy

02:08

We're here to learn with you from some of the best in the industry, bringing the most innovative ideas, inspirational stories, all to create an Impact Uprising.

Becky Endicott

02:16

So welcome to the good community. We're nonprofit professionals, philanthropist, world changers and rabid fans who are striving to bring a little more goodness into the world.

Jonathan McCoy

02:27

So let's get started. Hey, Becky, what's up?

Becky Endicott

02:31

Oh, you know, I'm excited today because one of my favorite nonprofits and movements is on the podcast. Because here's the thing, guys, there is a nonprofit fairy tale story. And I want to take you back three college students who saw this problem in the world. And then they ended up building this scrappy grassroots solution that's absolutely changing the world and the way we look at food. So I'm introducing you and not a first time guest to the podcast, the farm LNG project, which really connects surplus food from farms to food banks all around the country. And you'll hold they have rescued over 160 million pounds of produce. Since its inception, which was just a couple of years ago, we were honored to sit down with Ben Collier, the CEO of the farm leek project at the nonprofit marketing Summit. And it was too good not to share with you guys here.

Jonathan McCoy

03:24

Yeah, we love this team so much. And Ben has led the transformation of a college dorm initiative into this National Hunger Relief movement that's redistribute this nutritious food to communities facing hunger. We're so excited to have him with us today. Ben, welcome back to the podcast.

Ben Collier

03:39

Hello, Jon.

Jonathan McCoy

03:41

Hello, Ben. It is so good to see you. Again. Thanks for making time for all of us here. We got to take it back and talk to us, like give us the inception story. Give us kind of the overview in the history of the farm link project. And we're not talking about many, many years ago, we're talking about what happened in March 2020. With you and a small band of committed people.

Ben Collier

04:06

Yeah, well, you know, marched of February, March April of 2020 was a time unlike no other and for myself, and so many of my contemporaries were being sent home from college at the time. I actually was recovering from this major reconstructive foot surgery, so I couldn't really participate in normal life. And then the pandemic happens. Everyone else is suddenly right there alongside me, you know, on Zoom. But we saw story after story as this commercial food industry shut down about food piling up on farms. And at the same time, there are just as many stories being told about food banks facing the longest lines they'd ever seen. And we knew nothing about this space. And we thought naively, which continues to be a quality that I think drives a lot of our optimism today. Let's connect one farm with one food bank. And so we started calling these farmers that we've been reading about it In national news all the way down to the local papers just to see, do you still have surplus? Is this real is true? And can we help get it to a community that can benefit from it. And probably 200 calls in we got through to this onion farmer that had just been written about in the New York Times, get a pile of 2 million pounds of onions with nowhere to go. And we called che che Miers is his name, and he says, if you get a truck here, you can take whatever you can. And so that was the sort of farm that we pulled together a little money, picked up 40,000 pounds of onions, brought those back to a local food bank. And that was, that was the beginning.

Jonathan McCoy

05:32

I mean, I feel like, every time that I hear a piece of your story or get to watch the beautiful documentary, we're gonna talk about two. It's like, Thank you for not giving up like calm or 200, like you casually say we call 200 people, how many of us in the room would keep calling, you know, to get to that 200 I think the level of Moxie the level of belief that this was possible, just shined through your story, Ben, and I just love it so much. I want to talk about now. I mean, what started as this project now, I mean, you're working with some of the most food players in the space. You're trying to figure out you the way you operate in this massive charitable food space. What does that look like? Now for y'all at farm like?

Ben Collier

06:15

Sure? Well, you say we're working with these huge players. Everything we do is centered around collaboration, we, as far as like, just to be clear, we are not a food bank ourselves, we are really positioning ourselves between the charitable food space and the for profit food space, try and create more connectivity. And what we've recognized as the largest thing we could add in terms of value is, yes, those relationships, but the logistics and the transportation between the two. And so a couple years ago, there were 30 truckloads of avocados, with nowhere to go in Pennsylvania. And if you want to find this out, you can search off mageddon There's a story about this.

Becky Endicott

06:55

I love the brand already,

Ben Collier

06:58

unintentionally caused a lot of traffic in a corner Philadelphia. But regardless, you know, there there are these huge moments of surplus food all over the country. And it happened with frequency. And our goal is to figure out okay, why is that happening? Why is that continued to happen for decades? And is there anything we can do about it. And the reality is not to the fault of any individual food bank, that's a lot to take on when your priority is getting the right amount of food to your community. And so what we can specialize in at FarmLink is saying, okay, 30 truckloads of cucumbers, that's great. One truckload or two truckloads are going to help 20 different communities, what we can do is make sure all of those communities are in the loop, connect the food banks to this food and coordinate the logistics to get it there. And that's really our bread and butter. But it's brought us in the room with these huge food producers with these huge charitable food organizations, and then a lot of different logistics players in between.

Speaker 1

07:49

I just love how you rejected everything that was told to you. And I truly believe that is part of the reason why that fearlessness that Moxie, that like dry for innovation is really propelled FarmLink because there was a lot of people telling you there wasn't a food scare, you know that they couldn't tackle the food scarcity issue, there was rejection of working across systems. And you fundamentally rejected that and said, No, no, this is the way it needs to be. This is what we're going to uncover. And I think that's such the beauty of the FarmLink story. And we're talking a ton this season on the We Are For Good podcast about how do you build a modern movement. And for us, there's a really simple formula, and it start with one person. And I feel like you all started that. And it's just the plotting the planting of the seed to the next to the next and then people start to bring others into the fold. So talk about this commitment that FarmLink embrace, to just have a gentle voice as a part of building this mission and how it influences your message and your community building.

Ben Collier

09:01

Well, I think we entered farmland at a period of time, that was actually perfect for the type of movement building that we did. I don't know how easy it would be to replicate it with different conditions. Now, before I jump there, I will say something you said at the top there, Becky of like challenging and not, you know, not settling for being told. This is the way it's always been. I don't think that we reject all all truths or reject all assumptions of how things

Becky Endicott

09:28

superlative Yes. clarification. I agree with

Ben Collier

09:32

you is the answer to the Why should never be that's the way it's always been. And that's what we were told a lot upfront. And I think that we just have worked on our values really refreshing them at FarmLink and forever students. And it centers around this principle of there should be an answer to any of the questions that we have and we shouldn't settle even for our own solutions at farm with ever being able to explain them by saying that's the way it's always been. But Rewinding back to At the start of FarmLink, we had an entire generation of people that were basically sidelined. And not just sidelined from making a social impact from community from their school from their internships. And so farming wasn't just something that three people were working on within a week, it was it's so hard to even tell our founding story because dozens of people were immediately a part of it. And within a month and a half, we had 150 students working on FarmLink with 30 kids calling I say kids, I, my contemporaries, my periods, but we there are 30 is calling farmers and trying to understand the intricacies of food banking and logistics, and just how could we be additive and supportive. And so it combined this movement building, giving people a space to be a part of something really meaningful, and also this forever, students mindset where if we didn't have a learning mindset early on, we would have just been really unsuccessful and really wrong. Because we had so much to learn in those early days that we needed to be, we needed to be asking questions who

Becky Endicott

11:06

have that abundance mindset, and Gen Z is like, I want to bottle it and sell it to people. So

Jonathan McCoy

11:12

yeah, I jump in there with talking about kind of like some of the generational voices that we're bringing, and that that started to influence your message and started to build the community.

Ben Collier

11:20

I think we didn't in the first month and a half of FarmLink realize how important the community would be to our overall success, truthfully, a month and a half in the farm link. We weren't even sure what that next step should be. I mean, after a week after we moved those onions, we then moved, the next day about 11,000 eggs to a local food pantry, that couple of my teammates picked up in a U haul. And I was looking at the chat here, which it means after about a day, we could have made a lot of omelets, but then set this goal of saying, Okay, well, if we can move a million pounds of food, that's going to be a meal. And within a month, we've moved a million pounds of food. And so it kept feeling it, it felt like we kept setting a goal for ourselves and then realizing okay with this group of people focus on it in the way that they're able to, we're going to reach it a lot quicker than we thought. And so I think that about a month and a half, and we recognize, oh my gosh, there's more students and young person capacity to be a part of this than has ever maybe been possible before. Let's just take on as much of it as we can. And so we sent out these posts on LinkedIn on all of our social media and just invited almost anybody who is interested to be a part of it. And what came out of this. I think the movement at the beginning was just a bunch of students who believed in this before we even a bunch of farmers and food banks and others did. And all they needed was this space of community and the ability to feel so connected to others. I think you can talk about moving movement building in layers, though, because of students and student Bibles. The first step, food banks and farmers and I'd say broader society are these layers on top of it that are a lot more nuanced, and something was very much entrenched in now.

Speaker 1

13:05

Well, I think that you really picked up on something that was really critical, which is like sequencing, and we talk about modern movements are best grown when they start from within. So so smart of you to start inside looking at the students and the network that you had. And I think that is such a good starting point. But foundational to movement has got to be storytelling. And I need to brag on you guys for a second because I think some of the differences I've seen in we talked to so many nonprofits on the past. These modern nonprofits, the social enterprises that are coming up now are looking at story and media in a completely different way. You were even able to get a grant to create your first video to get your out of your story out there first. And by the way, friends, there are foundations out there funding media and funding video and grants because they believe that it can scale the mission even faster. So you've got to talk about this deep commitment that FarmLink has to storytelling and flexing the narrative in media, because you all get there a full swath and a full documentary called abundance that launched last year that we are such big fans about and we want to talk about how you were storytelling that and community and how that lifts your mission. And P.S. such a big fan and I totally shared it on Reddit many, many times.

Ben Collier

14:36

Thank you. We have plenty of Reddit superfans. Now, Becky, you, and I've talked about this before. I really believe that farm links purpose is to try and systemic progress and there is no example of systemic change in the last 50 years that I can think of. That doesn't include a successful shift in social Your perspective about whatever problem it is that this change is about. And zooming in on, on food access and hunger and nutrition, and agriculture and climate and how it relates to the food space. I didn't know anything about this four years ago, and I don't assume most people I speak with even know the difference between a food bank and a food pantry. But FarmLink is trying to create the space for this entire industry to, to grow. And if that's going to happen, we need a lot of conversation, we need a lot of challenging existing perspectives, we need people to both feel a sense of urgency that these problems need to be addressed more or in a different way than they are now. And we need a sense of optimism that is possible. And so I think that philosophy has driven why we believe that storytelling is not just a part of our marketing and fundraising efforts. It's a core part of our theory of change. Our storytelling work to date, I actually think has just scratched the surface of what it intends to be where abundance, thank you for the plug. That's our founding story, it tells the story of how a bunch of college students got off the ground at the beginning of the pandemic, it doesn't tell you anything about where we're trying to go from here. And that's okay. I think that's our next step.

Speaker 1

16:21

That's right person to actually we're

Ben Collier

16:24

working on right now. It's our theory of change. It's what we envision this looking like in five years. But I think that storytelling for farm like in the future is taking this community, this movement that we're trying to, to build alongside. And being a platform through which great community voices can be heard. You know, there's such great displays of what food access with dignity looks like, at small levels, that aren't necessarily the way all food access access should look like in every community around the country. But they are really great templates and models that people could learn so much from an FarmLink. One day can be a storytelling platform, through which people can understand what food access, what dignity looks like, in all of the ways that can exist. I think that is a huge way that we're going to be able to drive forward. Systemic change,

Becky Endicott

17:13

how many missions are talking about creating a storytelling culture? Like how smart is that, Jon?

Jonathan McCoy

17:19

It's deep in the moment. And what I love about how you're phrasing this bin that she's talking about, you know, these big systemic issues are not going to be solved unless we really change people's perspectives. It's it's not like media is a vanity project. And I think there's a lot of board members, board seats around the country that think that marketing is an expense. And it's like, it's not what it could be when we say marketing is mission, we talk about how can we actually use it to change people's hearts and minds and open up their eyes, and do that through dignity and uplift and not adding more harm or pain to the situation, but to provide solutions and talk about the collective and y'all do that. And so I love that even you're owning that this is chapter one, because one film is not going to solve everybody's opinion, one film is going to capture, you know, this movement. And I want you to talk about the movement, because a lot of people came to this session about that piece. And if you haven't watched abundance, Becky just dropped the link, like go home, go click it. It's like, what, 15 minutes? It's not even a huge amount of time. 20 minutes, yes. But you, you'll feel like you're like, the energy is just growing as more and more people link together and get involved in this. And that's what it feels like inside of a movement. I want to ask you, Ben, what have you learned, you know, now looking back about what it really takes to build this movement? How, what are those hallmarks that you would call out?

Ben Collier

18:44

I think that FarmLink entered a space that was more territorial than it expected. And when I say territory, I mean, food banking. They're not, again, to the fault of any individual food bank. But there have not historically been a lot of incentives for food banks to do everything they can to get more food to another community than the one they're serving. And as a result, we experienced a lot early on this sense that FarmLink is threatening the balance that has existed for many decades in certain communities. And I will comfortably say it's a balance that is not a level of success, that I know, is the ultimate goal. And so in building a movement, there's nothing that firm that can do without partnering with food banks. And at the same time, we seek to point out the ways that we want to see progress. And that's such a delicate line to walk. I think that it's important for us to recognize and never point fingers at those who have less control than you might think of the problem that you want to see change. And so for FarmLink be very vocal about the ways that we want food banking to become more collaborative and more innovative and more open to tech adoption. That's something that I would comfortably say At the same time, I'm not going to point to any individual food baskets that you're the reason that this system is the way it is. And that's hard. And I think that there are certain people that are very open to hearing that kind of perspective. And there are others who have taken it more personally, despite the intent there. And so I think we're, when it comes to movement building, with the peers in the space with farmers, with policymakers with food banks, we're pretty in that journey. But our path is one of as much collaboration as possible. In the next few weeks, I'm going to be publishing this pledge, which I guess I'm speaking about, Oh, good. Yeah. But it's, it's a set of commitments that FarmLink is making to making this space as innovative and democratized and collaborative as possible in a way that I really, truly believe aligns with the mission of everyone who gets into food banking, or hunger fighting as a whole. And despite that, I know that this pledge is not something that is actively being followed by everyone in the space today. And so this is our attempt to say, we're not here to call people out. We're not here to make people feel like they are the problem. But as much as we can, we're here to show this is a series of steps that if we take, we could go a lot further. So I guess it kind of falls back to this abundance mindset of there is enough food, there are the options available, there are the solutions there. How can we bring as many people as possible into finding them.

Becky Endicott

21:30

I'm so dang proud of you. I mean, only Gen Z could look at a 10,000 foot view and say, not not nonprofit, you're you're really behind. You're not innovating Hello, not a newsflash to any of us that have been in the sector, 20 years, but also saying the way forward in collaboration and not resting on the this is the way it's always been done. And leaning into these tech solutions. Leaning and cook to collaborative partnerships, media, we can go further together. Because we all know this. We're all marketers, your audience plus my audience, we can have double the audience, and you start to layer those partners on. And I want to give like an example here of what I thought you guys did that was really smart. That's practical for our audience. I mean, when you launch this documentary, we just ironically, happen to be together presenting at another conference in Napa. And as I was about to watch this thing, get launched, I got an influencer toolkit, I got images and graphics, I got little nuggets and facts, I got an entire kit that said, if I just want to spend like two minutes on this, like, here's the cut and paste and how you put it in there and how you socialize it. That was so easy. Of course, I didn't want to do that, because I'm a writer and a personal life. But making it frictionless for your partners has got to be one of those great tactics. And so talk to us about what you've learned and what I would call like partnerships 2.0, which marketers, this is our moment. This is our moment, I'm so excited about the way partnerships are evolving now, because it's so much less about, hey, we really need this gift. And we need this funding. It's more about we need the funding, we need the social proof. We need your volunteers and your employee to come in, we need your network. And it's really asking them to think creatively about what they can bring to the table. And that's not even one dimensional. We can bring things to their audience too. And I feel like FarmLink is such a beautiful example of this thing out in real time. So talk about this strategic partnerships and how it's really helped you guys scale.

Ben Collier

23:43

Sure. Thank you. And thank you for walking me through some of the actual tactical things we did. Oh, it's so brilliant. We loved it. I'm not doing any of that right now. But I think that these types of partnerships are such an easy way to build community. And I think for us, we go after the partnerships that seem the most strategic with the time that our small team has. But I think we are particularly open minded with the partnership ideas that people bring to us. For instance, we have someone in Los Angeles that's doing a fruit and vegetable tattoo flash sale, and I don't have any tattoos. I know that only a lot of people here tattoos, but there are a huge audience of people who that might really resonate with them to actually have the space for them to learn about FarmLink through what might otherwise not the very common nonprofit, marketing space. I love any of those ideas as they come about. And we've had some really successful larger corporate partnerships that have been great for pharmalex brand Chipotle, just round it wrapped up there, I think fourth round up campaign with us and that's where you know, you're on the app, you can run up to the next dollar and it's an amazing way that we've benefited from their huge community supporting FarmLink with millions of dollars of fun Over the last few years,

Becky Endicott

25:01

and total value alignment, two Ps with Chipotle, like brilliantly. And

Ben Collier

25:06

I think what we've tried to do for Chipotle in return is say we, as much as possible are channeling this younger generation, and celebrating your support of us in a way that feels authentic. So, most times when a roundup has ended, people get really excited about the chipotle Roundup, they'll send us screenshots or pictures of them with their burrito or their order. We'll compile it all into videos, and we'll send it back to Chipotle. And they love that because it's cute and charming. And it's not actually getting us another donation. But it's something that is, I think, only made that relationship much stronger.

Jonathan McCoy

25:40

Absolutely. I mean, that's stewardship and partnerships. 2.0, this whole conversation is not about money is the only doubt denominator to get people involved in a lot of seeing you in the comments. I mean, talk about a mission that's just fueled by ambassadors that are around your mission, go follow Andy's work, too. So I want to talk about your team a little bit. And then I want to say I quoted you and Aiden, y'all came in a couple of seasons ago. And I always try to have an open hand. But when I got schooled from Ben and Aiden, that they said, Our greatest contribution, I'm gonna misquote you and go back and get this, right. Our greatest contribution is not in this mission that we're working right now. It's in what's going to happen with the people that are part of this mission, and how they go out and change the world. And I think that's the kind of culture building that gets me excited that it's so bought into the long game. It's not just about what's happening within our walls, but like, how are we treating people in a way that gets them excited to go out and pour into whatever mission or passion or interest that they have? And so I want to tap that brain of yours again, it gets your wisdom around. How do you activate team? How do you activate volunteers? What really matters right now? Well,

Ben Collier

26:53

one thing that we've really tried to preserve over the last couple of years as FarmLink, moved from an organization that was self governing college students to one that now has 20 plus full time employees and a fellowship commitment is create a super intentional and clear space, that young people have to be part of our mission, beyond working full time for us. So these fellowships we've created, there is so much energy that has gone into how can we create a fellowship with the sole purpose of taking someone who's passionate about this work, and teaching them everything we know at FarmLink, immersing them in other parts of the space that we couldn't possibly teach them about, and then bringing them back together to synthesize their learnings with everybody else. And the purpose of that fellowship is not to have the next problem that FarmLink is facing, solved. But to rather present all of these fellows with the problems that Farmleigh has reached four years into her said, and to say to them, you're gonna come up with a completely different set of solutions than we are, but go and think about it and figure out and come back to us and present what you think this could be. And that wasn't the best pitch I've ever done for a fellowship. But the takeaway there is that our only goal is to bring more amazing people into the space and give them the opportunity to be a part of it. And we've had 700 students come through fun link over the last four years. And I can think of dozens who have through who have let me know directly or shared with the from the community that their entire trajectory in life has pivoted because of it. And some might have only been farming for a few months. But what you now see, we're going into work that isn't necessarily in the food space, but is mission driven, or is related to policy or is about advocacy through storytelling or working with young people. And it is it is really exciting. And I don't think that we've necessarily figured out how to capture that and share it as a product of farming. And it's not fully a product of farm link. But to think that in the future, we'll have 1000s of students who have now become leaders in their base who have a mind for sustainability and food access and climate. They're the ones who are really going to create that generational shift in perspective. And I talked about that shift in perspective earlier as a part of systemic change. I think that that comes through great storytelling, and it comes through a certain level of generational Byun. And you'll just reach generations, my generation grew up believing it was reprehensible to drink and drive. Because that was something that was ingrained in us through the Nickelodeon ads we watched from day one, all the way to how it was taught in school. And I know that wasn't the case 50 years ago, that is a generational shift. And I think that if all of these people who've been a part of FarmLink can go on and embody the values that we have in their future careers. That's going to be a generational shift as well.

Becky Endicott

29:55

I mean, let's just talk about the 700 people Because even if you're doing nothing more, and this is not, I'm just going to cast a wide net to the audience in this, even if you're doing nothing more than saying, This is what's happening, here's what we're about, here's how you can help. You have 700 human beings going out and telling their friends, posting about it, wearing your merch sharing your videos, every single time they come out, they have a true purpose. And when I think about Gen Z, they are driven by purpose. They want to live in mission, they want to live an impact, they want to feel like they have put some kind of a stamp on the world. And y'all this is not just like happening within the FarmLink. Family. I mean, you've been on every nightly news program. You've been on, Ellen, you've been in People Magazine, I mean, this has started this absolute domino effect that I'm just so proud of you for starting. And I and I think that a lot of people are probably sitting in their spaces right now listening to this thinking, how do I engage the next generation of changemakers? I'm literally thinking, Jon, we need to manifest we're for good ambassadors immediately, just to talk to him about what they're doing and what how they can help us. And so what have you observed, that really connects with this next generation of donors and leaders and any tips would be icing on the cake?

Ben Collier

31:27

I don't know if I don't know if I have the perfect answer to that one. Becky, I think that I think that what we're going to try and do over the next year is help people understand the journey of $1. With FarmLink, that's something we started taught me is one of my teammates just sketched up a 30 to 62nd video, which is much shorter than all of the other stuff we've ever made, which just through an animated little journey shows how $1 is going to lead to, you know, 20 pounds of food on different people's tables. And I think to actually see that process is something that will be really grounding for people when we have engaged the most with young people, though, it's been one degree of separation away from fundraising. And I think that's okay. You know, we'll have the most young people will reach out to me about our chipotle partnership about Selena Gomez putting us on her story, which we only got eight new followers from even though she has 400 million followers. But that's beside the point.

Speaker 1

32:32

Sometimes they work sometimes they don't we prepare for it either way.

Ben Collier

32:36

They they see us on the things that don't necessarily mean it's equal to transformative funding. But those are the things that have made FarmLink more of a household name. And so I think there's value there because we don't need that person to donate all the money they have today, they might have $25. And, you know, some textbooks, that's okay. But if the theory holds that in 10 years, they're going to be well established in whatever career they're on. And in 20 years, they're going to be leading it, then we'd love for them to know who we are right now. And so I think that our fundraising philosophy is not as much tied to how well and how much we're engaging with younger generations as just our intention of having to be something people care about or willing to promote or willing to believe in. And I guess maybe this time next year, hopefully we'll figure out a little bit of a better way to to fundraise around it. But that's

Jonathan McCoy

33:31

the whole Yes, you will forever students. I mean, yeah, I got this. It's Yes. And

Becky Endicott

33:36

I would think the ripple would just continue as you continue to put out content, put out meetups put out ways that really elevate the conversation beyond just farm link. It's about all of us. And I just think you've done a great job with that.

Jonathan McCoy

33:51

I mean, Ben, you know, us, we'd love to just sit and talk about philanthropies transformative power, you've gotten to have a front row seat to this unfold in front of you. Is there a moment that you've just seen philanthropy big or small that's really stuck with you?

Ben Collier

34:06

It's a good question. I have a small example, I think of a big one. In our first year, we were people. We were gonna story at the end of a newscast that was full of really hard to hear news. And a lot of young people really connected with us because we felt like they felt like we were closer to them than we were to their parents. And there's this one, eight or nine year old girl named Chloe, who saw our story and then had this flower stand in Washington and all summer she fundraise. She just had to take whatever flowers you want. And if you want leave money, send us $900. And she caught herself farmer Hudson plots and we have this letter in crayon that he wrote us and when I first saw it, and it's on our Instagram deep down there somewhere, but that's an example of small philanthropy where She wrote in the letter it, I wanted to fundraise for you guys because it felt like you're closer in age to me and you know you you're you're a kid like me and it's not i i think when it comes to big philanthropy, I'm actually trying to step into that space now where we're at the stage as FarmLink, where transformational funding is something we're starting to talk about, what is the story that we can tell people that's going to really build a movement around, not just believing that we can move a lot of food, but believing that we can move the needle on hunger as a whole. And to that end, we've spent so much of our time over the last few months thinking about how can we create something that lasts and is self sustaining. And so I could go into the whole elevator pitch of where we think that's going as that's actively being crafted right now. But I think when it comes to big philanthropy, I gotta be honest, that's where my mind goes right now is, how do we tell that story of lasting and consistent impact?

Becky Endicott

36:00

I don't know about you, Jon. But the quote that I'm channeling right now, as he talks about this, we had the privilege to sit down with Scott Harrison, the founder of charity:water, and he says, you know, it's much easier for me to go to a $10 million donor, and ask for that big mega gift, when I have a bank of 1000s of $10. donors who are already bought in that are creating the base underneath that, because mega donors don't want to feel like they're the only ones pushing the movement forward. But when you see that you have that historical background of champions giving a little than little by little a little becomes a lot. So we're absolutely rooting for you. And that and I just I want to share one little story as I brag on Ben. And I'm totally going to ruin the end of the documentary as a result of it. But I think it's a brilliant storytelling angle. But as you're going through the FarmLink documentary, you're seeing faces of the students and I see this one girl's face popping up, she comes in at the very end. And she says, This is my story. I used to have to go dumpster dive for my mom and my sister because we didn't have enough food. And now at college, and now I'm able to work on the frontlines of eradicating the thing I never wanted a child to have to do. That is the type of person your mission is attracting, that's who saw your value. And I just really commend you for the way that you live community and cognitive story, whether it's pots and tots, I don't remember what that was. But what a great example of how diverse the community stories can be an adding to the FarmLink story, because it's not about any one of us. So, okay, then we got to wrap it up with a one good thing you know, we're going to ask you this, what is one piece of advice? Maybe it's a life hack or a quote, what's one thing that you could leave with this community today, that will kind of give us a little boost, as if we haven't had a boost already.

Ben Collier

38:04

I had a long conversation with someone last week about how I tend to not get super angry before I figure out what other emotions I'm really trying to get through. And we talked about the idea that people are less in control of what you're upset about than you want them to be. We were at a restaurant and we watched someone next to us laughing at the waiter because something was wrong with the food that obviously had nothing to do with the waiter. And we talked about this concept of most people are less in control of the thing that you're upset about than you'd like for them to be. And I think that reflecting on when you're upset with someone and ask him or her what do they really have control over? And what are you asking them to do? It's been pretty helpful for us at FarmLink. And I think that's the one good thing on my mind right now.

Jonathan McCoy

38:59

In Collier,

Unknown Speaker

39:00

why?

Jonathan McCoy

39:00

Yeah. You never you can see why we just love hanging around you. Lifting up the sector asking a bigger, better question, gathering people around you. So we're gonna have a little bit of time we got like five, six minutes left. So we'll have some time for q&a. But as you're putting them in the q&a, vote up what you want to see here. Take to Ben and we'll take it to the lounge after this too. But how can people connect with you, Ben? Like what's on the radar for FarmLink? How can people plug into what you're doing right now and find what do you need?

Becky Endicott

39:30

How can we help you? What do we need?

Ben Collier

39:33

Oh, man, oh, first of all, please. You know, hop on our website, make sure you're signed up for our newsletter. That's where all of our new fellowships that's where our big updates, it's where our conversations about Earth Day and other things like that are happening. Please follow us on our socials. And now add me on LinkedIn and let's talk if there's anything that we've talked about today that could be worthwhile, what FarmLink needs I've done this exercise in person with a group of four I know is one of the most useful things I ever did with a group of people I didn't know. And it was challenging people to think of the one person that they think should be a part of this. Almost everybody has a network that they underestimate. And you take something like FarmLink. In this hunger space, we're trying to connect with major USDA policy leaders. Right now we're trying to work with food banks on the ground community partners, major farmers, and major fundraisers major donors is there one person that resonates with this are so well connected to this that you think they should know a farm like kids, and they should be a part of it. Because of 300 people did that farm Linkwood probably raised well over a million dollars, we'd have a bunch of new followers who'd be connected to a bunch of new articles and opportunities and future fellows. So that would be the one thing I would ask for.

Speaker 1

40:49

That's a one good thing we can all get around. So thank you for that. We're gonna go to the q&a. And Matt Elston, I just want you to know that I even voted your question because I can't wait to hear within says here. But Matt says how do you change people's perspectives with issues that are dominated by denial of reality? And human equality? Is that like the biggest question on all of our minds right now, then I would love to hear you tackle that?

Ben Collier

41:16

That's a good question that I think that in mission driven work, we have the opportunity to boil things down to values in a way that it's harder to do when the bottom line is a bottom line. And for our space. For instance, there's this concept that we've struggled with at times of donor stewardship, and I don't mean, financial donor, I mean, food donor, you have food banks, that'll say that's my donor, even though the farm will be coming to farm like and saying, I can rescue way more food, if we can work in this way. And we'll try and get as much food as possible to that food bank, but that food bank will still say you're stealing our donor. And to me, there's an element of denial and an abandonment of the original mission there. And I think, the most successful ways we've confronted that have been boiling it down to the actual value of why we're doing that, and standing on those values and standing on, if there's anything that we can actually communicate in terms of the impact, it's there. And so for me in those conversations, actually bringing up what the goals of those food banks are, and explaining how we think that we can be helping fulfill those goals. Truly, by working the way that we are, even though it is contradicting the way that they want it to be. It's, I think it requires a lot of patience and empathy to see it the way that other people see it. But ultimately, that's, I think, the best I got.

Becky Endicott

42:42

I actually think that was pretty bad actually think

Jonathan McCoy

42:44

it's brilliant, too. I mean, when we talk about storytelling, it's, we're fascinated by it, that it's like this age old practice, but it's still like the thing that cuts through. And like we have a superpower in nonprofit missions to like all of our stories connect to value, like deep core value levels of people. And those are the things that resonate. Those are the things that we fight for the things that we want to invest our money in. Like, it's just like, we have that superpower of connection. And so I think we need to lean into that. I think it's a brilliant way to think about it. It's gonna be a long game, you know, it's a really changes flash

Speaker 1

43:18

from this recovering major gift officer. No one owns a donor, no one holds claim over a donor, a donor chooses to be the captain of their own sales. And so I'm pretty sure everybody knew that but I had to double click on it. Okay, we've got a great question here from winter. She says we are an aging services organization. We serve older adults and adults with disabilities primarily, we are trying to engage younger generations as they enter caregiving or impacting by aging issues, especially ageism, is there any advice you may have for reaching younger generations about these issues and engaging them as partners?

Ben Collier

43:57

That's a really good question to thank you for that work winter. I would say that we've found champions for our work, even amongst the 700 fellows that are the reason this whole community has succeeded. So well, that stretches of time where our farms team has 30 fellows calling farms every single week for a year, it's going great. It's because we had two fellows that were actually leading it, who knew exactly what they needed to do. And I think if I were in this position, leading this organization, I would try and find one or two young people that really cared about being there for the right reasons. And then I tasked them with figuring out how to engage young people from there because they'd probably know how to make how to relate with their friends. But then you have the tie to them of knowing that they're there for the right reason, and they're there because they really care and you can hold them accountable. Again, coming back to the values piece. But I don't know if I'd have the direct answer I'd probably want to.

Becky Endicott

45:00

Oh, that's great. Can I throw one in there to Jon? Okay, this is very specific. But what if you winter started a campaign that said, post a photo of you with your grandparent and tell us one reason why they're so special. All of a sudden, not only do you have content, but you have someone's why, about why spending time with and maybe it's not just grandparents, someone that is an older person in your life that you've gained wisdom from, you get content, you get community, you can get such I wouldn't even think of peripheral view of how that generation speaks and values, that sort of population of people. So and again, to Ben's point, what a brilliant and beautiful mission that you serve. Keep going.

Jonathan McCoy

45:48

Yeah, my heart's full. I hope you've loved this show some love to Ben, thank you for being here. Thanks. Thanks so much for being here, friends, and you probably hear it in our voices. But we love connecting you with the most innovative people to help you achieve more for your mission than ever before.

Becky Endicott

46:05

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Jonathan McCoy

46:16

And one more thing if you love what you heard today, would you mind leaving us a podcast rating and review? It means the world to us and your support helps more people find this community. Thanks so much friends. Can't wait to our next conversation.

Jonathan McCoy

46:35

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Becky Endicott

46:46

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Jonathan McCoy

47:07

Can't wait to see you inside. That's weareforgood.com/friends.

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