Jenais Zarlin
(Director of Business Development)
Posted about 1 year ago
Our business model is built on a concept of justice not charity, it's right there in our motto "Not just a cup, but a just cup" we say. But is that what the broad Fair Trade conversation is about? The majority of our coffees are Fair Trade certified, but our conversation about it as a model for change often highlights poverty and barriers to access of basic needs and resources - like clean water, mosquito...
Brad Black
(Co-founder and Co-CEO)
Posted over 2 years ago
Owning my own business comes naturally to me - it’s almost like walking or breathing. As a child I sold vegetables, plants and my artwork at the bottom of my driveway or to neighbors. I frequently inquired about the many aspects of owning a business to my parents and grandparents (who were entrepreneurs – piano teachers, a publisher and a farmer). I enjoy the process of creating something from an idea. Ideas are essentially...
EO Products
Following ...
EO Products
San Francisco, CA
Lori Hope
(Paper=Food Project Manager)
Posted over 2 years ago
Do you believe in magic? We do, so much so that when we launched a new initiative and decided to create a video about it - a very short piece in which the pictures would speak at least as loudly as the words - we went with a concept that at first seemed somewhat odd. It involved a magic trick of sorts, and one that was truly unique.As anyone who's made a video knows, such...
Reem Rahim
(Co-founder and Creative Director)
Posted over 2 years ago
When my brother Ahmed and I decided to start Numi Organic Tea in the summer of 1998, it was a given that I would do the art on the packaging and he would do the tea blends. He had owned and operated tea houses in Prague and knew a lot about tea. I have been drawing since my childhood and was steeped in the Arts. We both have been creative all our lives and it...
At eight, I had a neighborhood lemon stand to make money for Beatles tickets. I liked the idea of having my own money to do what I want. That venture was followed by babysitting, car washes and day camps during school vacations so I could buy coveted items that my parents deemed extravagant. By the time I was 21, I co-owned 2 clothing stores in State College, Pennsylvania. I was motivated by creating beauty, working...
EO ProductsFollowing ...
EO Products
San Francisco, CA
People often ask us "Why do you make your Kombucha with Yerba Mate tea?" and my typical response is "because it's delicious," but I rarely get into all of the details of why Yerba Mate is so special. Grown in the sub-tropical rainforests of Argentina, Brail and Paraguay, yerba mate has long been revered as the “drink of the gods”. The Pasteur Institute and the Paris Scientific society concluded "it is difficult to find a...
I've recently been in search of a used desk and office chair for our office in Emeryville. What I found was a far more valuable--a timely and even critical lesson for the mounting debt and tough job market that we face today. I grew frustrated after spending hours searching Craigslist, both of searching for used office furniture, and hearing that I should just go to Ikea, which is walking distance away. But I didn't want...
Local is not about buying the same stuff at higher prices from a local vendor. Local is about happiness. I believe that the concept of Local is not well communicated. When people suggest that we "buy local," it comes off as preachy and turns many of us off. How many times have you gone into a corner store and left feeling like you'd been ripped off? The $2 Coke or $1.50 orange may as well be...
Today I heard a story worth sharing about a Bay Area woman whose life's work changed upon having her first child in a way that many of us could learn from. It wasn't long ago that Sandy Eng was working as a network engineer for a large Bay Area tech company, where she applied her background in math and computers. Back then, she might have spoken with some affection for the challenge of her work...
Starting NUMI was a major decision beyond just starting a business; it was about lifestyle, place of living, the way the mind works, and many more intricacies that weren't even clear to me at that time. My sister and I had the idea in late 1998 on a trip our family took to the Grand Canyon, but I was still living on my farm in Europe and couldn't even imagine living in the US and...
