Deer Buzz

How a Social Mission Guides This Business

Dancing Deer CEO moved her cookie company to a gang-ridden neighborhood and donates a third of the profits of one product line to charity. How can this be good for business?

Dancing Deer Baking Company got off to a rocky start but that didn’t stop the Boston, Massachusetts-based outfit from making the local community and its employees priorities—right up there with turning a profit.

In the early and mid-90s, America was falling head over heels for gourmet coffee, and to Suzanne Lombardi, that aromatic blend smelled like opportunity. After spending time with some artisanal roasters out in California, she recalls, “I realized that the coffee craze was something that was going to come East.”

Seeing the need for high-quality baked goodies to accompany the country’s newfound java predilection, Lombardi rented a caterer’s kitchen in the evenings where she could bake in mass, schlepping pots and pans to and fro each night, and delivering her all-natural baked goods to coffee shops at the crack of dawn. Understandably, this was a stressful way to run a business, and one day she sought out Trish Karter and her husband Ayis Antoniou for advice. The pair did her one better and became angel investors, but a year and a half into the partnership Lombardi was still struggling.

Read the full article at Inc.com!

Dancing Deer Press Release: Local, Mission-Driven Food Businesses Collaborate To Beat the Recession

BOSTON, MA, December 8, 2009 – Dancing Deer, the women-led natural baking company and Equal Exchange, the worker-owned Fair Trade pioneer have joined forces to solve your gifting and holiday party needs—all while supporting the local economy and some great causes. The “Taste of New England Gift Baskets” feature the award-winning Molasses Clove Cookies and other tasty treats from Dancing Deer complemented by some of Equal Exchange’s most popular organic coffee, tea and chocolates. The gift baskets also include two other local, independent enterprises; locally produced honey from Reseska Apiaries of Holliston and trail mix from Fastachi of Watertown.
The CEO’s of Dancing Deer and Equal Exchange, Trish Karter and Rob Everts, have been professional friends for years and often noodled the challenge of how to work together and help each other build their businesses which have so many parallel values. Both companies have won many awards for their socially responsible business practices and have been lauded for having two of the most democratically organized workplaces. Both are members of Boston’s Sustainable Business Network, and Trish and Rob have shared in a CEO roundtable with other local mission-driven entrepreneurs. So when Dancing Deer decided to bring out a gift basket line, the opportunity to collaborate was obvious.
It’s been a tough year in the food business and particularly in the world of gifts as consumers and corporations have ratcheted back on spending. However Dancing Deer and Equal Exchange appeal on not only one level, but three: Great Product; Local Business; Double Bottom Line Operators who are committed not only to financial return to the shareholders, but also to environmental sustainability and social justice. This might be considered good marketing and strategy, which it is, but this double bottom line approach is driven by the convictions of the founders and employees of these organizations. Equal Exchange supports small-scale organic farmers around the world through its Fair Trade program. Dancing Deer dedicates one of its product lines (the Sweet Home Project) to funding scholarships for homeless mothers by donating 35% of the retail price on those gifts in addition to its broader double bottom line mission.
Rob Everts said about the collaboration: “Given all the values our companies share in common plus Dancing Deer’s hard-won reputation for both delicious food and serving the community, we’re really pleased to finally work together and have our products alongside theirs.”
Trish Karter returned the compliment by adding: “Equal Exchange has done some really important work in the Fair Trade movement, their products are terrific and I love their broader mission and values”.

About Dancing Deer
Dancing Deer is a company of people who are passionate about food, nature, aesthetics and community. Known for yummy, all-natural cakes, cookies, brownies and baking mixes, the company has won many national awards and accolades for its distinctive products and innovative business practices. All employees are stakeholders in this women-led enterprise. Sold in gourmet, natural food and conventional grocery stores nationwide, the company also ships directly to consumers (www.dancingdeer.com 1-888-699-DEER) and offers creative marketing programs to corporate customers. When people are happy it shows in the food!

About Equal Exchange
A pioneer and U.S. market leader in Fair Trade since 1986, Equal Exchange is a full service provider of high quality, organic coffee, tea, chocolate, cocoa, healthy snacks and bananas. Major customers include Harvest, Roche Brothers, Whole Foods, Stop & Shop, Hannaford, City Feed, Ten Thousand Villages, schools and places of worship nationwide. 100% of Equal Exchange products are fairly traded, benefiting more than 40 small farmer co-operatives in 22 countries around the world. In keeping with its Fair Trade mission and belief in economic democracy Equal Exchange is a worker co-operative, owned and governed by its approximately 110 employees. http://Shop.EqualExchange.coop 774-776-7400.
Contact: Rodney North, 774-776-7398, rodney@equalexchange.coop

Creative Leader Trish Karter

Yesterday I spoke at the annual Executive Women’s Leadership conference at Reebok by the invitation of Brown grad Sarah Stuart on my favorite topic of “Creative Leadership.” There I had the chance to meet Trish Karter who is the CEO of one of my favorite sources of cookies (no kidding). Ms. Karter began her life as a studio artist that later discovered how to channel her ability to “think in leaps” as a successful industry consultant, went back to the purity of painting and established that career, and then came back as an entrepreneur running an inspired enterprise as a classic creative leader.

In my many encounters with creative leaders around the world that channel the power of art-thinking and design-thinking, I am convinced we live in a new, exciting time of opportunity for the world of art and design. It’s just begun. -JM

Visit RISD’s website

Home Work

In Boston, long before you walk into the Dancing Deer Baking Company and long after you leave, you smell it. The chocolate. The cinnamon. The unidentifiable yumminess.

Goodness lingers. Company CEO and co-founder Trish Karter, a Wheaton alumna, has made sure that that is also true of her business mission by practicing corporate social responsibility. Her award-winning Boston-based company donates 35 percent of the retail price from the Sweet Home product line to programs aimed at ending homelessness.

She has taken the mission on the road with the Dancing Deer Mother’s Day Ride to help end homelessness. To mark company’s 15th anniversary, Karter got on her bike on April 22 for a 15-day, 1,500-mile ride from Atlanta to Boston. The ride will end around Mother’s Day on May 6. Along the way she plans to stay at homeless shelters in 15 cities and talk about ways to end homelessness. She’s also trying to raise money for a scholarship fund that helps homeless mothers.

Before she left for the trip, NECN interviewed her about her efforts. See photos, find out where she is now via her GPS tracker and read her blog at www.dancingdeer.com/ride.

Dancing Deer President Rides Bike To Give Back

Dressed in cycling spandex and riding a stationary bicycle, Trish Karter is not your typical trade show exhibitor. She caught my eye when I was walking the aisles at San Francisco’s Fancy Food Show. The Dancing Deer Baking Co. owner is doing her part to spread sweetness by riding 300 miles during the three day food extravaganza.

Her efforts are part of a bigger picture. The Chief Deer at Dancing Deer is participating in a solo Mother’s Day Ride, covering 1,500 miles to celebrate Dancing Deer’s 15th Anniversary.  Karter will visit 15 shelters in 15 days with Dancing Deer “Cookie House” events taking place with shelter residents, local chefs and mayors.  Her goal; to inspire folks to send a gift to every homeless Mom in the US, (700,000.) A secondary goal is to raise scholarship money to help homeless mothers.

When I asked Karter about her Boston-based company and the inspiration behind her Mother’s Day ride she said, “The reason I’m in business is to make social change.  We’re a green company and woman-owned.  The cookies are great, but they are my vehicle for change.”

Do you have plans for Mother’s Day? Why not help spread some sweetness and donate to a worthy cause.  Afterall, everyone has a mother to thank.