Mark Brand, owner of Save on Meats in Vancouver, has teamed up with creative agency Village & Co. to help feed the homeless over the winter months.
Brand, who runs a restaurant, butcher shop, clothing company and social enterprise in Canada’s poorest neighbourhood, created a token that could be exchanged only for food at his shop. He ordered 1,000 tokens expecting it would take him through to the end of the year.
The program launched at the end of November, and in the first 10 days he sold more than 5,000 tokens, many to businesses.
People, Brand said, are hesitant about giving money to people on the street because they suspect it goes to alcohol, drugs or cigarettes.
“All it is, is giving somebody a sandwich, it’s really black and white,” Brand said. “What’s really important to me is being able to create the conversation between the affluent and the people who are struggling. The token has to be handed to someone. You are not doing a random donation you have to look somebody in the face and give it to them.”
Village & Co took the concept into the digital sphere. Whenever someone uses the hashtag #shareameal on any social platform, the agency puts a Save On Meats sandwich token worth $2.25 (which covers the cost of a healthy breakfast while at the same time supporting Save On Meat’s social programs) on their tree. On Dec. 31, the tokens will be donated to Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside Women’s Centre.
“Mark developed this whole thing around Christmas in January, and it got us thinking [about] what can we do now that they can reap the benefits in a month where typically people are ignored,” said Justin Young, a partner in Village & Co. “We are so tainted with the big agencies doing these very self-promotional kind of activities where they spend $120,000 on a website where if someone does something they’ll give 5 cents to some sort of charity. We wanted to do something that’s actually meaningful.”
Brand received national attention on Nov. 28 when he appeared on the CBC show The Big Decision. After taking a close look at Brand and his businesses, Arlene Dickinson, CEO of Venture Communications and one of the show’s panel members, invested $250,000 along with her marketing savvy to help Brand build his socially responsible business model.
