Greater Good Granola

Mandy makes a mean granola. Not too crunchy, not too chewy, not too sweet, not too dry: just plain ol’ yummy. It’s got the good stuff in it:  olive oil, grade A Vermont maple syrup, dried cherries, and homemade vanilla salt.

Her original recipe came from her mom, Pat, who, she says, “was the homemade-granola queen before it was en vogue”, but she tweaked it a bit to her fancy (swapping out the honey to maple syrup, vegetable oil to olive oil, and not being afraid to give it a big pinch of salt).

She’s been making it for years, for herself, for her kids before they walk over to the John Stanford School, for friends. Her friends liked it so much, they told her she should sell it.

But Mandy didn’t much feel like trying to make a living selling granola. She was already making a living consulting with companies on “how to align their values with those of their consumers: that is, expressing their shared values and giving back to the community.”

Then Mandy spotted a little flower stand that had popped up at the corner of 2nd Ave NE and 42nd St: someone put out bouquets of flowers for sale, with a note asking whoever took them to leave what they felt appropriate. And she thought about the CityGrown Farm Stand at 41st and Eastern, where they were selling truly local, organic produce grown in gardens around Wallingford and Ballard every Saturday. And she thought about the signs people have been leaving by their apple and plum trees, inviting passing neighbors to share in the bounty.

“It felt like something was happening, something was shifting in our neighborhood, something I really like,” she told me as we chatted by Meridian Playground, the sounds of the Farmers Market and kids playing around us. “We may be in an urban setting, but we’re trying to re-infuse our community with some of the goodness of a small town vibe. “

Thus was born Greater Good Granola.

She decided to sell her granola in a way that made sense for her and for the neighborhood she lives in: you can buy a subscription at $14 per lbs or $25 per 2 lbs per month. She’ll leave the granola in mason jars on her front porch for pick-up. Stop by, drop off your money. 100% of the 2014 profits will go FamilyWorks, a Wallingford-based food bank and resource center “for people and families in north central Seattle who are seeking a path to long-term resiliency and might not otherwise have access to healthy food or parenting- and life-skills resources.” [Ed note: Wallyhood donates 10% of its income to FamilyWorks, as well.] After that, she’ll ask her subscribers where they’d like the money to go (although she says she’d “like to keep the cause aligned with the product- hunger, nutrition, etc.”)

“We’ve got 15 people signed up so far,” Mandy explained, “and we leave the front door open, so we can say hi when people stop by to pick up. People come to the porch, some stay and talk and I’ve seen a few friends more in this past week than I have in a long time.” 

And, of course, this dovetails nicely with her day job, Lev Strategies, her new marketing consulting firm with a special interest in “cause marketing, shared values as a means to create loyalty and sustainability. I have watched consumer appetite move beyond cause marketing to a bigger, more holistic idea – post-recession consumers increasingly consider themselves investors and they want to know they have shared values with the companies they do business with.”

If you want you’re interested in getting some Greater Good Granola of your own (or just chatting with her on her front porch), you can contact her through the Greater Good Granola web site or at [email protected]. But move quick: she says he has to limit it to 50 subscribers, since it’s all being made in her own kitchen (and don’t worry, she’s got a cottage food license). That’s up to 100 lbs of granola a month (plus some for the kids!)