Maple Street - We're In Bellingham

I just wanted to again express my regained faith in humanity by the turnout at the first-ever Brett Allsop Memorial Bagel Toast.  For those that don’t have the entire background on it, here it is:

Back in August 2008 I met Brett at the Word of Mouth Social Media Conference held by TAG and the SBDC (now the EVC).  It was refreshing to know that there was someone, in the sea of CEOs, marketing/biz dev executives and consultants, that genuinely felt as out of place as I did.  In the respect that, he was invited to speak on a panel about social media, and he was the first to admit the most he’s ever participated is on LinkedIn.  And here I was, on all the major social media channels, and still wondering where the value was.

Then, in the midst of all the catch phrases, Brett identified what got him excited about what the future held: the ability to find and try the next great idea.  To experience a problem, hunt down and persevere for a solution, and the tools to make that happen are coming.  As a side anecdote, he imparted his own private pet peeve: the inability to get his bagels toasted at The Bagelry.  ”The next great business I build,” he joked “is to set up a toaster in front of there and toast bagels”.

It’s strange the things that stick with you over a year, from a passing acquaintance, over the smallest detail.  But on August 18th, when I learned of his passing at age 38, it was the first thing I thought: he didn’t get to try his great idea.  There were plenty of people I ran into that always mentioned a preference for toasted, but wanted to keep the peace.  Once his family identified a charity to give to, it seemed the right time to break out his idea.

So on Monday, August 31, 2009, at 8:30 in the morning, the first (and perhaps only) Brett Allsop Memorial Bagel Toast Happened.  The proceeds of $100 for just an hour on a sidewalk went to the Brett Allsop Memorial Scholarship for Bellingham Dollar for Scholars.  Here’s my big take-away from this particular grassroots guerilla campaign:

1. On Monday morning, half of the people aren’t prepared to have their reality shaken. The sight of a lone toaster on the sidewalk with a crowd around it did garner a load of double-takes from the morning class of Bikram Yoga, who inadvertently supplied our power (so, much love to them, see number 5).  Although people were curious, not all were curious enough to venture closer and reset their breakfast.  Also, many already loaded up on grapefruit, muesli, or whatever they start their day with, so if it looked like work, forget it.
2. Surprisingly, the other half are really your best allies. When the idea to throw the bagel toast came about, there wasn’t much if a window to get full support.  I had a host of things that could go wrong: zoning restrictions, food service regulations, and a whole slew of road blocks could either shut the event down or worse, if I didn’t behave, land me in jail.  But the biggest issue I had with the concept was the blessing of the folks that sell the bagels.  As a matter of fact, the very concept of a toasted bagel goes against the credo of one of our favorite Bellingham haunts: The Bagelry.  Their bagels are fresh out of the oven and hot – there is no need to toast them.  However, some like them crunchy.  I pushed ahead with the conviction that what people do with their bagels once they walk out the door is their right.   Luckily, after a series of missed voicemails, and bounced emails (see number 5).  We got the blessing from Ken, and a bag of leftovers besides!
3. Let people help. When you start the day, it’s lone wolf time.  You’ve done your planning, your advance location scout (see number 4), grabbed everything out of the garage and went to work before the dawn fog has even burned off.  However, stay alert to the needs and abilities of those that show up, be it volunteers… or even participants that wind up as volunteers.  You cannot, and will not, be allowed to do the entire event yourself.  In this case, when Brett’s wife Amy and their kids were the first ones at the scene, she was a dynamo.  The first instinct is to say “No, you sit over there, this is for you guys, I’ll handle things”.  Don’t fall for it.  Amy and the family were there to participate in something bigger than themselves, and in their week of grief, it became their project of the day.  Extra bagels were acquired.  Schmears and butter hit the table, plastic trays were provided.  Ben at Mallards brought us real knives!  Kids were eating chocolate chip spread on toasted bagels from the trunk of my wagon.  I didn’t do that, that happened.
4. Let your Plan B look like you Plan A. Very few knew, the original plan was to have a power inverter connected to a cigarette light adaptor in the car and be completely off the grid for the event.  As much as I pride myself as an idea man, I’m a crappy electrician.  Did you know that a mere toaster can pull enough juice to fry an inverter, and if I kept up, the entire electrical system of a Suburu Legacy?  Me neither!  Luckily, I had already scouted my plan B (perhaps subconsciously predicting my failure).  There was a grounded outlet in the right spot in the adjacent building, and I had the foresight to pack a roll of gaffer’s tape and a ten-foot extension cord.  It wasn’t sexy, but we achieved toasty.  To be fair, I had absolutely no Plan B if we faced any other obstacles, so let’s say the event fell on the side of lucky.
5. Broadcast your intentions before your face time. Let’s face it, the cooler the concept is, the greater the chance that not everything will be clear to supporters, participants, or even bystanders.  Email, Facebook and Twitter were paramount in closing the gap to not only promote the event, but also avoid some massive losses of goodwill with people not directly related to the event.  Remember when I mentioned that Ken eventually got and blessed the idea of Bagelry bagels for a brief and shining moment being toasted?  That was not an instant process.  As a matter of fact, it was the culmination of a comedy of errors involving phone tag, bounced emails and crossed wires.  I finally had to appeal to the Facebook community and tossed the equivalent of a message in a bottle to make sure that we were on the right side of things.  Miraculously, Ken – who isn’t on –  found out from employees and all was well by Monday morning, and for that I thank him.  Also, I never directly contacted the Allsop family for help… Amy found out around the time of the funeral from a friend of mine who was on Facebook, emailed me with her support that weekend, and showed up as the powerhouse I mentioned earlier, along with the entire clan.



6. Start small and crappy, so you can elicit ways to do it better. Not that I had a choice, but it was imperative to run lean and fast with the barest essentials to make the event even happen.  A car, a TV tray, a power inverter (blown), a toaster, an extension cord, gaffer’s tape, one laserjet print for the log and one laserjet print for the instructions to passersby.  The advantage when doing a pilot event like this is, people get the essence, then start jamming on the idea while they’re there.  By the end of the day, there were people talking about doing live radio remotes and adding fun runs to the core of an idea Brett had given us a long time ago.  And by the end of the morning, there were a load of amenities (like spreads) that I left off the list.  Don’t take the suggestions or criticism from your volunteers as a condemnation of your efforts.  Remember, you set this up to be a live, real-time, in-the-field brainstorming session with your greatest supporters… you just found that day!
7. Follow the letter of the law, but feel like an outlaw. Like I said, I worry a lot the day before anything like this.  More than I should.  Why?  Because I pick projects that, on the surface, haven’t been done before.  With that, as a responsible member of society, I have to ask why.  Man, I have a vivid imagination (see number 2)!  As none of the horrible fates I planned for came to pass, it gave me plenty of energy to think that even if I weren’t bending laws on the books, I was the only one parked backwards on Railroad.  We were running power from a stranger’s place!  We were toasting the previously untoastable!  Kids were eating chocolate before lunch!  We were unstoppable!  Don’t go out of your way to actually break laws and piss people off.  Break your own laws, your hang-ups and fears, and you’ll feel like you’re defying gravity itself.
8. Find the inside joke. To the rest of the world, the concept of a Bagel Toast is probably lost.  But to a population inside Bellingham, a toasted bagel is something to not be taken for granted.  Getting a decent bagel, it is said, is a rarity in the corner of the Pacific Northwest where we are, and the one place famous for them doesn’t toast for the reasons above.  Over the years, we’ve woven that into our cultural identity here, along with “The poorest man in Bellingham is the umbrella salesman”. Because, in spite of evidence to the contrary, we don’t see the reason to have one.  Does that mean that the next event is an Umbrella Planto Ex, where we challenge people to make things from the parts of tourists lost and discarded umbrellas?  That’s entirely up to you.
9. Some will support a cause, most will support an experience. With the largest per-captia ratio of non-profits in the nation, we talk a lot about residents and corporations in Bellingham suffering “donor fatigue”.  It can become a straightforward and expected exercise of dinners and postage-paid envelopes.  Heck, it even doesn’t phase me that friends of mine are in jail for charity anymore, although I try to help make bail… because it’s not a real jail.  It’s what they call at Disneyland Goofy Jail.  And Goofy Jail has higher stakes, you’re usually really in trouble!  Let’s flip the theme park on its head for a second: if you were at the gates of a park that charged admission, and with that ticket came the promise of a cure for cancer, but once you got in there nothing remarkable was happening… there’s a part of you deep down that, in spite of everyone’s best intentions, makes you wonder if these guys could really cure cancer at all.  I know, it’s a ridiculous and irrational correlation, but that’s the difference between “good show” and “bad show” in the parlance of the Imagineer.
10. Have fun. I shouldn’t have to remind you, but I do.  There are so many pressing issues in the world, and you’re probably at the helm of solving a few… or one.  I’ve witnessed the strength of a family today, and I assure you they brought me more cheer than I could ever hope to bring them.  Why?  Because I could see, in the light of their loss, they were celebrating and enjoying what it was to have been with that person, and to be alive themselves, and to know that they were there for each other.  I spend as many hours as you, my nose to the grindstone, agonizing over the problem.  It’s a worthwhile endeavor, but it doesn’t do any good on the day if you look like the worries of the world have worn you to a nub. That’s not the experience people want.  If you believe there’s an ounce of a fighting chance, people need to see a pound.

That’s more than enough typing for tonight.  But also a big “thanks” to Brian Sibley for the picture of the crowd.  That is all.

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