Issue 026: Can One Idea Create a Movement?
Photos courtesy of Love Your Melon
– Lee Iacocca
Has a startup ever grabbed your attention so much that you followed its path? In 2014, a campus tour led by college students Brian Kelly and Zachary Quinn caught mine. Two years earlier, Brian and Zach met during an entrepreneurship class at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul. For their class project, they needed to start a business that made a profit by the end of the semester. Since the Minnesota winters were cold and there wasn’t a lot of fashionable headwear, the duo focused on beanies.
The project was based on the simple concept of a lemonade stand. Think lemon and yellow. Then, mix in the TOMS business model, and Brian and Zach’s original outcome was Love Your Lemon, driven by the mission to give one yellow beanie to a child battling cancer for every one sold. After some consideration, the co-founders realized that kids would want hats in their favorite colors, which meant Love Your Lemon didn’t work.
The problem was “lemon” was the core project concept. Brian and Zach shared three strong reasons to change lemon to melon.
Even if you lose your hair, you still love your melon.
Lemon and melon had the same letters.
Kids would want their favorite colors.
With their teachers’ support, the Love Your Melon’s co-founders wanted their products manufactured in North America and the beanies had to be soft and comfortable for the kids to wear. With 400 hats in their first production and the goal to sell half of them and give away the rest, they sold out in two days.
What started as a class project shifted when Zach attended a fundraiser for a local teenager who knew he was losing his battle. Zach realized he could’ve been that teen.
If you’ve read Simon’s Sinek’s books, Start with Why or Find Your Why, you know that your “why” becomes your biggest motivator. At a support meeting, one woman with three children emotionally told how she couldn’t leave a physically abusive relationship because without business skills she was stuck in a dead-end job and couldn’t support her kids. I realized how crucial mentors, who generously shared their knowledge, were in my life. The message of “Teach a man how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime” (Lao Tzu) became mine. Shortly after, as a community service, I taught a weekly sales training to 15 people who wanted to develop their skills. What’s your why?
Love Your Melon’s event that pulled me in was what some would call a crazy, risky idea. As you probably guessed, I didn’t. The start-up founders bought an old tour bus. They retrofitted it with bunk beds and toured college campuses across the country. They sold beanies and invited students to join them when they visited local hospitals to give hats to kids, which kicked off their ambassador program. Love Your Melon’s tour caught the attention ofGood Morning AmericaandToday.
To date, with the help of 13,000 student ambassadors, LYM donated over 200,000 hats to children battling cancer and 7.2 million dollars to fight pediatric cancer.
Stand behind your change. Brian and Zach stood firm in their belief that changing the name of the company and the color of the hats, even though they didn’t follow the project outline, would help them reach more kids.
Shift for the good of your audience. Their company name, Love Your Melon, encouraged kids to love their melons during all stages of treatment.
Know who can help you. Recognizing other college students like them, who wanted stylish products with a purpose, would help Brian and Zach reach more kids.
Momentum Builders
When looking to shift from one decision to the next, ask:
Will a shift help you reach a better outcome?
Does this decision align with your core values?
Will this decision benefit a long-term goal?
Until next time, have a Bounce-Up™ day.
Mj
P.S. Did you see this review? Sales Productivity Expert Shannon J. Gregg and Andrew Duncan of Cloud Adoption Services reviewed Bounce Up™: Outpower Adversity, Boost Resilience, Rebound Higher
