INTERVIEW with Masami Sato & Paul Dunn of B1G1

David and Emma talk to Masami and Paul, the founders of B1G1, a global organisation dedicated to connecting businesses and projects that want to do more good in the world.

with Emma Stephens & David Durance

B1G1 – Buy 1, Give 1 – is a global giving initiative that enables businesses to create great impacts in our world. Today, B1G1 works with more than 2,500 businesses. And these businesses have created over 175 million giving impacts already. When business become part of B1G1, they can choose to give to as many of the 500+ carefully selected projects as they like. All B1G1 projects are in line with the Sustainable Development Goals set by global leaders. 100% of their giving goes to the projects they choose.

Business also benefit as they change lives through daily business activities – typically donating a small fraction of business transactions. They are finding and connecting to a higher purpose, and at the same time engaging and inspiring customers and employees.

Emma: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview with LivingNow. We were very inspired by your talking yesterday, and love what B1G1 offers to the world; so we wanted to offer some of your insight to our readers, too!

David: We really like the idea that you talk about of flipping things 180 degrees. Some of the things that you showed us yesterday were ‘flipped’ from regular perspectives, such as ‘don't try to be interesting; try to be interested’. So we thought the angle we would look for his interview would be transformation. What changes B1G1 makes, and also what changed for you, Masami? You started out as a chef, right?

Masami: Yes, I used to work on Chapel Street, here [in Melbourne] as a macrobiotic chef, before my daughter was born. And then I quit my job because I got pregnant, and then moved to New Zealand.

David: What made you decide to be a chef?

Masami: When I started to travel, I used to be very shy. I found it very difficult to talk to strangers or express myself. When I was travelling I found that there were two things that helped me to connect so much better: one of those things was to cook!

And another thing that I did when I was travelling was actually palm reading! Yes, so, I used to go and meet people, and I would say, “Oh, you are so interesting. Can I have your palm print, please?”. I had my palm book, and I asked people to put their print in my book, and I wrote down what I learned from the conversation. And people loved it, and talking about themselves! I didn't have to say much; I just listened to what they said.

Emma: And that helped you connect?

Masami: Yeah, that helped me a lot. Although it was just a hobby –I don't do it professionally – it has helped me in many cases.

For example, I read Sir Richard's Branson’s palm last year [Emma: cool!], and he was very keen to know about whether he has a good, healthy, long life, and so on. So it helps me to connect with whatever the space is that I’m in.

And the cooking was another thing that helped. Because if you could cook, or if you wanted to learn to cook from the local people… Everywhere I went people invited me into their homes. And they were so proud to share that with me.

I would sometimes go to a restaurant, like a local, little place, and I’d say, “Oh, the food here is so nice – can I try to cook it with you?” Then I would cook with the people, together.

So that was why I got so much into food. Although I didn't have formal training or anything –I actually used to study architecture when I was at school; very different! But because I worked in so many different places, when I came to Melbourne for the first time –I was at that time doing a working holiday –I could work here as well. I wanted to stay a long time without spending too much money; so I applied for a cooking job. There was this macrobiotic restaurant opening up soon. They didn't care that I didn't have any official training; I had cooked so much in so many places that they said, “Why don't you come in and just try.”

That's why food became so much a part of me. But also, I believe that food brings people together, and connects people.

That sharing of a nourishing meal is such an important part of life, like a happy family, or friendship. I wanted to be part of that.

Emma: That’s so beautiful.

David: So then you moved to New Zealand, and you were cooking there?

Masami: Yes. And because I got pregnant, I took a little time off work. At that time I was thinking about what I wanted to do, having my young baby with me. And that's when I realised that maybe the thing that I could do was to start my own business. And then I could dictate where the resources or profit went, as a result of building this business.

David: And what was your idea for the business?

Masami: Starting a business is very difficult if you try to do something big and proper. Especially if you don't have any form of proper funding, or investor, or anything like that. And I didn't have business experience; I had chef experience, and cooking experience, but I didn't know how to run a business! So it's difficult to say please invest in this business, which I've never done!

So, with my now-ex-partner, we went to see all the businesses that were for sale. There was this particular business, which was a fast food / take away, in an industrial estate. It was so run down, and the owner had really had enough of it; so he wanted to get out of the business. He even wanted to give away his business, he was so tired of it!

So what happened was, we bought this business for about $2000, including all the equipment that comes with it! But the business was losing money every week. So we had to turn the business around quickly. Otherwise we were gonna be in trouble!

We got that, and I started to make some changes because it was fast food. Hot dogs. Chips. Burgers – which I didn’t even eat, myself! I never even tasted the burgers! But I tried to make them nicely, and I started to add more lettuce, and tomatoes. And I tried to make things more interesting.

Then I started to add on some additional things, such as quiche – you know; things that maybe some of the ladies working in the offices of the factories might like to eat.

And those little improvements, as well as people knowing that this young family with a baby – quite often on my back! – was really trying, made a difference. We wanted to connect with those amazing, caring people working in these places. Including the tradesmen with their big muscles, and the drivers, and the office ladies… And our store became very popular.

It was in Christchurch. Then we bought another shop. And then we had two take away places called ‘Fast Feast’ – cute little shops.

Eventually, there was a time when I thought that maybe it was time for me to start doing something which I REALLY wanted to do, which was to do healthy food. Because, you know, I was into organic food, and all that kind of thing, previously.

I thought, if we were to have our own business design, then I would do healthy food. And also food that people with allergies and other food issues could eat. So that was gluten-free, organic and vegetarian. Not because we wanted to just cater for vegetarian people, but if it's gluten free and organic and also vegetarian, we could do many varieties of food, and then people could share it easily. So that was the idea.

I wasn't a business person; so that's why we worked together. My partner at that time came from an IT background – so he was the one who wanted this business to be an online business!

And that was, like, 18 years ago! Very tough. You know; nobody ordered food online then!

But we were trying to do this gluten-free, organic food; change your lifestyle, and order online, and we will cook it freshly and deliver it to your door! Very different. And a huge struggle, initially.

Emma: Wow. And was your partner at the time from New Zealand?

Masami: Yes. And now I have two teenage kids who are New Zealand citizens. And because I’ve spent a long time in Australia, I have a strong connection with this region.

David: So what changed? You had this successful, very busy food business – but that's not what you’re doing now. So was there something that happened that had you decide to do something else?

Masami: The intention of the food business was that we wanted to give. We wanted to give back. We wanted to use our business to make a difference.

Food was part of it, but I wasn't attached to food. What I wanted was to make a difference.

Emma: The food was just the vehicle.

Masami: Yes. The thing is, when you are a business owner, and you are so busy all the time, it's very easy to say, “I'm not ready to do what I want to do just yet, because the business is not successful yet.” And we could keep going with that thought. It can feel like always the ‘achievement’ or ‘success’ is just a few steps ahead of you. And you're hoping that soon, or one day, you will ‘get there’.

And the realisation, for me, was that, instead of trying to do something that I cannot do today, what about if I just try to do something that I CAN easily do today? And continue to do.

The ‘buy 1 give 1’ idea began: every time we sell a meal we just feed one child. We found out that this actually only costs something like 25 cents to feed one child, if you are working with capable NGOs who have a really great expertise. For us, this was in India. Because I had travelled in India, backpacking, I wanted to start with the Indian street children.

Then adding that giving into our products was so easy. The giving and caring then became one of the ingredients of our food! And that really transformed the way I saw what was possible.

And then I started to imagine – eventually; it took several months – until I got the realisation that it’s nice that we were doing this, but we shouldn't be holding on to that idea as ours. So I started thinking of all the other caring business people I met along the way, and learned from. I thought, ‘They would like to give, if they had a way to do something like this’.

Not necessarily giving food; they might want to plant trees, or educate people, or help the disadvantaged, or some other form of giving. Everybody has a different caring; different issues or topics that they resonate with.

So then we started to imagine the world of ‘buy one give one’ where everything we do makes a difference, together.

So that’s why, even though I loved my food business, I decided to sell the food company. I moved to Singapore, so that we could fully focus on developing the global giving initiative that makes it possible for small businesses to make a difference like this.

David: So do you think that your attitude about giving made a difference in your food business? Do you think that the spirit that you had, of wanting to give, made people want to be part of it?

Masami: Totally! I was beginning the business, and trying to do an online business, but it was too early for that to succeed. During that struggling time we were trialling many different ideas, until we got to the working model, which was the frozen packaged food (which eventually was distributed to over 150 stores). During that period of the trials, and errors, and struggles, many amazing things happened.

One of those things, for example, was: we couldn't afford to pay staff, so we put up a notice in the WWOOFing book, offering an opportunity to learn to cook organic, gluten-free food. And we had so many people applying from around the world. At one point we had twelve of us living in one small house!

We were commuting every day, in a van. Some people couldn't fit in – so they would jog to the commercial kitchen. And we all worked together happily, all day. Often long hours. WWOOFing is about four hours, maximum, so we were saying ‘you don't need to work more than four hours’, but everybody wanted to work with me all the time!

We’d come home and make food together. We’d do a detox, or juicing – we were learning and sharing together. We’d talk about lots of things. And we became one big family.

After a while we couldn’t fit all the people in the house, but we still had more people wanting to come. So I said to my partner, ‘Okay, let’s move to the garage!’. So my family moved to the garage so that we could give up all the bedrooms to these lovely guests!

People saw this; how much we cared about them. We weren’t trying to use them as cheap labour. They could see how passionate we were with this vision.

And we were grateful for those people, giving their time to help us. And we all became one in that mission to achieve something great.

And this pattern – of people coming together trying to give more – happened everywhere I went.

Today, in B1G1, I'm just so inspired every day by the amazing, giving spirit of our members and partners, whose businesses we work with, because they always come to us wanting to give more. Wanting to help more.

I wonder, if it’s so easy to really create the giving spirit, and it feels so great to be in it, and everybody gets rewarded (without thinking ‘what's in it for me?’), then why can’t the world create this?! It can heal so much pain, and can solve so many problems.

David: And this resonates with what you said earlier, about the Mother Teresa statement about ‘drawing the family circle too small’.

Masami: Yes. I feel that these things tell us the ultimate truth. The family system has been here for thousands of years, and we maintain our families. They’re still here. We didn't go extinct. [Emma: Yet!] So this means that this strategy actually works. The family unit, working together, in achieving great things.

We have kids, and people experience this unconditional love. Even though kids don’t give us anything back, and they cry and they poo, and they make mess. But we don't abandon them. So we continue our generations.

So this is working. And if this is working, then why don't we do this in our businesses as well?

David: In some ways, although what you’re doing now is different, there are some common things about your previous business and concepts, and now. You’ve gone from chef, to travelling the world [with B1G1], and through those things you’ve brought this sense of family, and your care for people.

Emma: And gratitude seems to be a really big thing that you bring. Gratitude for the connections that people are caring to make. That seems a really strong theme in everything you’ve talked about, Masami.

My question – and this could be for one or both of you is: if you could say something to hundreds of thousands of LivingNow readers, interested in personal development, what would you wish they could know?

Paul: I’d say: the reality is, there actually is a gift in everything. Even things that might seem like a bad situation. And just being grateful. Be the zero; let go of the ego, so that everything can then flow through you.

Masami: There are two things that help me: the first one is the analogy that life is a game. Because we do our life and we do our business, and sometimes we get too serious. A game is something that kids play, and they love it. And there’s something that's common between life, business and a game: they all have a beginning and end.

So we choose to start, or we happen to start something. We might happen to be born! And one day there's an end. End of life and end of business.

Even though businesses can be sustained for many generations, still, one day, the business will not be needed any more, when the times have changed. So there's a beginning and an ending.

And then another thing is that there are rules that we play with. Not necessarily written down, like ‘This is what I should and shouldn’t do’, but rules. And we learn to play the game, and try to become better game players by learning tools or skills, or techniques or insight. So we try to become better, but sometimes we get obsessed, and attached to the outcome. But the thing is, the real purpose in all those things is to ENJOY.

Paul: Enjoy the game!

Masami: Yes – enjoy the game, enjoy the life, enjoy the business!

So that is a thing that I would love people to ponder on. And then another thing, which I think of, I wrote about in my first book. There are three words in that book – it's a very tiny book! – and it has a formula. It is: ACCEPTANCE, TRUST and LOVE.

Acceptance links to our past. If we are not accepting something, we are not accepting our past or our experience or something that already happened. Even though we cannot change our past, why don't we accept it? Or else it will create pain and suffering.

Trust is about our future. When we are not trusting, we are thinking that maybe this is not going to go well, or this person might lie to me or so on. We doubt. And as a result, this creates fear. But if we can accept our past, and trust our future, that leads to love in the present moment.

And so, in order for us to really enjoy this life – and our game and our business – if we could just accept everything. And acceptance doesn't mean we don't do anything, or we give up. But accept what is, and trust our future, and trust everybody. When we can do that, we will truly enjoy and love the present moment. And that gives us an almost magical energy and ability to do the best that we can do. And we can continue to learn and experience things.

Paul: And that goes back to the title of the magazine; LivingNow! Right now, in the moment!

Masami: And I used to read LivingNow when I was living in Australia! [Now that we’re paperless, Masami can read it anywhere in the world. Ed.]

Emma: Such good coincidences and connections!

David: What stands out as being one of the biggest transformations? Of course, we can see many on your website, with your cool widgets and so on, but what stands out to you?

Paul: Well, of course, there are so many examples! The goat project is a great one: these people receive a goat, with the understanding that, when they do, they have to give the prodigy of the goat to their neighbour. So the ‘receiver’ becomes a ‘giver’.

Or there are the schools in rural India where we have this e-learning program. Primary school in India is free, but when you go to secondary school, it’s a bit different. They say it’s free, but you’ve got to have a uniform!

Emma: Right, and they have to have shoes.

Paul: Exactly. So if you can’t afford the uniform, you can’t go. So these kids in rural areas, their families are existing by farming. So when the kids finish primary, often they go back to work on the farm – and half the time they didn’t enjoy school anyway! But now, with the e-learning we’re offering, all that’s changing, because all of a sudden the kids LOVE to go to school! Interesting enough, they are now outperforming in the national exams, with the kids from the cities!

And what’s SO great is; the parents get, that as a result of the education, the kids are being transformed. And then the magic happens: the parents go to the school and say can you please open the school at night so that we can learn! And then the magic of that is that it’s the kids that are teaching the parents!

Emma: That’s awesome. The beauty of the ‘receivers’ becoming the ‘givers’ is so inspiring.

Paul: So when you have the initial idea, which Masami expresses, of creating a world that’s full of giving – why? – because that’s a happier world, you sometimes go into doubt. But we’re seeing it transform, first hand!

Masami: Sometimes, when we give, we might have an expectation to get something back. Whether it be thanks for the giving, or we want something in return. But the most rewarding giving is when we give without any expectation.

And also, not just the absence of having expectation, but even feeling grateful for the fact that we are able to give. Then, when we have that, no matter what happens, we are already content.

That form of giving is ‘I share this with you because I honour you, and you have a great potential that I want to see’. And then the people who receive the gift in that way get empowered through that giving. And they themselves want to become a giver.

But if we ever give thinking, ‘Oh, you are poor and I will help you because you are a poor person’, that might become dependency. People will keep wanting more like that.

David: I think that’s what many people are afraid of; that if they start giving, they’ll get caught in it.

Paul: Yes, and that’s why we source projects which we describe as ‘hand up’, rather than ‘hand out’! I mean, obviously, if a kid doesn’t have water, you’re not going to say, well, hang on; I’ll teach you how to build a well!

David: That’s so great. So we’ve discussed some of the transformations for recipients of your programs. Is there a transformation you’ve seen in the businesses that work with B1G1 that you could talk about?

Masami: Oh, always!

Paul: Perhaps the way I can best express that is this little story: we were sitting around the table with the team, bringing in a new team member. We were wanting to check in that we were using the same ‘languaging’ when we’re talking about B1G1. You know, for example, it’s really important that we don’t use the word ‘charity’, because 60-70% of people have had a bad experience with charities! So we’re discussing all the words that WE think describe B1G1. And anyway, we left the meeting feeling good that we were all on the same page.

And then one of our team members, twentysix-year-old Sharon, who really thinks about things – she’s great! – decided that what she would do is just get on the phone and ask our members what THEY say. You know, we’ve got these seven things that we say, but what do THEY say? And from this research she produces this word-cloud.

And out of her word cloud comes the word ‘transform’.

They say that the big thing is it has transformed their enterprise.

And when you ask why is that, they say it shifts the spirit.

If you think about that in another way, for example, if you were some kind of a management consultant, or similar, and you saw a program called ‘we transform your culture’ and it’s a hundred grand… Well! There’s a much better way: try B1G1! You get to do good in the world AND it transforms your work culture and environment.

Emma: And it benefits far more people.

Paul: Absolutely! In fact, we have people who actually use B1G1 in the hiring process – they literally say that it has transformed their hiring because they can identify straight off who will be a match to their culture, by the applicant’s response to the ideas of B1G1.

David: That’s fantastic. And we really love this idea of ‘flipping’ things in business, and in what’s possible in the world. We’ll ask our readers how are YOU going to transform your business, and flip it 180? and they’ll be able to get some inspiration from B1G1.

Thank you for speaking with us, Paul and Masami.