On October 20th we began the first workshop of Buy Social Canada’s Social Value Marketplace series. The series is a continuation of the work outlined in ‘Marketplace Revolution’ by David LePage. Our goal is to put these ideas into action and bring our community together to learn and collaborate.  

Brad Mills & Peter Pula did an incredible job leading the group through  “Selling & Telling”, or as David LePage put it ‘Stelling’ the stories of the social value marketplace better and more broadly.    

Brad Mills started off the session by presenting practical tactics for honing your elevator pitch. Brad served as the CEO of Mills Office Productivity for forty-one years. A B Corp family business that he grew into a leader in its field. In 2006 he co-founded HAVE cafe a culinary training society and cafe, which was one of the first social enterprises in the Downtown Eastside. Throughout his career, he has enhanced the art of elevator pitches and shared his professional experience with crafting a memorable and intriguing pitch.  

An elevator pitch is a powerful tool for social enterprises to have to provide a clear and impactful impression of your organization and spark intrigue. Pitches can be challenging to narrow down. Thankfully, Brad and Peter had useful exercises to aid the participants in discovering and practicing their pitch. 

As Larry Berglund put it: “The elevator pitch exercise was concise and helped me focus more.” 

During the second half of the workshop Peter provided insights into generative, organizational journalism (GOJO). Participants explored how they can; create, capture, and utilize the stories that are already available. 

Peter provided the participants with leading interview questions to aid in cultivating a story and an interactive opportunity to test them out on one another.  

Coreen: “I love the interview questions and can’t wait to help share stories of our staff and partners!” 

By the end of the workshop the participants not only gained valuable skills in the art of telling and selling but also sparked many new connections within the group.  

Ralph Gutkin: “This was an extremely useful and interesting session”.  

We look forward to continuing the knowledge sharing and connecting into our next sessions of The Social Value Marketplace series where we will explore “What If We Could Build Relationships and Bridge Gaps Between Ecosystem Players?” 

Register today for the November 17th Social Value Marketplace Workshop!  

Visual capture of the first workshop by Yvonne Hollandy of Axiom News.