March 21st, 2008

Branding by the People for the People

Take a bit of entrepreneurial flare, mix in a bit of eco consciousness along with a dash of digitally enabled community participation in the form of “crowdsourcing” and “crowdfunding” and what do you get? How about Nvohk (pronounced “invoke”) – an eco-friendly, surf inspired clothing manufacturer that appears to be decidedly democratic in its management approach. The concept: You sign up for free and when membership hits 20,000 everyone invests $50 a year. In return, you get a say in the management of the company, including — according to its founders — major business decisions like logo design, product design, athlete selection and advertising direction. You’ll also have a voice in choosing what charities receive 10% of net profits and 35% of net profits will be directed back to members via award points. As of March 21st, over 2106 future members had signed up. This experiment is one to watch, if not participate in. It will certainly test the power of crowds and our capacity for collective decision-making.

- ian

This entry was posted on Friday, March 21st, 2008 at 1:44 pm and is filed under Outdoor Sport, Design, Positive Change, Compassionate Capitalism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.