The Santa Claus of Bread and Other Sharing Strategies
I work in an office with great benefits, but one of my favorite perks isn’t anywhere in the staff manual. It’s a personal initiative of my colleague, Sat Jiwan, who happens to be one of the greenest, cheapest people I know. For over a year now, he has been providing my office with loaves and loaves of free bread, making him our all-season Santa Claus of carbohydrates.
I’m not talking about just any bread, mind you. I’m getting organic, whole grain, name-brand bread. I get to choose from whole wheat, sunflower, cinnamon swirl, rye, and just about every other variety you can imagine. On average, I get a supply once every couple of weeks and can take home as much as I want. Sometimes I even get bagels and whole grain English muffins, too!
What’s the catch? Sat Jiwan volunteers at our local food co-op, and on a regular basis the baked goods hit their expiration dates. Around that time, co-op staff and volunteers can take home whatever unsold bread they want for free. Rather than see any of it go to waste, Sat Jiwan has lugged in anywhere from five to 20 loaves or more at a time to the office. Though we get our carbs near when they're ready to go stale, if they're transferred promptly to the freezer, the bread will last for several months and taste fine toasted. Because we have limited room in our staff freezer, everyone with access to our kitchen is periodically encouraged to take home as many loaves as possible.
We currently have over 10 different loaves in our office freezer, and Andre and I are working through about three loaves and a handful of bagels at home. I’ve also given Andre another four loaves to bring to work with him to make sandwiches for his lunches—and all that is just in the last month. These loaves retail for $3.49 to $3.99 each. My best estimate is that Sat Jiwan’s bounty has benefitted me personally to the tune of about $104.72 in the last year (or about 28 loaves at an average of $3.74 each—but in reality, Andre and I have probably eaten our way through even more than that, and I’m not even counting the bagels and other random baked goods we sometimes get).
This has also improved the quality of the food I eat, since I do not usually spring for organic grains on those rare occasions when I must actually shop for bread. And because Andre is addicted to carbs, this arrangement has kept us well-stocked whenever the sandwich urge hits him—which apparently is all the time. Best of all, it keeps pounds and pounds of food out of our local landfill and puts the bread where it should be: in people’s bellies.
This may seem like my own little gravy train, but the idea here is that volunteering—and sharing—can have additional benefits beyond the satisfaction of helping out an organization that needs it. (Sat Jiwan also gets a discount on all his co-op purchases in addition to the periodic freebies.) Now, I’m not suggesting that one should volunteer simply for the swag—although I’ve known people who have handed out theater programs, worked the door at concerts, or helped direct traffic at folk festivals just to see free shows, which strikes me as a pretty sweet deal, too. If you have an interest in making some part of your community a better place or putting in time for something you care about, you can often come away with a little something to help stretch your budget, even if there’s no “bread” involved. If you get a real windfall, share your good fortune with friends, family, coworkers, or housemates, and you may be pleasantly surprised at what kind of karmic benefits come back to you, too.
If you’re like me, you may not have time to volunteer as often as you’d like, and when you do volunteer, you end up planting underwater grasses in a creek or sitting on a committee somewhere, rather than gaining access to very much free food. No worries. There’s also the time-honored tradition of sharing where no volunteerism is required: the swap.
You’re probably already familiar with the concept, but for those who haven’t tried it, let's just say I'm a huge fan. All it takes to pull off a great swap is a free evening or afternoon, a meeting spot, and a group of people who like to share. In my office, we have arranged several clothes swaps in which we clean out our closets, bring in whatever we no longer want, and trade outfits; we then donate whatever is left over to a local charity and a nearby thrift store. I’ve also taken part in a small-scale book swap with some of my friends that I’d love to organize into a larger event with more literary connoisseurs. (Baltimore area residents can also check out this spectacular and more formally organized book swap that happens in Charles Village every weekend.) Swaps are great because they simultaneously help you clear out things you aren’t using, get things you will use for free, and keep all of those various things (or most, anyway) from heading into landfills. A win-win-win for cheapskates everywhere!
---
So, the president unveiled his proposed budget for 2007 this week, and it wasn’t very green. Take heart that we can at least manage our own budgets to reflect our values better than where our taxes may be headed. Suggestions: you may not need to spend quite so much on defending yourself. Give a little more to charity. Invest in renewable energy. Set some extra money aside for your health care. And put more money into savings. Bipartisan tightwads (and even a few politicians) agree: working from a deficit is a bad way to manage money.
--- by Jennifer Errick, Communications Associate
BA, University of Massachusetts. Jenn managed her own web consulting business and served as a web/communications specialist at Johns Hopkins University. Jenn is now responsible for designing, editing, and writing content for New American Dream's print publications and outreach materials, including our quarterly newsletter In Balance.
================================
Please feel free to link to this blog sponsored by SJOPromotions
I’m not talking about just any bread, mind you. I’m getting organic, whole grain, name-brand bread. I get to choose from whole wheat, sunflower, cinnamon swirl, rye, and just about every other variety you can imagine. On average, I get a supply once every couple of weeks and can take home as much as I want. Sometimes I even get bagels and whole grain English muffins, too!
What’s the catch? Sat Jiwan volunteers at our local food co-op, and on a regular basis the baked goods hit their expiration dates. Around that time, co-op staff and volunteers can take home whatever unsold bread they want for free. Rather than see any of it go to waste, Sat Jiwan has lugged in anywhere from five to 20 loaves or more at a time to the office. Though we get our carbs near when they're ready to go stale, if they're transferred promptly to the freezer, the bread will last for several months and taste fine toasted. Because we have limited room in our staff freezer, everyone with access to our kitchen is periodically encouraged to take home as many loaves as possible.
We currently have over 10 different loaves in our office freezer, and Andre and I are working through about three loaves and a handful of bagels at home. I’ve also given Andre another four loaves to bring to work with him to make sandwiches for his lunches—and all that is just in the last month. These loaves retail for $3.49 to $3.99 each. My best estimate is that Sat Jiwan’s bounty has benefitted me personally to the tune of about $104.72 in the last year (or about 28 loaves at an average of $3.74 each—but in reality, Andre and I have probably eaten our way through even more than that, and I’m not even counting the bagels and other random baked goods we sometimes get).
This has also improved the quality of the food I eat, since I do not usually spring for organic grains on those rare occasions when I must actually shop for bread. And because Andre is addicted to carbs, this arrangement has kept us well-stocked whenever the sandwich urge hits him—which apparently is all the time. Best of all, it keeps pounds and pounds of food out of our local landfill and puts the bread where it should be: in people’s bellies.
This may seem like my own little gravy train, but the idea here is that volunteering—and sharing—can have additional benefits beyond the satisfaction of helping out an organization that needs it. (Sat Jiwan also gets a discount on all his co-op purchases in addition to the periodic freebies.) Now, I’m not suggesting that one should volunteer simply for the swag—although I’ve known people who have handed out theater programs, worked the door at concerts, or helped direct traffic at folk festivals just to see free shows, which strikes me as a pretty sweet deal, too. If you have an interest in making some part of your community a better place or putting in time for something you care about, you can often come away with a little something to help stretch your budget, even if there’s no “bread” involved. If you get a real windfall, share your good fortune with friends, family, coworkers, or housemates, and you may be pleasantly surprised at what kind of karmic benefits come back to you, too.
If you’re like me, you may not have time to volunteer as often as you’d like, and when you do volunteer, you end up planting underwater grasses in a creek or sitting on a committee somewhere, rather than gaining access to very much free food. No worries. There’s also the time-honored tradition of sharing where no volunteerism is required: the swap.
You’re probably already familiar with the concept, but for those who haven’t tried it, let's just say I'm a huge fan. All it takes to pull off a great swap is a free evening or afternoon, a meeting spot, and a group of people who like to share. In my office, we have arranged several clothes swaps in which we clean out our closets, bring in whatever we no longer want, and trade outfits; we then donate whatever is left over to a local charity and a nearby thrift store. I’ve also taken part in a small-scale book swap with some of my friends that I’d love to organize into a larger event with more literary connoisseurs. (Baltimore area residents can also check out this spectacular and more formally organized book swap that happens in Charles Village every weekend.) Swaps are great because they simultaneously help you clear out things you aren’t using, get things you will use for free, and keep all of those various things (or most, anyway) from heading into landfills. A win-win-win for cheapskates everywhere!
---
So, the president unveiled his proposed budget for 2007 this week, and it wasn’t very green. Take heart that we can at least manage our own budgets to reflect our values better than where our taxes may be headed. Suggestions: you may not need to spend quite so much on defending yourself. Give a little more to charity. Invest in renewable energy. Set some extra money aside for your health care. And put more money into savings. Bipartisan tightwads (and even a few politicians) agree: working from a deficit is a bad way to manage money.
--- by Jennifer Errick, Communications Associate
BA, University of Massachusetts. Jenn managed her own web consulting business and served as a web/communications specialist at Johns Hopkins University. Jenn is now responsible for designing, editing, and writing content for New American Dream's print publications and outreach materials, including our quarterly newsletter In Balance.
================================
Please feel free to link to this blog sponsored by SJOPromotions
posted by Shannon @ 9:02 PM
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