i think a lot of us (most of us? all of us?) can agree that 2020 has been, for major intents and purposes, a dumpster fire of a year. yes, we may have had small personal triumphs, or used pandemic-induced time alone to dig into our shadow selves to generate some fresh growth (gotta love that compost), but for the world as a whole, and definitely here on turtle island, it’s been framed by a giant pile of flaming shit. as a small biz owner who makes my business decisions from a set of core intersectional feminist values, it’s felt like a minefield at different points to run my (now basically entirely) online biz when so much crap is hurtling around my head and the heads of basically everyone i love. of course, not showing up online isn’t an option for me. my biz is my sole source of income, the only way that i support myself and willow, the only way that i generate the finances i need for both my basic needs and to have excess with which to share in my community and assist others with surviving during this hell of a year.

are there things i can provide other than money when it comes to causes/loved ones’ needs/community emergencies/etc.? yes. are any of those things as useful when this year has primarily required basic needs like bailout funds for protestors, food (which costs money because i don’t have a green thumb), herbal medicines (which require money even if i forage them by foot because i still need jars/bags/oils/etc. which may be reused or upcyled in some cases but have still come from a jar of spaghetti sauce or face cream i finally finished or something else that also initially required money), purchasing products from others so that they can pay their own mortgages/employees/grocery bills/medical bills/internet bills? i mean, yea, sometimes, but honestly most of the time the money makes a big difference. we live under big-C capitalism, which means that no matter how idealistic our dreams might be, we still need to access money to cover our basic needs even if we figure out some non-money-based ways of assisting others through equal trades of goods or energy or similar formats.

money is not inherently evil. the misdistribution of wealth and resources is definitely evil and the systems of oppression that maintain it are similarly evil. but money itself? no. it’s definitely a construct, but it’s a construct that can be utilized for good if we use it that way. so.

one of the things i’ve learned this past year is to think of money as a water source. we want it to flow, both into us and away from us (aka investing in the community/society/world we want to see). what we don’t want is to hoard it, because that makes it stagnant and stagnant water breeds unhealthy ecosystems. case in point: see the world - gestures out generally

now that we’ve established this, you might be thinking, ok ash, let’s pretend you have a point. if that’s the case, and the way i can invest in the world around me is to pay for services and/or products from businesses that share my values, how do i know who actually gives a shit and who’s just paying lip service?

one of the ways i choose to engage with my own values as a business owner is by sourcing my yarns from small and medium-sized canadian mills who work exclusively with canadian-sourced fibres. my primary yarn lines all come from canadian-raised sheep… — one of the ways i choose to engage with my own values as a business owner is by sourcing my yarns from small and medium-sized canadian mills who work exclusively with canadian-sourced fibres. my primary yarn lines all come from canadian-raised sheep (different breeds depending on the base and intended/recommended use) and occasionally i get to focus even further with limited fleece-specific yarns sourced directly from the farmer and brought to my mill partners.

i’m so glad you’ve asked! before we dive into some ways of sussing out a business’s real values (not just the performative acts they post once in a blue moon on social media when a cause is trending), let’s establish a couple of ground rules:

there is (ironically) privilege in being able to adjust your social media messaging to prioritize a specific cause for anything longer than a single post. businesses need to generate revenue, not to hoard it, but to pay their employees a fair wage, to pay their suppliers a fair share, to pay their (so often team of 1.5 people) enough to cover the business’s needs AND have a safety net in case of emergency. if a small biz owner has another primary source of income - say, their partner has a pandemic-stable job that brings in a very generous wage and they have an emergency net of savings that could cover their needs for a year if they actually needed it - then yea, it’s not out of the question to hope they can stop selling for one week. but surprise! we basically never know someone’s true financial situation (maybe their partner is awful and they’re saving a secret fund so they can safely divorce and support themselves and the kids; maybe their partner’s job isn’t actually that stable; maybe their parents or friends who were the safety net are going through their own money crisis and so their usual stability doesn’t exist right now; maybe they live in the states and have to always worry about the possibility of crushing medical debt; maybe their health is dicey and they know they need six months’ worth of savings in case they have to stop working but they only have one months’ worth). tldr: we can never truly know someone’s financial position unless they happen to share with us the intimacies of their bank accounts, and that’s unlikely to be anyone we’re not very close with. just because it looks like someone is crushing the biz game on social media doesn’t mean they’re making a living wage or have the capacity to not bring in any income for a week or more.
on that note, if you have a job that provides you a consistent paycheque, you do not - i repeat, do not - get to tell a small biz owner with an employee force of one or a larger biz owner with an employee force of 800 to not make money. your paycheque is being provided by someone else generating revenue. they have to generate revenue to pay out paycheques too.

okie doke, that might have seemed harsh. but here’s the part where you have all of the agency: you don’t have to pay anyone for anything you don’t want (other than, like, your mortgage/rent, power bills, that sort of thing). but when we’re talking about the non-essentials - like, hey, my yarn, or tinctures from an herbalist, or new clothes, or toys for the kids, or a new vehicle, or… - you get to choose (based on your income levels, physical location, a bunch of other things that get complicated by those earlier-mentioned systems of oppression that keep big-C capitalism in place) who you give your money to. you might have decided by this point of this post that you really don’t like me and don’t want to buy any of my yarn or classes or herbal remedies or patterns. and you don’t have to! but if we’ve determined that short-term social media activity is not necessarily a good barometer of a company’s alignment with your values, what is a helpful sign?

we’ve covered a lot of ground in this first part, so go grab a cup of tea and maybe a snack, then head over to this post to read part 2 and find some helpful tips for determining whether a company’s values align with your own. and if you enjoyed this post and don’t want to miss other content, be sure to sign up for my weekly newsletter!

everyday magic: how to figure out whether a business aligns with your values (and why only looking at their social media isn't a strong enough barometer) - pt. 1