Let me tell
you a story, a very familiar story. You are awakened at 3 in the morning by
your three-year old, who announces, as best he can, that he has diarrhea. You
sigh, get up, go to the bathroom, and yes—there it is. You wash the child, put
him to bed, and wait for the inevitable. Sure enough, two days later, again at
3 AM, you’re at your local clinic in a small town in rural Zambia, where there
are no medicines. Your gut wrenches: your child may very well die. You trudge
home, passing as you go small shops, all of which have Coca-Cola for sale.
There are
people who have the word “why” wrapped tightly around every strand of their
DNA, and my guess is that Simon and Jane Berry—two retired people who had a little to go off and save
humanity—are two such people. And their question, as you can guess, is “why can
a town have Coca-Cola but not have medicines? If the Coca-Cola can get there,
why can’t a simple, cheap diarrhea kit that could save a kid’s life get there?
Why do one in five kids in parts of Africa die of diarrhea before they reach
the age of five?”
The nice
thing about the why people
is that they keep on asking questions, frequently driving everybody else who is
just trying through the day, dammit, nuts. So Mr. and Mrs. Berry—they’re
British, so no “Simon” or “Jane” here—asked, “why don’t we use the extra space
in the crates of Coke to get the diarrhea kits up to the stores that sell the
Coca-Cola?
Presto, mágico! (And I’m sure it wasn’t that easy….)
Tremendous
idea, right? The Berrys had designed the kit to fit between the bottles
of Coca-Cola. And the kit—which contains basic salts, soap, and a towel—is
relatively cheap; as I recall, it costs about a dollar to produce the kit, and
it’s a nice little moneymaker for the shopkeeper, with a good margin.
Unbelievably,
the Berrys succeeded in getting the attention of Coca-Cola, and they met with
them and learned about their distribution chain. That frequently looks like
this:
Well, the
whole thing seemed like a great idea, when I was pondering the problem of what
to write about last July, and also wondering what to do about my brother
John and his wife Jeanne, who have:
1.
everything
2.
birthdays
in early July
So it
seemed like a good idea—why not donate 10 dollars every month? What’s ten bucks
to me? So I called John and Jeanne up on vacation and told them about it, and
then I forgot that I / they were making the donation. (Just as an aside, isn’t
it criminal that we are living in a world where ten dollars is nothing for
some, and everything for others?)
Well, among
the people for whom the ten dollars is nothing are Bill
and Melinda Gates—I’m presuming no introductions needed—who, so says the
email the Berrys sent me, agreed
to screen a documentary of the project in Seattle last month. Nice!
In fact, I
also have a fair amount of “why” bred in the marrow of my bones, and I spent
seven years at a company even bigger than Coca-Cola making everybody completely
crazy. And when Wal-Mart could bear it no more, they showed me the door; there
are, however no hard feelings.
So here are
my questions, presented in good business English as a bulleted list:
· Why doesn’t Wal-Mart partner with ColaLife (the Berrys’ organization)?
· Why not sell the kit in Wal-Mart (the
cost of Pedialyte at Walgreens—sorry, but it’s closer—is six bucks, so what a
Volume Producing Item! Wow—better than those Moon Pies!)?
· Why not donate one dollar for every kit
sold to Colalife, thus letting the developed world help the undeveloped world?
There’s
something about the Internet that makes people go nuts, and a good example I
draw from the comments section of the “About ColaLife” page:
The
third world government should tax coca cola and other multi nation corporations
at proper rates according to their level of profits. This tax then should be
use to supply medicine and infrastructure for the maufacture and distribution
of medicines,
These
half ass aid program does very little to truly alleviate underdevelopment or
promote progress. These programs only continue the dependency and
underdevelopment of Africa.
Tax
coca cola and other multinational like they do in the west and use the money
for medicines and infrastructure.
Ouch—as
much for the grammatical errors and typos, as for the content. Fortunately, Mr.
Berry is a more temperate soul, and does a neat job of first agreeing with him,
and then—gently—demolishing him.
In fact, I
think the Berrys’ ideas are a breakthrough on several levels—not the least of
which is to combine the private sector with public health.
Now then,
Wal-Mart, you guys in?
