Gary Hirshberg Stirs Up the Audience at All Things Organic

I was really pleased to see that Gary Hirshberg, CEO of Stonyfield Yogurt, and author of “Stirring it up: How to Make Money and Save the World” would be the keynote speaker at the Natural Foods Expo East and All Things Organic trade shows, which I attended in Boston last week, because I had heard he was such an effective spokesperson for the organic food movement.  Following a lot of back talk from my Droid about the best early morning driving route to the South Boston convention site, I had scored a front row seat, and was paying rapt attention as Hirshberg stirred up the trade show attendees with a powerful call to action.

After outlining  a number of indicators of environmental damage as symptoms of our “flawed relationship with the planet”, Hirshberg told the audience that “organics has the solutions,” but the industry has to get beyond 4% penetration of the U.S. food industry to raise its influence, which will require “proving the profitability of our paradigm.”    At Stonyfield Yogurt, Hirshberg’s team has mined the profit and loss statement for efficiencies so they can be competitive with conventional food companies.   For example, Stonyfield spends 0.5% of revenue on advertising, while Dannon spends 8%.   “Social media is a gift to this industry,” said Hirshberg, relating how his company invited four prominent bloggers to visit their organic farm, and the subsequent blog posts generated over 3.6 million hits.