Answer Yourself! A blog by Sukhpreet Singh

I recently read this quote:
“What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure.” - Samuel Johnson (18th Century English author, critic, & lexicographer).

Are you putting in effort to write your blog posts? Effort in researching content, the way you write it (style) and the value it brings to your readers? Your effort (in writing) is the price you pay to get the joy & satisfaction that you are connecting with your readers. Are you paying the price?

Update: I found this article to be very useful - The Art of Writing: 10 Tips from the Masters 

In my previous article, i talked about a small, young (4 years new) but fast growing organic plant food company - TerraCycle®. They are being sued by a large (over 2.6 billion dollar), 100 years old company - Scotts Miracle-Gro®.

So whats the lawsuit? According to suedbyscotts.com, a site owned by Terracycle:

1) Scotts claims that the two companies’ products look similar and will confuse customers because some TerraCycle plant foods have a green and yellow label with a circle and a picture of flowers and vegetables on it.
2) Scotts also objects that TerraCycle says its plant food is as good or better than “a leading synthetic plant food” and is refusing Scotts’ demands that TerraCycle hand over its scientific tests conducted at the Rutgers University EcoComplex to Scotts’ scientists and lawyers. Scotts refuses to turn its tests over to TerraCycle.

But Why did this multi-billion dollar GOLIATH sue DAVID (TerraCycle - the small company)? I found this reason by Rider of sustainableisgood.com to make a lot of sense:

It appears the lawsuit is really an attempt by Scotts Miracle-Gro to prevent TerraCycle from becoming established in the rapidly growing market for organic non-chemical based fertilizers and plant food, which coincidentally Scotts Miracle-Gro is trying to crack into with its Organic Choice® line of products.
Clearly Scotts is concerned by the fact TerraCycle is carried by Wal-Mart & Home Depot as well as numerous other large retailers and that this will some how impact their business.

Hmmm… that seems like bullying to me. According to this definition of bullying at wikipedia.org :

Bullying is the act of intentionally causing unhappiness to others through verbal harassment, physical assault, or other more subtle methods of coercion such as manipulation. There is currently no legal definition of bullying.
In colloquial speech, bullying often describes a form of harassment perpetrated by an abuser who possesses more physical and/or social power and dominance than the victim. The victim of bullying is sometimes referred to as a target. The harassment can be verbal, physical and/or emotional.

There are many types of bullying. One particular kind is known as Legal bullying. It is a way of bringing a distressing legal action to control and punish a person or an organization. So what are the characteristics of a target that is chosen to be bullied amongst so many others that exist and what events trigger such an act - (source: here)

a) target company/person might be showing independence of thought or deed.
b) the bully fears exposure of his/her inadequacy and incompetence; target’s presence, popularity and competence unintentionally fuel that fear
c) having a well-defined set of values which the target is unwilling to compromise (hint: Being environmental friendly, organic)

Triggers:
a) target’s performance unwillingly highlights, draws attention to, exposes or invites unfavorable comparison with the bully’s lack of performance
b) challenging the status quo, especially unintentionally
c) gaining recognition of target’s achievements, eg winning an award or being publicly recognized.

TerraCycle has decided to fight the lawsuit which might cost them an estimated 1 million dollars. For a startup company which is just beggining to see profit, thats a lot of money. On the other hand, putting myself in the big Giant’s shoes, i see the point - crush the competition before it becomes big.

So whats right - being #1 by any means or fair play?

PS: Check out suedbyscotts.com to find more details about insighful comparison between the two companies, their history, TerraCycle’s counter-arguments etc. Also, there is a link to make donations to TerraCycle to raise enough funds to fight this case. Disclaimer: I am not affiliated to any of the above companies.

Talking the talk and walking the walk - what a big difference. Everyday hundreds of ideas pass us by; everyday hundreds of people think/discuss about their amazing ideas; everyday hundreds fight to keep the implementation of their idea alive just one more day, but there are a handful that make it to the other side. A few days back, i heard about the founder and CEO of TerraCycle - Tom Szaky on NPR. I couldn’t believe, he is only 23 years and he started this company when he was 19. I have tremendous respect for young entrepreneurs. His idea - sell waste using waste. Here is an excerpt by Bo Burlingham of Inc.com

It may well be the world’s first commercial product made entirely from garbage. The plant food itself is a so-called vermicompost tea, a brew made from the castings (that is, the poop) of red worms that have feasted on various types of organic waste. The containers are reused soda bottles. The spray tops are the unwanted extras that have been dumped by manufacturers of other spray-on products. Even the boxes that the plant food is shipped in are garbage: They’re the misprinted rejects of major companies.

How did he come up with this idea?
When he was a freshman at Princeton University, some of his friends were trying unsuccessfully to grow marijuana in their basement and they used various kinds of chemical, but were unsuccessful. Then they tried fertilizing the plants with worm poop and it fixed everything. Quoting from an article on Tom, (7 page article - must read)

As it happened, Szaky had been searching for a business to enter in Princeton’s annual business plan competition to be held in early 2002. The answer came to him as he and his friends were enjoying the fruits of their labor. Worms! If these worms could turn table scraps into such terrific fertilizer, just think what you could do with an army of worms! You could recycle all the organic waste in North America! You could solve the problem of dwindling landfill space! You could replace chemical fertilizers with organic fertilizers! And you could make a fortune!

Have you ever had any such idea that just popped up while you were living your life as usual? And did you do something about it (not necessarily start a business) - maybe help solve some crisis, or present it for a class project or as business plan or it helped you earn some extra cash? What did you see that nobody else could see even tho it was always there in front of everyone.