So November was a great month here at Cyclewand, milder than usual weather meant lots of cycling for us and apparently the winter months don’t slow our lovely customers down either, above average sales for this time of year which means more money raised for our favorite cause 1% For the Planet! Hooray!

On that subject November saw the first 1% For The Planet European Summit in Amsterdam which we attended, it was an inspiring day and we got to meet and hang out with lots of innovative companies and remarkable individuals all doing great work to help protect the planet and ensure we have a better future.

Best known for their totally awesome naivety and rowing across the Atlantic, the Tempest Two humored us and provoked our thinking to show that anyone can accomplish anything if they adopt the same unshakable determination to commit to the task and remove can’t from their vocabulary.

Their next big charitable challenge is to climb El Capitan in Yosemite national park, USA, it is a vertical granite rock face which can take professional climbers up to Ten days to scale,what is remarkable about this is that neither Tom or James are climbers and have given themselves only one year to prepare for this. They are fully committed! Good luck guys!

Patagonia Europe Head Office,

Okay so this was just the venue however it was a fitting one, Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard is also the co-founder of 1%FTP so the two organisations are closely connected. Patagonia are among the leaders, if not the top of the pack when it comes to environmental philanthropy and wow does their European office reflect that, messages of hope and activism echo around the open plan space, their mission statement displayed proudly (and so it should be) ‘Build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis’ It is no wonder that the team at Patagonia are so invested in their work. Much of our own philosophy at Cyclewand is drawn from the inspirational wisdom in Yvons book ‘Let My People Go Surfing the education of a reluctant businessman’ a recommended eye opening read for anyone.

It was really great to hear different perspectives from across Europe and to learn about the many different B-corps and non-profits partners and the great work they all do, which is far to much to list here however I’d like to say that each project, idea and business model gave me great optimism and hope for the future, at a time when mainstream media delivers misery on a daily basis it was really refreshing to not only hear but really feel that great things are happening and good ethical business is making headway. The businesses and organisations that had representatives on these panels are linked below.

I can’t wait for the next one!

 Pukka Herbs.

 Surfers Against Sewage,

 WeForest,

Protect Our Winters – Switzerland,

Fossielvrij NL – a chapter of 350.org.

HUCK Magazine,

Leidar,

Jari Salo Design,

Rebel Kitchen,

Coldhouse Collective,

ELSK,

Re_Set,

Richie Graham Photography.

Special thanks go out to the lead sponsors

Zwitscherbox and Kind,

the meal sponsors Spectrum and MOJU,

and supporting sponsors Wholegrain Digital, Leidar UK, Glo-Ed Travel, Innovation Visual, and Austral Thinking.