History

The Smith & Hawken business was eventually purchased by Monsanto to help them create a "greener" corporate image. Dave Smith recommends boycotting S&H as he and Paul no longer have any ownership interest and among other negative impacts from Monsanto chemical products, it's widely used Roundup herbicide has been identified as a potential cancer causing agent.

The Briarpatch was founded in Menlo Park in 1974. Fathered by Dick Raymond of the Portola Institute and mothered by Gurney Norman, author of "Divine Rights Trip" in The Last Whole Earth Catalogue, the phenomenon of mutual support for right livelihood and simple living was an idea whose time had come.

Folks involved in the extended family/community that grew up around the Whole Earth Catalogue formed various businesses including a coop food market, a woman-owned auto repair store, and several others. Gurney Norman put together the first Briarpatch Review using Whole Earth's layout studio. In it he described this new form of socially conscious, mutual self-support for businesses.

Former banker Michael Phillips was a key organizer of the Briarpatch and his efforts were principally responsible for the extended life of the community during the first decade following its founding. He introduced Dick Raymond to CPA Elliot Buchdrucker, insurance broker Werner Hebenstreit, and lawyer Tom Silk and the five of them together raised enough money to hire the first Briarpatch coordinator Andy (Bahauddin) Alpine, who later became the publisher of Common Ground and Specialty Travel Index. Phillips continued to recruit consultants and coordinators until his withdrawal from active involvement in the late 1980s. Up until that time, he traveled to many communities to assist them in starting their own Briarpatches and even got the Briarpatch principles introduced into the World Bank.

In the beginning, Phillips and Alpine started out using the old C.O.Y.O.T.E offices (Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics -- Margo St. James' organization that was working for the decriminalization of prostitution) on San Francisco's Pier 40 to hold free consulting session every Wednesday. Very soon, so many people were coming for advice that they asked Dick, Elliot, Werner and Tom to help out.

From 1974 to the present day the Briarpatch has seen more than 1,000 people pass through it's membership roles. There were always about 200-300 names on the current mailing list and 100-200 active members at any given time. Hold a lecture by a Briarpatch celebrity and several hundred people might show up. Throw a party and 50 to a hundred people would attend. Hold a workshop on business skills and you could always get a couple of dozen members to sign up.

In the Bay Area there were also several satellite networks in Marin and Sonoma counties, in the East Bay and on the Peninsula.

In San Francisco there were three coordinators: Andy (Baha'uddin) Alpine, Charles (Shali) Albert Parsons, and Claude Whitmyer. Marin Coordinators included Peter Oldfield, Sylvia Gorman, and Michael Stein. East Bay coordinators included Roger Pritchard, Elissa Brown and Portia Sinnot. Sonoma coordinators included Jim Bucheister, Tom Hargadon, Salli Rasberry, and Joan Leslie Taylor. In 1988, on the Bay Area Peninsula, a branch Briarpatch Network was started by Dave Smith and Paul Hawken. It met weekly at the Late For The Train restaurant in Menlo Park for about a year. Smith & Hawken then decided they should start their own business by importing garden tools from England.

In 1974 Gurney Norman published the first issue of The Briarpatch Review. Over the next few years eleven more issues were published with Annie Styron as editor and Tom Hargadon as publisher of the first eight. Numerous volunteers brought out the final three issues. The first eight issues were published as a book compilation by New Glide/Reed in 1978 and entitled The Briarpatch Book : Experiences in Right Livelihood and Simple Living from the Briarpatch Community.

Other Networks

In addtion to the San Francisco, East Bay, Marin, Sonoma, and Peninsula groups, we know about networks offering similar support structures to those offered by the Briarpatch that appeared in the U.S. in Tennessee and Washingtion and internationally in Australia, Denmark, England, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, and Sweden.

The Briarpatch Contribution

Exemplifying the important contributions that Briars have made to society in general and the causes of right livelihood, simple living, social responsibility, social justice, health and well being, the arts, and just plain fun, several other important books have been published by Briars, some of which are listed below. And several important publishers also have been Briars over the years as well.

Authors

Publishers

Briarpatch Schools

Noren Institute

In 1980, Stuart Brand organized a "learning expedition" with Paul Hawken and Michael Phillips as fellow faculty. The three of them took participants around to visit Briarpatch businesses as exemplars of values-based businesses that also made a profit.

In 1981, based on this "learning expedition" idea, Andora Freeman, Shali Parsons, Michael Phillips, and Claude Whitmyer founded Noren Institute, a business school affiliated with the Briarpatch. After the first year, Shali Parsons moved away to Hawaii, Charmian Anderson joined Noren breifly and then Salli Rasberry came on board. Noren offered courses on "Honest Management," "Honest Consulting," "Honest Selling," "Running A One-Person Business " and "Marketing Without Advertising ," twice a year until 1986. The latter two courses became well known books.

The Noren Institute advertised "Hands-on Business Learning" and used Briarpatch members as teachers. Students came from all around the world to take the courses when offered. Just as with the original Brand/Hawken/Phillips event, classes were taught by taking students, in a bus to study exemplar Briarpatch businesses. Noren had nearly 300 alumni by the end of its five year life-span.

Other Briarpatch Schools

From 1993 through 1997, Briarpatch members were also involved in creating a Master of Arts in Socially Responsible Business at California Institute of Integral Studies that graduated 36 M.A. degree students before a CIIS fiscal crisis caused the program to be cancelled.

For many years Briar Paul Terry was principle consultant, instructional designer, and instructor for the business training programs offered by the San Fransico Renaissance Entrepreneurship Center. In 1995, for his work at Renaissance, he recieved the Inc. Magazine/Kaufman Foundation award for "Outstanding Entrepreneurial Educator of the Year."

Other schools in the Briarpatch included:

• American School of Traditional Japanese Arts
• Amma Institute (Japanese massage school)
• Avenue Ballroom
• Berkeley Owner/Builder Center and Integral Urban House
  (an early "green" building launched in 1976).
• Bess Bair Tap Dance Center
• California Institute of Integral Studies
• Cheng Hsin Workshops (tai chi, transformational work)
• Clement Street Counseling Center (therapy internships)
• Elain Badgley/Arnoux's EBA School of Art
• Focal Point Stress Workshops
• Marina Counseling Center (therapy internships)
• McKinnon Institute (massage school)
• New Age School of Massage
• New College of California
• Palo Alto Computer Learning Center
  (where Steve Jobs met Steve Wozniak)
• San Francisco Zen Center (Soto zen training)
• Thousand Islands Institute (owner/builder center)
• TouchPro Institute (chair massage)
• Urasenke Japanese Tea School

Briarpatch Food Chain

Dozens of Briars started food related businesses and many of the original food coop businesses were Briars.

• Briarpatch Coop Market
• Bolinas People's Store
• Market Place (Santa Fe, NM)
• Noe Valley Community Store
• Other Avenues Community Food Store
• Rainbow General Store
• The Earth Foods and Deli (Oklahoma City)
• The Natural Food Store
• Uncommon Grounds Gourmet Coffee
  
  
• The Kitchens, Inc.
• Creative Catering
• Gail's Catering
  
  
• Kathleen's Doyle Street Cafe
• Green's Restaurant
• Mudd's Restuarant and Crow Canyon Gardens
  
  
• Wildwood Natural Foods
• Bean Machines (first tofu making home kit)
• Alfalfa Omega Express (Corn Cheaps)
  
  
• Crop Care of Southern California
• Integrated Orchard Management

Briarpatch Take on Tech

Briars often have unique takes on the use of technology in society. For example, founded by Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link or The Well was one of the earliest technology-mediated social networks, acutally using direct dial-up to the server rather than Internet based access back in the mid 1980s. Stewart also launched the Whole Earth Software Review and many Briars were active in the early stage development of Wired and Salon. Self-help law publisher Nolo Press was one of first publishers anywhere to sell their books online and to offer downloadable e-books. There have been dozens of technology related Briarpatch businesses over the years. Here are some that are still quite active:

• Outformation (David Chilcott)
• The University of the Future (FutureU™) (Claude Whitmyer)

Briarpatch Businesses About Community

Community organizing, community building and communities of practice have long been of interest to many Briars. There have been dozens of members involved in co-housing and intentional community from the earliest "hippie" communes to todays modern cooperatives and co-housing projects. Here are some examples:

• Co-Housing (Kathryn McCamant and Charles Durett)
• Community Catalyst Project (Geoph Kozeny)
• Rainbow Grocery (formerly Rainbow General Store)

(Somewhat) Well Known Briarpatch Businesses

Well known Bay Area businesses whose owners were Briars include:

• Ananda Village Products
• Berkeley's Buttercup Bakery (arguably the originators of "California Cuisine")
• Margo St. James' C.O.Y.O.T.E. (the prostitutes union)
• Fort Mason Center (the first urban National Park facility, founded by Ann Howell)
• Good Vibrations
• Greens Restaurant
• Haight Ashbury Switchboard
• Harvey Milk's Camera shop
• Nolo Press
• Pickle Family Circus
• Rainbow General Store
• Rosie Radiator and the Guinness World Champion San Francisco Rad Tap® Team
• San Francisco Roommate Referral Service
• San Francisco Zen Center
• Smith and Hawken Tools
• The Skin Zone (the original "Body Shop" type store)
• Sea Trek Ocean Kayaking
• Tassajara Bakery
• Kaisek Wong

Briarpatch Information

The most complete source of information on Briarpatch can be found in The Briarpatch Book a compilation of the first 8 issues of the Briarpatch Review. It frequently shows up on the shelves of used book stores (such as Dave Smith's "Mulligan Books" in Ukiah) along with first editions of "The Seven Laws of Money" and "Honest Business," muched preferred over later editions.

What is a Briar?

Media Note:

Some of you may be familiar with the Briarpatch Network. This group is an association of over 500 small business members, who believe in open accounts, business honesty and information sharing. The network has been so successful that other groups have formed in Canada, Japan, Sweden, and Finland. It contains every type of business, including fashion design, furniture manufacture, ranches, restaurants, circuses, libraries, bars, theatre groups, educational institutions, professional services and health clinics.

The Network aims to improve business viability, within a basic framework of honesty and openness. Studies of it have shown that:

1. Competition is a poor model of the real world; co-operation is more accurate. Members set their own prices with relatively little reference to competitors.

2. Profit has a detrimental effect when treated as a primary goal.

3. Social costs (environmental responsibility, etc.) are rewarded when included in business pricing.

4. Honesty is a major factor in business efficiency; dishonesty has negative effects and the extent of harm is proportional to the degree of dishonesty.

This is the reality in small business, where the consequences of a decision are close to the decision maker. But the basic ethical and business environment is the same as the one in which Microsoft, Exxon, et.al. operate.

Edwin Humphries
Mottahedeh Development Services
In a discussion thread on the Bahai Business Forum for the Americas about "Applying Devine Principles"

The Briarpatch is a system of self-reliance and mutual support, based on the ideas that you are a Briar if:

1. You have an insatiable curiosity about how the world works.
2. You seek to do the work you love and to make a living at it.
3. It is more important to you to provide the highest quality product or service than to get rich, but you recognize that you must make a profit to stay in business.
4. You prefer cooperation to isolation.
5. You prefer honesty and openness to deceit and secretiveness.
6. You believe in independence and personal responsibility.
7. You believe in simple living and environmental preservation.
8. Your financial records are open to your community.
9. It is important to you to have fun in everything you do.

Are you a Briar? If so, please update your contact information and/or answer our survey by clicking on this link.

The best way to find a Briarpatch where you live, is to just start one.

1. What's your purpose? Every business support network is different. Most combine both emotional support and practical business counsel in various mixes. A clear purpose will make it easier for you to attract others.

2. Recruit at least one buddy. If you already meet regularly with a support buddy, the two of you will make the perfect kernal of an organizing team. Each of you can invite another person and you'll have a support group. As each new person invites their friends and associates, you'll become a network.

3. Avoid homogeneity. Many groups form around the similarities we see in each other, and that's ok. But for longevity and innovation and the opportunity to change and grow, make a focused effort to invite people who are different. Of course you will want to invite experts in accounting, law, marketing, and so forth. That's just good business sense. But also invite all genders and multiple ethnicities, and make a special place for the creative, the strange, and the wonderful.

4. Choose the right meeting place. Bay Area Briars have met in the posh San Francisco Tennis Club, member business board rooms, the meeting rooms in local restaurants, right in the middle of bustling cafes, in school classrooms, at different member homes and just about any place you can think of. Our longest continuously running meeting took place once a month for 6 years in an art gallery where we stored tables and chairs that we brought out each time we met. Mutual support was the main attraction, but members also looked forward to the continuously changing exhibits.
   The place you choose will have a profound effect on the "look and feel" of the meeting. Make sure it's in alignment with what you're trying to accomplish.

5. Meet regularly and continuously. If members know the regular time and place and that the meeting will always be held, you'll save on the time it takes to keep everybody informed about the meeting and folks will incorporate the rhythm of the meeting into their routines. Experiment has shown us that support buddies (2 people) should meet once a week, but support groups work best if they meet once a month.

6. Use meeting facilitation techniques. Agree on an agenda, appoint a time keeper, work together to keep the meeting moving. The Bay Area Briarpatch usually spends the first hour giving each attendee 2 minutes to introduce themselves and describe their business. If there are more people than there is time for introductions, the coordinator helps attendees move quickly through their 7 to 20 word "elevator" speeches. Then the floor is opened for brainstorming about individual attendees business needs. These can range from simple resource referrals of suppliers or professionals to shared words of wisdom from hard won experience. The coordinator keeps people to the time limit and at the end, time is made for announcements and networking.

7. Eat Lunch. Meeting over lunch draws more attendees because no matter how busy you are, you have to eat and lunch is a time that no one is expecting you to be at your desk to answer the phone. Many groups are successful at organizing potlucks, but it's a lot of extra effort. Bay Area Briars held a monthly bring your own "brown bag" lunch successfully for more than 12 years. Participants often brought food to share, but it wasn't a requirement.

Claude Whitmyer, January 1, 2007