This is my WIFE's happy face
Is this not the cutest face you have ever seen? Our super duper photographer caught this "OH MY GOD IT'S WHEATUS!" face at the perfect moment.
Those of you who know us, know that we had our low key, low budget wedding with big love and even bigger surprises - in the form of one of Sarah's teenage dirtbag favourites - Wheatus.
I know, I'm good.
Wife material.
In the run up to our wedding, my Friday class were kept in the loop of wedding planning, dresses, flowers, invites, food, social media surprises! I have a beautiful rapour with my students in that, they listen, I listen, they learn, I learn, and it's a never ended circle of growth for all involved.
So when I returned from my annual leave break for the wedding, to hear their group project ideas, we began the class as we always do.
Part of teaching, is including the latest and loudest messags from above, and currently, that is the embedding of British Values; which truth be told, I adore, because despite some teachers finding this a laborious task to add into a lesson plan, for me, teaching digital marketing and technologies, it's a natural point of conversation. Every. Single. Lesson.
In a world of technology, social media, and constant conversation, it's a natural topic of conversation. In the past few weeks we have talked about CyberBullying and freedom of speech, why and how? Jesse Nelson's "Odd One Out," gave us an abundance of theorising and philosphising. Immense pause for thought and unfortunately for the students; the perfect opportunity for me to roll out my new favourite team building exercise a la Legally Blonde - SnapCup.
(actual footage of me in class on Friday)
The SnapCup gets rolled out in times of need, when I notice the students need a lift, and so I put them through the immense social torture of writing down something positive about eachother and then reading it out to one another; and whilst it sounds utterly cringing, and it is, it is also beautiful to see the kindness and thoughtfullness they each put in to saying something kind. In a world where we are not always kind. Especially online.
Kindness is something my students are not short of.
Those of you who know me, will not doubt have heard me waxing lyrical about their latest endeavours, both in and out of the classroom - the BeeHydrated bottles.
BUT, I imagine the majority of you don't know the reasoning behind it.
It is an inescapable message of late, that plastics are killing our planet, suffocating our oceans and plaguing our futures. Single use plastics in particular, have become known for their fickle and disposable nature, reflecting upon our own behaviours of being too quick to throw away and too quick to stop and think, to stop and care.
Cue my digital marketers class 2019.
Coursework project for their portfolios was to design a brand, a product, a launch, a 5 page website, with coding, tracking, analysis, a marketing plan including socials, content, seo etc. It was all bells and whistles, testing their forsight, knowledge skills and behaviours, a test of their communication in a group, their innovation, their problem solving, but primarily, their creativity.
It was designed to be fun and packed full of purpose, as all learning should be.
(although I wish someone had shared that methodology with my teachers back in the day!)
And lo' their resuable stainless steel water bottle was born, unders a different name and design, only after the conversations of democracy, freedom of speech, equality and diversity, did the idea arise - Rainbow bottles.
Why rainbow bottles?
Because they were big, bold, in your face, loud and proud.
I LOVED IT.
They go further, if with my help, they could transform their idea from paper to product, could they do so, not for profit, but for purpose?
What purpose I ask?
They want to create something that will directly feed into the LGBT community, and here in Manchester, after their research of where they would want their money to go, their logic took them to the LGBT Foundation.
BeeHydrated was born.
Rainbow bottles, produced and sold in the UK, designed to reduce single use plastics and to raise positive awareness of the LGBT+ community. To flaunt love and equality in the face of rising hate crime statistics and reports.
The loop.
Sarah and I got married.
A beautiful day.
The students saw the photos and whilst they adored the happiness and the frivolity, there was treperdation in their voices. Worry.
That even in Manchester, Sarah and I may one day come a-cropper, may be put in danger, may fall foul of the rising tides of hate and become victims.
It's my job. My job, to worry about my students.
To worry about the girls on the dating apps, going on dates with dishy men.
To worry about the boys getting into online gaming wars with dodgy hackers and trackers and trolls.
To worry about the impact of social media on their young minds, body images, self-worth, validation and hopes.
It's my job to worry.
Not theirs.
But they took it on. They ran with it. And they created a beautiful bottle concept that is rolling out across the UK as we speak, slowly..... and I mean slowly.
Having had my own business, I know what it is to run before walking, to stumble instead of stand.
I know.
I know the frustrations, the headaches, the hurts, the hurdles.
But I also know the joy and the hope and the change.
I was disheartened today, to see some negative backlash against my young ones.
Don't get me wrong, as a consumer, I too find myself wondering what avenue to pursue when pissed off and let down by something, but that's usually directed at my late online shopping, at a corporation that should know better, at streamlined, trained, financed and finessed people and processes.
Those of you who know me, will know my fiery temper, and my lioness approach to protecting things that matter to me.
So it's taken the majority of my will power to remain 110% professional, because actually, what I want to do is shout at the top of my lungs STOP IT.
Stop it.
Yes, you ordered your bottle in 1969 and yes, its 2019. I know.
But holy jesus Manchester, London, Great Yarmouth, Jersey, Newcastle.
3 kids. And maybe that's patronising, but they are.
3 kids have taken a product from a classroom to a webstore that has sold in the thousands, and they are posting the bottles like Father Christmas' elves working overtime on Christmas Eve!!!!!!!!
Working full time in apprenticeships, studying one day a week with me, and outside of that 40 hour week, is the packing, posting, branding, and processing the bottles and dispatching them up and down the country.
Which to any startup would be a mountainous task, this a task that was expecting, a couple of hundred bottles to sell and that be a success, not a couple of thousand.
Cue negociations with printers, for pricing and produciton and fast turn around.
Failed quality checks, poor printing, charlatans taking advantage of the need for speed, re-print, rebrand, resend.
Pack, post, postoffice runs, every single day after work.
Customer service, social media, refunds, complaints, more posting, packing, post office runs.
They say, don't bite off more than you can chew - they ate the whole dam bar.
With just cause. The bottles are INCREDIBLE.
The purpose is INSPIRING.
The 60% profit to LGBT foundation is LIFE CHANGING
Their processes and naivety? - Chidish and expected.
So for those of you lighting up social media - calm the fuck down Sandra.
What have you done today that changed the lives of many, through the alturism and vision and knowledge?
Drive, passion and purpose?
These guys are game changers. I have never known such heart, such drive and hope.
So I'm Postman Fran - posting, packing and legging it to the Post Office daily to get this thing off the ground.
Start small, think big.
And team; you've got this.
And I am so so so so so so so so proud.
