Supporting or being a vegan business

[Stained]

A couple of things I wanted to ask/bring up here.

First, a few years ago I decided I wanted to make an effort to support vegan businesses(businesses that use vegan products or advocate in some way)....I do not mean vegan products, but businesses that I happened to know were created by or supporting vegan families.
The only way I really knew who they were was through blogs or meetup-type groups.

I am familiar with most of the major websites that encourage or support the vegan community, but none of them really keep up-to-date info on what is new or nolonger-with-us ( I have gone to sites and hit links to places that havent existed for years,annoying and depressing).

With this said, has anyone had success outside of meetup.com for supporting local vegans?

Does anyone else here run a vegan business, and can you share your tips with connecting and supporting other vegans in the community? I am totally out of the loop if there is a vegan site just for this purpose.

 

[Calliegirl]

I've been putting together a directory of vegan businesses, either all the products they sell are vegan, or it's a service that is owned by a vegan. I only have about 150 listings so far, so it isn't very big yet. I need to get on it and add the new ones I've heard of recently. Thanks for the reminder.

The website is in my signature.

 

[Stained]

I've been putting together a directory of vegan businesses, either all the products they sell are vegan, or it's a service that is owned by a vegan. I only have about 150 listings so far, so it isn't very big yet. I need to get on it and add the new ones I've heard of recently. Thanks for the reminder.

The website is in my signature.

Well I will frequent your site,hope you keep it current

I mention on my site that I am a vegan supporting and attending vegan-friendly/eco fests and fairs, but Im in the process up revamping the site to narrow my target audience ( most people do the opposite).

I have learned that being authentic in biz is the best way to inspire others to be authentic as well (mostly because people do not expect you to be genuine, they expect you to say whatever needs to be said to make a sale).
I feel like if being vegan is a big part of who you are (and sometimes it isnt for some) then allowing it a voice in what you do ( at whatever volume,softly or loudly) is giving people a better idea of what being vegan looks like,instead of the cliche idea they may have.

 

[Clueless Git]

I have my own business.

I sell vending machines and the stuff that goes in them online. www.businessvending.co.uk if anyone's curious what that looks like.

I manage to keep it 99.999% vegetarian and around 90% of everything is 'incidentaly' vegan. It's impossible to fully veganise it though.

Next year I should have a secondary business up and running teaching karate, mainly to kids. Not strictly a vegan business but I will be pushing the benefits of the 'plant based diet' (back door veganism? ) very hard.

 

[Amy SF]

Next year I should have a secondary business up and running teaching karate, mainly to kids. Not strictly a vegan business but I will be pushing the benefits of the 'plant based diet' (back door veganism? ) very hard.

I wish you luck with your back door veganism. Some people may be upset by this, however. I remember reading reviews on Amazon of that "Skinny *****" book, in which the authors pushed for a vegan diet (authentic or not), and some reviewers were seriously miffed by that. How dare the authors suggest a vegan diet! *clutches chest*

 

[Stained]

I have my own business.

I sell vending machines and the stuff that goes in them online. www.businessvending.co.uk if anyone's curious what that looks like.

I manage to keep it 99.999% vegetarian and around 90% of everything is 'incidentaly' vegan. It's impossible to fully veganise it though.

Next year I should have a secondary business up and running teaching karate, mainly to kids. Not strictly a vegan business but I will be pushing the benefits of the 'plant based diet' (back door veganism? ) very hard.

I used to sell vending machines!
Back in the 80's I worked for a company that put "health" foods in them, and placed them too.
You can guess what people commonly considered healthfoods back then.

Dont most people learn martial arts so that they never have to use them? Thats pretty vegan

 

[Ann Chovie]

I wish you luck with your back door veganism. Some people may be upset by this, however. I remember reading reviews on Amazon of that "Skinny *****" book, in which the authors pushed for a vegan diet (authentic or not), and some reviewers were seriously miffed by that. How dare the authors suggest a vegan diet! *clutches chest*

Apparently just uttering the word Vegan is an indication that you are attempting a back door raid on omni sensibility. I work in a hospital cancer unit and my recent polite request for Vegan food to be serve at a forthcoming event was met with confusion and irritation. The dietician (herself not adverse to listening to my views but having no apparent knowledge of/ or interest in; the link between cancer and meat eating) informed me that my 'back door' approach to forcing people to discuss Veganism had 'riled up' people who did not want 'preaching' at. And that was the problems... it was why people were sulking and why the buffet provision had been completely abandoned as 'too difficult to arrange'. Yes of course THAT is the reason why

WTF .. all I was doing was trying to make sure that I did not have to spend two days presenting to patients fuelled only by black coffee and the 'fruit sticks' that were proposed for those who did not eat 'normal' buffet food. And of course not starve out any other Vegans that might wander through and expect to receive some lunch refreshment.

Heaven forbid that anyone should begin a discussion about healthy eating options at an NHS Health and Wellbeing event !!!!!

 

[Clueless Git]

I wish you luck with your back door veganism. Some people may be upset by this, however. I remember reading reviews on Amazon of that "Skinny *****" book, in which the authors pushed for a vegan diet (authentic or not), and some reviewers were seriously miffed by that. How dare the authors suggest a vegan diet! *clutches chest*

Aye, anything that challenges the 'necessity of meat' myth can seriously upset some people.

So much so that there's something going down on Saturday which has me seriously worried.

Worried enough that untill I see what actualy happens I don't even want to talk about it.

 

[Clueless Git]

I used to sell vending machines!
Back in the 80's I worked for a company that put "health" foods in them, and placed them too.
You can guess what people commonly considered healthfoods back then.

I'm old enough to remember when 'salt'n'dripping' (heavily salted lard, basicaly) and sugar sandwiches were considered healthy, Stained.

Lard helped keep children warm and 1/2lb of white sugar wrapped in white bread gave them energy, apparently.

Don't most people learn martial arts so that they never have to use them? That's pretty vegan

Most people start martial arts so as they can beat the bejasus out of oiks that irk them.

That's why I started anyway.

But, yes. You're right.

Those who persevere usualy become living proofs of the old addage that "only the truly strong can afford the luxury of being truly gentle".

Just for chit-chat, a favourite story of mine ...

A brown belt at a course I once attended asked a Japanese master, Hirokazu Kanazawa, which was the most important out of striking and blocking.

Kanazawa replied "If you can block someone, what for you need to strike them? If you can get out of the way, then what for you need to block them?"

I liked that because it opened my eyes to something. The ultimate goal is evasion; Be skillfull enough that no one can harm you and then you never need to harm anyone.

 

[ledboots]

My son is a black belt and the only fights he's been in are scheduled sparring matches. He was challenged once by a stranger and just did a fancy, scary looking kick and said he didn't feel like fighting.

A friend of his with a black belt was jumped by 4 young men one night. One had a baseball bat, and swung it at the boy with the black belt. He was able to catch the bat mid- swing and twist it from the grasp. The boys took off, no one was hurt.