People today are involved “in a kind of lostness,” in which we destroy the sources of our own lives without knowing what we’re doing. [What’s needed is] an ethic that places paramount importance on the cultivation of love and care for one’s particular place, its people and its traditions … – Wendell Berry

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The signs were already emerging. Customers, employees and even shareholders were beginning to view institutions with greater distrust and even contempt. The recent economic meltdown, the attendant demise of several major financial institutions along with shotgun weddings merging into mega-trillion financial institutions, and the government bailout will only accelerate the trend.

We revisit of the writings of Wendell Berry and find this prophetic insight: “The computer driven world of high finance has brought the global economy to the brink of catastrophe … this is what you get when the economic destinies of communities fall into the hands of financers and money men who have no connection to local folks and are not sharers in their fate.” Those who see the writing on the wall will find new ways to develop and grow trusted, local relationships.

Can we bankers learn from grocers and farmers? Whole Foods’ grocery bags, only available in paper (no plastic) made from 100% recycled paper, have the following message plastered on one side: GO LOCAL – Good Stuff from Around Here – we support local growers & producers. On the other side, they aren’t shy about explaining the advantages of local: BUYING LOCAL … keeps you connected to the seasons, reduces the distance from farm to plate, supports local jobs and communities, gets you the freshest produce available, supports independent farming.

Whole Foods is a large organization that continues to expand and extend the ‘local’ model. They recognized early on that local taps into a basic, organic value – that touches our soul. Here’s what Fortune Magazine had to say about this company back in 2003:“Whole Foods customers can find different items in different stores because regional directors and store managers choose local products … Whole Foods’ success is largely due to its flexible, decentralized decision-making.

There’s a new grocer nearer our home called Sprouts. They have sent us home with one of those re-useable shopping bags. Sprouts is an emerging regional player in the battle for local. They actually advertise the location where food is produced – telling you just how local their stuff is. Here’s how they describe themselves: Sprouts Farmers Market, an Arizona based company, is one of the nation’s fastest growing retailers sprouting in Arizona, California and Texas. Sprouts specializes in farm fresh produce, purchased from local growers when possible. Sprouts also offers a large selection of vitamins and supplements, all natural meats, fresh seafood, bins full of bulk foods, an extensive selection of natural and organic grocery items … Customers enjoy a friendly, educated staff in a fun and easy-going atmosphere. Sprouts proudly supports local communities with product donations, sponsorships, educational events and more …

Farm fresh produce from local growers -organic, natural, educated, easy-going, and energy saving – it doesn’t get any more local than that. And, they have made inroads on that other important issue – price. They appear to be less expensive than Whole Foods. They are working hard to advance the ball in getting local scale to translate into both quality and price advantage.

Yet innovation in the battle for local waits for no one as consumer needs and marketplace alternatives continue their dance. Susan Saulny writing for the New York Times, “Cutting Out the Middlemen, Shoppers Buy Slices of Farms” describes a new variation on the theme of local: In an environmentally conscious tweak on the typical way of getting food to the table, growing numbers of people are skipping out on grocery stores and even farmers markets and instead going right to the source by buying shares of farms. Can you say ‘dis-intermediation’? This concept imported from Europe and Asia in the 1980s has grown from fewer than 100 such farms to nearly 1500. In essence these consumers are buying personal local farmers, like celebrities buy personal trainers, in what is known as community-supported agriculture.

At the transitional housing for the homeless where I volunteer, they have recently planted a garden and made it a part of the children’s curriculum. It has been amazing to observe just how children who have been traumatized by homelessness respond to growing and cultivating a garden and eating food their hands have helped prepare. Local, organic, hands-on connection has a calming and healing effect on those over stimulated by violence and fear and under nurtured by relationships too scarce and unstable. In our mobile and even transient society, where the institutions grow larger and more distant we are all homeless in ways that we cannot even comprehend or describe.

We are a society saturated in “lost-ness” which translates into a longing and hunger for local – local food, local relationships, local bankers. As bankers in organizations large and small, this is an accelerating movement we cannot afford to miss. Which raises the question: What are you doing to ‘out local’ your emerging competition?

(Column appeared originally in ABA Bank Marketing magazine – December 2008)

By ROBERT E. HALL

Not to be reproduced without written permission. All rights reserved. © Copyright Robert E. Hall 2008