Considering the overwhelming encouragement I get from all I speak to, it’s screamingly obvious there is a place for Chemical Free Community in our future as the global awareness of our toxic environment and the growing need to find safe alternatives filters throughout our global community. This community is gathering momentum and it’s awesome!
BUT, there I was, completely strung out and working 24/7, thinking how am I ever going to manage to run events, write blogs, secure member deals, post across our 6 social media channels, update web pages, pen newsletters, gather new members, create listings and support our existing membership to keep this train on the tracks… when I had finally said it out loud. “I can’t do this by myself anymore!”
A call to my colleague Alan, my strategy guy, sounding board and sanity checker, and we had a plan.
Three days later I received a phone call out of the blue from Madeleine, who was responding to my call for help on Gumtree. Just arrived on the sunshine coast and wanted to connect. Clearly, she was a woman committed to all things organic and chemical free and in search of a place to call home. By the end of our chat, Madeleine had offered to assist in co-ordinating our very first Chemical Free Community Meet Up event on the Sunshine Coast that enabled our sunshine coast supplier members to meet and collaborate. That was last June and since then Madeleine has settled into a life on the Sunshine Coast and has become passionate about ChemFreeCom.
Officially on the team, with business cards in hand, Madeline in now entrenched in the vision and activities of ChemFreeCom. I thank the universe every day for leading Madeleine to the Community!
SO WHAT CAN WE DO WITH AN EXTRA PAIR OF HANDS?
Like all start-ups and small businesses we’ve been relying on the ‘Just in Time’ management theory, with many things never quite making it to the top of the to-do list. We are pleased to say, with Madeleine’s assistance, we have resources and a plan in place to reconnect with all our current members who have been incredibly supportive as we have been gathering the troops for the directory. A big thank you to all of our supplier community for your patience.
We have come a long way in the last eight months. We’ve added a number of services to our repertoire to help promote our supplier members products and services such as member logos, supplier spotlight blog, members discounts page, in-store presentations, regional meet up events, while still attending local/national expo events. Much of which was requested by our supplier community, so thank you to those members that have challenged us and help us grow in the appropriate channels.
In the coming months, the lovely Madeleine and I will be contacting our supplier community to say hello and check in to ensure you are leveraging all our services – member logos, blogs, FB group, in-store events, meet ups etc. We have a rather long list of suppliers and hoping we can touch base with you all by Christmas.
ECO-ENTREPRENEUR MEET UP EVENTS – SUNSHINE COAST & GOLD COAST
Madeleine will continue to coordinate our sunshine coast regional meet up events, the next one scheduled for Thursday 13th Oct. We are pleased to share that we will be planning our first event on the Gold Coast in early 2017. These events enable all members based in a region to connect, collaborate and support each other to grow the non toxic industry in their region.
MEET MADELEINE
Madeleine has a diverse professional background of environmental consulting, office administration, child and aged care, and yoga teaching. She is passionate about holistic health and wellbeing and networking and connecting with others in this realm, specifically with growers of organic and chemical-free produce. Having lived with environmental sensitivities her whole life she has always been mindful of the importance of minimising toxic exposure. Having lived in several different locations up and down the East Coast of Australia, Madeleine relocated to the Sunshine Coast in May 2016. Shortly after this she joined the Chemical Free Community team soon after meeting with, and being inspired by, its founder, Jillian Exton.
Thanks again to all for your support and patience. We look forward to seeing what we can achieve together.
Jillian
Founder of the Chemical Free Community