Good Morning John, So, maybe it has
not escaped everyone’s notice that we are up to something.
Two different subscriptions to two very different products?
What are these boys doing? Well let me tell ya.
Several years ago, we realized something obvious,
that there are many things that people want and need.
Drinking a delicious cup of coffee,
for example, is a tremendous joy for many people including for me.
Putting on socks that are art, made by artists and having people point to them
and go “I like your socks!” or sometimes people point
to them and go “I have those too!”
That’s also a happy feeling.
And people are going to buy socks and they’re gonna buy coffee,
and they’re gonna buy a lot of other things.
And what you and I are trying to figure out, John. Let’s let everybody in on the secret,
is can you make those things really well, and people really love them,
and have it be a great experience for them, and build something really weird and unusual.
Which is companies that give away all their profit.
So instead of the money going to make the lives of the owners better,
it goes to make the world generally better.
Now we talk about this stuff with people we’re getting advice from
they often say like "why are you doing this?" Why would you work so hard
creating a business that you do not benefit from financially?
And why spend fifteen years
building up a community on the internet only to monetize it for somebody else?
And I have two main answers to that question.
The first answer used to be because we have plenty now. Which is true, we have plenty now,
but when I said this to like, people in the business world they
were often quite incredulous, because, of course,
they know lots of people have plenty and yet are still interested in more.
So here’s the refined and I think actually more accurate version of that answer.
At this point, we are more interested in impact than wealth.
I would not work half as hard as I do on the Sock Club if it was just about me
making more money.
And I know that is also the case with you and the coffee.
If we didn’t have Partner’s in Health’s work there to excite us,
I just don’t think that we would be as ambitious as we are.
But second, and I think is an even bigger deal. The thing that has excited us about this
for fifteen years has not been building a community
so that we can make a living.
It’s been, building a community. And one of the most amazing things
about communities is when they can build things together.
An example from Nerdfighteria, like I feel a lot of personal
pride from Crash Course because it’s a wonderful thing
that helps a lot of people, it has a lot of value.
But I also have community pride in Crash Course because the people at Complexly and the people
who wrote the scripts, all the freelancers and Thought Cafe
and everybody all came together to make that thing
with each other. And that was a community.
But also, maybe the thing about it that I am most proud of
is that it would never have been able to be funded.
And would never had its initial viewership that sort of carried it
forward and helped it grow, if it were not for this community.
Crash Course is something Nerdfighteria built.
And that is true for so many of the things that we have done.
I don’t see them as things I did. I see them as things that we did.
And I feel that way because it’s true. Now I think that this community could have been
somewhat proud of a sock club for profit. Like, as a thing that we made together.
And like, we work with artists and we create art-socks that people like to wear.
I feel that way about lots of projects that YouTuber’s do.
I feel that way about Holo Taco, and about Dropout.TV.
But we are lucky enough to be able to ask,
what is the best and coolest thing that we can do with this activation energy.
And it is stuff like delicious ethically sourced coffee
that gives all of its profit to charity.
And I don’t think that this is a small or even medium sized idea.
I could be wrong… been wrong before.
But I think that it is possible that someday there will be Awesome Club subscribers
who have no idea who Hank and John Green are. That to me is the best outcome.
That this community builds things that spread across the world,
doing good and making people happy, and making the world a better place,
with people having no idea that that is something that we
did. And already, the Coffee Club is doing a tremendous amount of good.
I think it’s donated already one-hundred thousand dollars
to Partners in Health,
and also every bag delivers two-dozen delicious cups of coffee.
So there’s that benefit as well. But no matter how big it is,
I hope that you who are watching this, know that whether or not you
want this coffee or not, and it’s fine that you don’t,
I hope that you feel the same pride as I do in the impact that this community has had.
John, congrats on the launch. I’ll see you on Tuesday
Also yes, you can still sign up for the Coffee Club at awesomecoffeeclub.com