Put YOUR MONEY where YOUR VALUES ARE: UNCORKED with DIANE OSGOOD

What if your next shopping decision could change—or even save—a life? What if that cheap chocolate bar, your fast fashion t-shirt, or the phone in your pocket quietly enabled child labour, environmental destruction, or modern slavery? 

In this eye-opening episode of the UNCOMMODiFiED Podcast, Tim uncorks a conversation with economist, sustainability strategist, and author Diane Osgood about her new book "Your Shopping Superpower." A powerful manifesto for values-aligned shopping and conscious consumer rebellion.

Diane dismantles the myth that we're passive victims of market forces and flips the script: we are the economy. Armed with over thirty years of inside corporate knowledge, she reveals how real power doesn't lie in supply, but in demand. You are the kingmaker. And one intentional choice—just one—can begin to shift everything. This isn't about perfection or being an eco-saint. It's about progress. It's about swapping one product a week to better align with your values—whether that entails reducing environmental harm, rejecting products tainted by child labour, or supporting your local community.

Listen and you will learn:

• How to make one small swap each week that aligns with your values—no boiling the ocean.
• The top third-party certifications to trust (and why "natural" and "eco-friendly" often mean nothing).
• Why "greenwashing" is the lie we want to believe, and how to avoid falling for it.
• How to stop feeding the problem and start living with less cognitive dissonance?
• And, why living your values doesn't just help the world—it makes you happier.

If you've ever whispered to yourself, "It's just one purchase," this episode will challenge you to ask a bolder question: What if that one purchase had the power to destroy—or to heal? Because it does.

Tim Windsor
the UNCOMMODiFiED Podcast – Host & Guide
tim@uncommodified.com
https://uncommodified.com/
  
PRODUCERS: Alyne Gagne & Kris MacQueen 
MUSIC BY: https://themacqueens.ca/

Transcript

TRANSCRIPTION:

PLEASE NOTE: UNCOMMODiFiED Podcast episode transcriptions are raw text files and have not been proofed or edited. They are what they are … Happy Reading.

© UNCOMMODiFiED & TIM WINDSOR

[00:00:00] What if your next shopping decision had the power to change a life or destroy it? What if the t-shirt you wear, the chocolate you eat, or the tech in your pocket had a hidden cost impact that you didn't realize? A child stolen future, a poisoned river, or a community exploited for your convenience? Sound extreme.

Well, it isn't, and you're gonna find out why. Today in a world where money moves markets and markets move mountains, your wallet is the most underestimated weapon of change that you own. You just haven't realized it yet, because demand not supply is king. And that makes you the king maker. And that's what we're gonna explore today.

Hey, my friends. Welcome back to the End Commodified podcast. I'm Tim Windsor, and today my guest on the show is Diane Osgood. Diane, welcome to the show.

Thank you so much. Fantastic intro. Couldn't have said it better myself.

Well, yeah, [00:01:00] you will. 'cause you're gonna get a chance to say it better yourself. It'll be great. So listen a bit about Diane, in case you don't know her. If you haven't met Diane yet, you're gonna meet her and you're gonna wanna Learn more about her along the way. For over 30 years, Diane has helped Fortune 100 companies create products that are better for the planet and for all people.

In integrated sustainability ideas and activities into their business setting ambitious goals to be better and develop strategies to bring their goals to life in the real world where it matters most. She's a nerd with a knack for translating. That's, I believe what you've said about yourself or someone has, not me, but that's what they say.

And you have a way of taking complex issues even in the call that we did for a preparation for complex issues. And even I can understand and if I can do that, Diane, that makes you quite brilliant. And so this conversation is gonna be all about understanding that you can be empowered to follow your values and make the borough better one purchase at a time.

Now we're gonna uncork this with a drink. What are you drinking tonight? Uh, my friend.

I just arrived in a hotel room, so I'm drinking water

for you.

[00:02:00] finest that Minneapolis has to offer.

Yeah. Minneapolis Water. I'm gonna drink California. Uh, red wine. How's that sound? Okay. Cheers to you. Thank you.

 you.

All right, here's the question. I wanna start this conversation off with Diane. Here's the question that's very important to me. What compels you as a person? Why this book and why Now, that's the questions.

I know they're just small questions, but that's the questions I wanna start with.

Well, what compels me is the fact that 69%, more or less of our economy is driven by consumer behavior, by consumer purchases.

Mm-hmm.

And yet we kind of have this stance of almost being victims of the economy. Like it's something out there. It's like this monster that tells us what to do, where in fact we are the economy by definition.

we are driving 69% of that. And then there's another interesting fact, which is about 80% of household [00:03:00] spending is done by the woman of the household. Obviously there, you know, our household is the exception to that. There's many, many other households that are as well, but in general, women tend to do a lot of the shopping.

So it goes back to that old adage, if you want something done, talk to a woman.

Well, I'm getting to do that tonight. And by the way, if you wanna listen to this woman, you should buy her new book. I, I mean, I'm gonna promote the the heck out of this today. So this book just to write at my house today, and I'm looking forward to reading it. And so I love the fact that you have decided to take all this wisdom and sort of quantify it and help people understand this thing.

So why. Did you decide that this was the time? And how do you believe people should understand and be moved by the message that you wanna give them?

Well. I have spent my entire career, really all 30 plus years of it figuring out and working with companies and with the market economy how that we can have a thriving economy. And by that I define it [00:04:00] as an economy which better jobs for more people are created. The the environment is restored, communities thrive, and products are healthy.

At least they're not harmful. By that definition, we've got a long way to go, but I know there is a way that we can have an economy where those conditions are met and that folks are in generally have a good life and a good lifestyle. So how is that? So I spent, as I said, 30 plus years on this question, largely working with inside companies in various roles. And I realized about six, seven years ago, Hey, you're an economist, Diane. You're forgetting the demand side of the supply and demand equation, and maybe that's where the power lie. It was a real kind of like duh, face palm moment when I realized I've been working on the supply side. And really the, the focus needs to be at this point in this [00:05:00] juncture on the demand side.

Now, this also arrived at a moment when there are a lot of tools available. There's a lot of data that can be crunched into apps and ways and rankings that consumers can have a pretty reliable source of information. So they know they're making choices that are better for the environment, better for their health, better for local communities.

Whereas, you know, 30 years ago, those tools did not exist. So it's also really good time in terms of the development, the arc of transparency and data so we can actually understand what we're buying. So.

So your journey starts on the supply side. You're, you're consulting for these organizations trying to help them understand their responsibility in the world. You're obviously, you have, I believe that you have a degree in economics, I think from uh, England potentially.

Yep. I did my PhD at the London School of Economics.

You're looking at this from an economics perspective, your consulting businesses who you know who want to make great economic decisions for themselves and for the [00:06:00] consumers at the same time, that can work against being responsible.

So there's this tension you're trying to manage for them, but now you have this epiphany and say, Hey, may, maybe there's another piece to this equation. So when you start thinking this. and you start sort of crossing the Rubicon onto the other side of this, is this a smooth transition for you, or how does this start to materialize as you start to have a different way you wanna approach this problem?

Well, right now I feel like I am on, um, two skis, not I'm, I'm definitely not on a, a snowboard. I'm on two skis doing two tracks at once because they're so interrelated.

Mm-hmm.

I'm also an economist and environmental economist, and my whole focus has been how can companies make products that are more sustainable in a way that's more ethical.

I. And so learning the consumer side has been fascinating. And in writing the book, my challenge was to explain everything that companies do and how it is that you get this t-shirt that's in your [00:07:00] hands and like who touched it and what are the environmental aspects of it, and how can you make better decisions about what t-shirt to buy.

I needed to break it down and explain it to someone who is curious and interested, but doesn't have 30 years of jargon and 30 years of the inside view. So that's been my, I think, most fascinating transformation is becoming comfortable using very simple, straightforward language to describe what's going on rather than couching it in all the jargon.

Yeah, that makes sense. And you know what, I guess that that when I started thinking about this subject matter and having you on the show, I started thinking about my own. Desire. I wanna, you know, I want to be responsible. I want to live harmoniously with my values that that's important to me, but I have to admit.

I don't think on any given day, I think as much about the power or the impact of my decisions that I'm making when I buy [00:08:00] something online or when I go to the store, you know, I maybe have some macro ideas of I don't wanna buy something from X, but so often. That's just not as simple as it is 'cause X isn't all part of the equation.

So how does the, an average person like Tim Windsor start to make one or two better choices and get this ball rolling for me in maybe a more, um, consistent direction to my values?

Well, the first thing you said is write on one switch at a time. Start with just one change a week. Don't try to do more. Just one. No. Boiling the ocean. And the other is you have to choose what topic you're gonna go for. So I, in the book, I break it down to, to the environment. To the people who made your stuff community, be it your local community or the community of business owners, and then health feat products.

And by [00:09:00] that is a very narrow definition of body care, personal care, home care, and clothing that doesn't have chemicals that are potentially harmful to you. Right. You, so you're unwittingly bringing home things to wear, put on your body, clean your house with that actually could have some, some nasties in them.

So, so let me ask you, just in an honest, if we weren't economists for a second and we were just looking at humanity, we'll forget economics for a second. Do you believe that the average human, not only wants to care about this, but will care about it?

So there's two points to that. I don't think that anybody wakes up in the morning and says, gee, I really wanna buy something made by child labor or.

No.

 Ooh, how exciting. I get to go buy something made by a slave. I, ooh, modern a slavery, I'm a fan, you know, and there's over 37 million slaves right now in the world.

So, you know, it's not completely, uh, impossible. So there's [00:10:00] that absence of will to do really nasty to purchase something that has a pretty nasty background to it. I think that's a given. But at the same time, we also want ease. We're creatures of habit. We want easy access, and for most of us, we want it today or tomorrow.

So there's an impatience now that's crept in, and so that's what causes the tension. Also, companies, again, until very recently, the information hasn't been transparently available. It's been hard to find. It's been very opaque. But now you can literally say, Hey, AI service. Tell me what the carbon.

Emissions reduction strategy of Company X is and how that compares to company Y. You don't have to read these reports that I've spent my career helping to write frame and read. You know, it's, we're in such a different age with information.

And information [00:11:00] is obviously powerful and understanding it. So obviously one of the challenges with information is, is that it can be architectured in such a way that it gives us the message we want. and we're in an age where we maybe trust certain sources less or more than we used to. So if I'm looking for a reliable source of information, can you help me understand, based on your research, where are some places, uh, other than the general internet that I would maybe wanna go to gather some really good data and understanding if I wanted to learn more?

So the first place I really recommend people do is to look at certifications. In the book I breakdown, there's different types of certifications, but really what I'll talk about now is certifications have been set up by a group of nonprofits or a single nonprofit that have an external advisory board and a board that actually verifies what's going on because the livelihood and the.

The essence of that nonprofit is [00:12:00] at stake. They're not gonna verify a product that ruins their reputation. They're gonna be really clear that if their mark goes on it, it stands for something. And that's one reason I, I continually recommend them. And the book, I list almost a hundred of really great certifications to look for.

You can look for fair trade. There's fair Trade USA. You can look for the Rainforest Alliance, green Frog. You can look for US protocol for us produced organic cotton. There's all sorts. You can look for specific certifications that mean your clothes have not been drenched in potentially harmful chemicals.

There's all sorts. You can get quite narrow, but once you go, oh, I'm gonna look for that one, it opens up the field.

Okay, so, so there's lots of reliable sources from, from your perspective, it's those third party independent sources that don't have a vested interest in the message that they're giving either way. So we, we'd [00:13:00] have to be careful about that and. One of the terms that I've heard, and I frankly, I wish I was smarter and I understood exactly what this means.

But you know, I have a friend who the subject matter we're talking about is very, very important to them. Much more important over the years to them as it has to been to me, if I'm gonna be really honest. And there's a term that she talks about, which I don't really understand, and the term I think is greenwashing. Help me understand like that. That sounds good to me. Like if green is good, isn't it? But green apparently, greenwashing maybe not so good. What is this thing?

Greenwashing is just a fancy piece of jargon that talks about deceitful marketing. 

So we, again, go back into the idea we, none of us wanna buy something made by slaves. None of us wanna buy something that's really destroyed the environment. And so if you notice plastic water bottles, there's usually a bit of blue on them.

There's a scene of the ocean. Packages often have leaves and greenery [00:14:00] to try to convey purity and the environment. And so they send me signals. To convey to us the qualities we may be looking for, be it purity, which is for nature or environmentally friendly, and then they can stack on words which are quite frankly meaningless, natural, environmentally friendly.

These are words that are absolutely meaningless. There's no standard associated with them, but it makes product, gives them a glow, the halo effect, and it's deceptive marketing.

Interesting. So greenwashing is a company's proactive, uh, deliberate desire to somehow shape my experience. So I'm thinking I'm doing something or getting something I might not be. That's the

bottom

Exactly, 

and I think we've reached peak greenwash, and that's because in Europe they now have regulation that. It's making it illegal and they're going after companies for it. [00:15:00] So any company that's large enough to have an eye on Europe or do business in Europe is gonna be paying attention to that.

Okay. Well that's, yeah. Now, historically, has Europe, always been sort of a little bit more sort of progressive in relationship to these kind of standards than maybe here in North America? Or is that not true?

I think it's true. Um, definitely in the early years.

Yeah.

And the other main difference is the term sustainability, which again, I'm sorry, but it's jargon, but it's what, you know, it's our trade in Europe, it includes social issues and the US it tends to be only environmental.

And so there's, you know, there's a whole range of, of social issues.

You know, we've. Touched on them in terms of abusive labor conditions. The most onerous being slavery and child labor. But there's a whole range unfortunately, of abusive, of, labor conditions. And in Europe, all that's considered. Where in the US there are two very separate camps almost.[00:16:00] 

Yeah. You know, and I, Diane, first of all, I love the conversation and I, and I am gonna be really honest. I, I am not a. Attentive to these things in my life that I than I should be. And I, and I know it on one level, and then the, the hubris of my own experience and the convenience that I've fallen in love with, frankly about my life takes over.

And frankly, I don't make some great decisions. I, and I know it. I I do know it. I think that's the problem is, is that I think now the problem is, is that it's hard to say you don't know it at some level. It's, it's different today. Would you agree with that?

It is different today. We all live with some level of cognitive dissidence like we just do, like given. I make compromises all the time and that's why one of my three principles is progress, not perfection. We just can't aim at perfection. No product is perfect. We all have life, you know, and life happens.

And sometimes, you know, I have a serious caffeine issue. I love my coffee in the morning, and if I'm [00:17:00] traveling and I can't find an organic fair trade coffee at the airport. I'm gonna drink the best thing I think I can make, you know, given the circumstances, I'm gonna make my best decision and get on with it.

I'm not going to forego coffee in that instance because I can't find certified organic fair trade. I.

Yeah. Well, I I love that. I love what you just said there. So, so we're seeking, progressing towards something

not perfect, not 

perfection. yeah. 

And there's a, there's another element I'd like to bring up, which is my hypothesis and my personal experience is that it makes you feel better. It makes you feel happier. You don't have that stress and strain of contradiction going on. like I want a healthy environment. And I know that buying this product is kind of contradictory to that, then I have a different relationship with that product and how I feel in the moment and all the little lies and white lies I have to tell myself to make it okay.

If you go ahead and buy [00:18:00] something different, you just don't have that strain.

Yeah. No, you, well, again, you're solving that incongruency in your own psyche and soul, which is really important. So, so I, I have a question around economics, but it's more on a personal economics perspective. So I grew up in a very poor family. My mom raised a group of ragtag children and government housing in Canada.

We didn't have a lot of money. I am, I live in a very. Different situation today than I grew up in. So I, I feel like, and I, by the way, I could be a hundred percent wrong about this. So I, I wanna explore this idea. I feel like I have the luxury uh, because of my income and my disposable level of income at times that.

I feel like I have a certain luxury regarding choices. Um, I feel like, and this could be a totally false narrative, but I feel like those people who maybe live a little bit closer to the poverty line or in lower income situations may or may not have the same flexibility of choices. Is that a wrong way of understanding this or approaching it, or is that some [00:19:00] contextual understanding that we need to bring to the discussion?

Yeah, let's break. Let's break down a few assumptions there. Overarching assumption is that ethical and sustainable is always more expensive, and that's just a myth.

It's not, it often is because unfortunately it's more expensive, for example, to use recycled paper than paper from virgin cut forests. The process is more laborious, it's more energy.

It just, it's more expensive. Same thing for cotton organic, regenerative cotton is much more expensive than the, the conventional that's just been sprayed and, you know, and, and absorbs a huge amount of water. It's less expensive. So your organic cotton is going to be more expensive than your conventional, pretty much across the board.

But when I got quite granular in the research for my book, I actually priced out some basic household goods, so chocolate cocoa puffs. [00:20:00] I went to two stores in my community in Northern Illinois, and I priced them out To my utter surprise, I looked at organic, conventional, and fair trade Organic. The Fair Trade Organic was the least expensive per ounce.

Interesting.

So what, what that shows is that brands and branding and positioning and all those other things, how brands create value, has a large play in the final price. Especially when it's, you know, it's, it's something like Cocoa Puffs, which are, you know, very much brand lead products. You know, or a, an organic coffee or something like, that's probably gonna cost a little bit more or chocolate.

But if the price difference is 20% and you're buying a $5 chocolate bar, and if you can afford a $5 chocolate bar, which I'll get to that part in a moment, 20% isn't that much more

right.

right. Whereas if you are [00:21:00] buying. A sweater, 20% is a lot more. And so sometimes I always say, start with some of the commodities.

That's also where you're gonna have a big impact on, you know, labor, uh, conditions and environmental conditions is in your coffee, your cocoa, your sugar, your bananas, tea, all that kind of stuff. And that's where even if it is a significant in, in, in relative value, in absolute value, it's, it's not too, too onerous.

That's kind of set of assumptions. One. And there are ways, of course, now with, um, for clothing and tools, renting and borrowing, there's all sorts of new marketplaces that keep the prices way down. It's really important to me that a family that's on even close to anything we would come to define as the poverty line.

Just like you just, you just go Do you like, don't worry about this. Your life is got enough challenges. There's no need, right? [00:22:00] Let us carry that burden and change the market because we do have that luxury. Now, if you wanna go to the farmer's market and you wanna figure out where to buy these things, because farmer's markets are often less expensive for in season produce, there are options.

But man, that's not who my target audience is.

Yeah. Well, first of all, I, I, I think first of all, it's a really wise approach. It's a very fair approach, which you would think based on the discussion, a fair, fair would be the way to do it. It's a fair approach. But to your point, there are small things that people can do in the context in which they live, which I think this is part of the conversation.

And, you know, one of the books that I have. Been really inspired by over the years is a book called Getting to, maybe the subtitle of that book is How the World Is Changed. And I'm actually gonna do a podcast in the next little while. Uh, I've got this idea, uh, working in my head around that concept.

But, you know, one of the things that, that book addresses, which is quite interesting 'cause it's about [00:23:00] social change and how it happens, and the, the authors of that book make this really interesting observation, which is, it's actually my fear. I mean, I'll, I'll personalize this. When I read the book, what I heard them saying to me is, Tim, your fear that.

What the small contribution you can make is so insignificant that it won't do anything, and the, fear of your own insignificance keeps you from making any contribution, and that's how things stay in this place of the status quo, the way we find them, because some Impressively evil. voice says to Tim Windsor, you're so insignificant.

Tim. What are you gonna do about this? Move on? Nothing to see here. Do you think that that is a primary barrier that really all of us need to ask ourselves a different question about?

I think it does, and I have a couple of responses to that. One is if you do make a change, then you're no longer part of the problem. You're not [00:24:00] feeding, right? That whole thing, like which wolf you're gonna feed, whatever, you know, right? You're not feeding the problem. You're making a conscious choice to say, no, I really don't want child labor in my cocoa, thank you very much.

Or, you know, whatever it is. You know, like, no, I'm going to invest in a sustainable piece of clothing because fast fashion has such a waste issue, right? So I'm gonna make that choice, and at least I'm no longer part of the problem. 

The second is it drives your own happiness, you know? And, and when we're aligned with our values, it's just easier.

Right? And, and, and we can have that conversation about, you know, on d many different levels, but I really believe that is true. We don't have that second guessing. We don't have that secondary commentary going on in our, in our head. And the third is, it's like voting, right? But the thing is. in voting for elections, we know what percentage of votes we have to get to tip.

We don't know that for these commodities, for these products. So [00:25:00] many years ago, at the beginning of my career, I was, uh, a young thing and uh, went off to Paris to worked with a pretty radical and wonderful nonprofit and got assigned to work on, fishing issues because at that point.

When tuna trawlers went out, they caught millions of dolphins as by catch, and they died. I was outraged. I wanted to go on the boats. I wanted to like slap the, the fishermen around and get them to stop, you know? No, no, no, no, no. You know, Madam Mozelle, you're going to sit in this office and drink coffee and write letters because you are going to be in charge of the consumer outreach program.

So after. Multiple months. We had one, 2% barely people responding to our our campaign. So I went back home after my little stint in Paris and it's like, well, so what you know that didn't work. Uhuh, 18 months later, the [00:26:00] entire tuna fishing, the big players got together and said, because of consumer pressure, 2%, they stopped.

Buying from fishermen. Without these, uh, dolphin friendly nuts changed the way tuna is caught. Now, there's other issues with canned fish we won't go into now, but just to say it took 2%

Yeah, it's very

right now, that's very different. than other attempts at consumer pressure.

But sometimes it's exceedingly shocking how little it takes.

It's interesting and, uh, that's kind of a interesting journey for you because you're going back then now in this book, you're going back to a learning that you had a long time 

ago. Mm-hmm. 

That sometimes, you know, I don't know what you, but every once in a while, I, I have these epiphanies and I go, man, I learned that.

A long time ago. I guess I'm, I'm learning it again. So what's interesting is you're relearning or coming back to a learning you had a long time ago that actually it's the demand side that [00:27:00] can, the consumer side of these equations that has potentially massive impact. and also even if it doesn't have massive impact.

And this is what I guess I really love about the idea of your book, and I can't wait to get into it, is that I win every day as a person when I live aligned with my values. Regardless of what value that is and where it's applied, I win all day long every day. I'm a I, I think I'm a better and more whole human when I don't live fractured within myself.

So the win I. Is somewhat selfish. In some ways it's personal. I live more aligned with my values and the side benefit or the bigger benefit is, is that if I do it and you do it and somebody else does it, then at the end of the day we all do it, or a portion of it, or maybe only 2% of us. Does that, but that starts to get the attention of business people and they say, wow, we, we, we've got a code red problem brewing here, and we need to ask ourselves different [00:28:00] questions about who we wanna be and how we wanna be in the world.

So it's, it's amazing how we can understand how movements are created. How we can, move things towards where we want them to be. So let, let me ask you, I mean, first of all, again, if you guys are listening in, I always say you're listening in for a reason. And if you're watching the video, this is the book.

You wanna buy your shopping superpower, you have a superpower. I always say that you have a superpower, and your superpower is the ability to ask great questions. That's my superpower. But I'm realizing in this book, I have another superpower. , and that's my Amex card. I thought it was just a superpower, you know, for a good lounge.

But no, apparently it's my superpower. I can make a choice at any moment, in any moment. And that's, and that's what I'm taking from this thing, is that at any moment I can exercise my superpower by asking myself a better question, one little better question about what I'm buying, if is what I'm buying today, contributing to child labor.

Yes or no? Is it contributing to, better earth practices regarding Mother [00:29:00] Earth? Yes or no? I can ask some simple question and as you said, not, I don't have to tackle it all at once. I can start with one, maybe the place that's most aligned to my values and if that's the earth, awesome.

if it's communities and people, that's awesome. You're giving me permission, which really at the end of the day is really wise 'cause you're taking away my excuses. Diane, that's what you're doing. You're taking away my excuses that I set up and say, oh, it's too big. Diane can't do anything.

Yeah, so I, I, I have three principles. One is no right, no wrong. What your value is and where you start is appropriate for you. I may start somewhere 

else. Right. So even though I'm environmentally economist and I have spent most of my career focused on climate and these things, because I have worked with enslaved people, that's always my first, that's always how I lead is on the labor rights, but that's right for me, it may not be right for you.

The second one is start where your, you have that poll start where, where your heart is most engaged. And for a lot of [00:30:00] people, that's the environment. And for other people, it's, it's their their own community. They want to have thriving independent businesses. It doesn't matter. Just choose where you have the most pull.

And then the third is keep it simple. One, swap a week. Don't do more. Just keep it simple.

Well, it doesn't get any. I even, I can do that. Diane, I, you know what, I feel much more empowered as we have this conversation. This, this is a brilliant conversation and I, I really, I really love it. And so let me ask you, early days the books just come out. I. Yeah. So you're getting some initial feedback from people and you're starting to get a sense, did this grand idea that you have, is it starting, is it resonating?

Is, are you hearing some resonation back? So tell me what are you in early days, what are you beginning to sense that this book could mean for individuals? And then for yourself as someone who's now going back to a lesson that one learned a long time ago.

Well, the, the biggest [00:31:00] compliment I've received so far is someone told me that their 11-year-old son wanted to borrow the book as soon as she got home from the book launch. And then she sent me a message the next day saying, not only did it take the book to school the next day, he read the first 20 pages.

Wow.

So it's like, okay. There's something there if you know that generation, that kid gets it. And of course I've had lots of positive feedback, but this point it's mostly people who know me. So I, I need to, you know, get it out to a population that's not gonna be afraid of hurting my feelings. but I believe that this is a universalism, you know, the demand side of the, of the equation is stronger.

We are the economy. And if I have to have, you know, like my, sole message is. You are a part of the economy. You're helping drive it, drive it where you want it to go. You know, I'm a kayaker and when you kayak and there's a rock in the river, you don't look at the rock 'cause you're gonna hit it if you do.

So let's not look at the [00:32:00] rock. Let's look at thriving economies and better jobs for more people and make our decisions with those frames.

Yeah, that's, it's just so, it's so powerful and it's just so, uh, simply wise, and I really love the conversation. And so, again, if you're listening in, you listen for a reason. I'm just gonna ask you to consider the simple wisdom that Diane's, uh, suggesting, but also the provocation. Just could you make just one small change?

 and if we can all make one small change, we're gonna move in a, in a wonderfully different direction. So, so again, I just wanna go back to where I started, you know. To this question, what if, okay, consider this listeners, what if your next shopping decision had the power to change life or a life or destroy it?

What if that was true? And it is true, but what if you actually asked yourself, is that true? Would you make a different selection? That's the challenge really before us, because at the end of the day, you know, [00:33:00] you are the kingmaker. Demand is king. You know, I've been training salespeople for a long time, Diane, and and leaders, and I always said to them, demand is king and demand is either created or responded to.

So the reality is here is that we. Have the ability actually within our wallet, within our grasp, and some with more control than others or more available resources to make a change. We have the power, and I just wanna strongly remind you, if you're listening, maybe in pause the podcast right now and ask yourself the question, would you be brave enough to make one different decision, just one in the next six days?

And do me a favor, if you do, if you take that challenge, do me a favor, DM me or email me at tim@unccommodified.com and let Diane know and myself know what you're doing. And do yourself a favor. Pick up this book. If you haven't seen it yet, I'm gonna put it here again. You gotta pick up this book, your shopping superpower.[00:34:00] 

My commitment is that this book's gonna get read. I have some books I have on my shelf I've never read. Diane. Full disclosure. So I feel like I've read them, but I didn't. This book is gonna get a full read from me. I really appreciate it. One last question as we finish up my podcast is this idea of the uncommodified, you know, not understanding that their commodities are something easily and readily accessible everywhere, but more difficult or problematic is when people become commodities.

Diane, you're. Clearly not a commodity. So when you walk into a room and you're bringing the Diane, which I can imagine that's pretty funky if you're bringing the Diane, what is Diane doing in a room of people that you know is your unique contribution to that ecosystem?

I really try to just let my heart tell me what to say. And because I have so much experience and I get in my own way, most people do get in their own way. So that's a lot of it is trusting that the stories I choose to tell, that my insights will land. And as a veteran of having worked [00:35:00] inside companies for so long, they need consumers. They need you to make choices. That will steer them in a way that's better for the planet and for the people who make this stuff.

Yeah. Great. And I appreciate that. That's a great place to finish up. Again, if you're listen in, you're listening for a reason. Thanks so much. just DM me and let me know what you're doing with this conversation. , just like I uncorked a bottle of wine, uncork this idea in your life and make it vibrant and real for your sake and the benefit of everyone.

Cheers, have an awesome day.