I'll have a Tall Glass of Milk with That

Earlier this week I attended a small round-table discussion with Jim Farrell, the founder of F'Real (www.freal.com), and a handful of my classmates in the Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital club. I hadn't planned on attending at first because F'Real sells milkshakes and it wasn't obvious how the company and its challenges were immediately relevant to my career. Lucky for me, there was a spot open at the last minute and I took advantage of the opportunity. Here are a few reasons why the conversation was immensely relevant:

1. Amidst all the hype of the financial crisis--all the talk of greed, recklessness and misuse of government (tax payer) bailout funds--Jim Farrell and his company were a breath of fresh air. For one thing, there are few products that incite such joy and nostalgia as the all-American milkshake. Second, Jim is a true, pure entrepreneur. This wasn't a conversation about business plans and venture funding. Rather it was about an individual believing in a product so sincerely that he was willing to take a leap of faith to create something with his own personal well-being on the line.

2. I've always believed that entrepreneurship is the most elevated form of ethics and this discussion reinforced that belief. Let me explain: MBAs, professionals and academics commonly talk about ethics in terms of what is unethical. They try to decipher unethical behavior and figure out ways to curtail it. This is fine and reasonable, but it's baseline. A more powerful approach is to understand ethical behavior in the positive. It can be subtle. For instance, with his dinner, Jim ordered a glass of milk. I absolutely loved this--a manager of a milkshake company that orders milk for dinner is poetic. As an aside, my dad once told me that he sat by Famous Amos on an airplane and for the entire trip, from takeoff to landing, the guy snacked on his own cookies. It seems to me that a manager who loves his product so completely could not help but be ethical. Ethical behavior can also be overt and it usually surprises people. Jim discussed F'Real's relationships with its dairy suppliers and the loyalties that existed even when F'Real began to outgrow the volume capabilities of some of these dairies. I won't go into the details, but it was touching. Further, entrepreneurship is inherently ethical because it is creative and progressive. By their very nature, entrepreneurs seek to make people's lives better, by offering better products, by creating new jobs, and ultimately by invigorating the economy.

3. Finally, technology and innovation are key to F'Real. The company has several patents, and it uses a special, high tech blender, and an innovative process. Again, details aside, suffice it to say that F'Real has a simple product that leverages a deep technological and process-oriented insight. All-too-often tech-focused entrepreneurs and venture capitalists are snobs about high technology--they glorify areas such as nanotechnology and artificial intelligence--but oftentimes the most productive, profitable technologies are far more grounded and intuitive.