One Foot in Each Pond.

Is it our business? Does food have rights? Should it be exploited? How have so many corporations and small business made money off of one simple ingredient – food. The shift from a good centric industry composition to a service industry – how has that affected the business of food? What is the strategic positioning of foods and how do they create industries?

Having grown up on a dairy farm in Southwestern Ontario, been involved in both the rural and urban community, and recently graduated business school at Wilfrid Laurier University – I wonder how synergies between food and people and business happen. Where did it start? The industrial revolution in Britain when the masses moved to urban areas, leaving cottage industry behind? When women began in the workplace during World War II, leaving home made meals a thing of the past? Or was it when industry began to capitalize on niche markets – creating a mindset that intricate, expensive food is better and more legitimate than simple meals.

Most students in my program are either continuing on with their studies in order to receive their CA’s, others said adios to classes and joined the ranks in Toronto, Vancouver, or New York. They received swanky office jobs that pay to pave their way to comfort. I however, don’t feel quite ready yet to give up the feel of soil between my fingers – but yet am also not ready to milk cows every 12 hours for the rest of my known life. So here I am. Graduated school – stuck in the middle with my feet dipped in both ponds. And so I begin my quest.

Why not go to Italy, Tuscany perhaps? I’ll work for a famous butcher whose methods predate the fashions of food that have come about recently, whose passion for authentic creations creates its own competitive advantage, a resource that no one else can copy. Dario Cecchini’s business strategy trumps many business owners’ attempts to create sustainable business – a hard thing to do in the food industry.