FINDING REASON FOR HOPE

January 20, 2021

The following is a message to staff from Brian.

Between MLK day on Monday, and today's inauguration, I have spent much of this week reflecting on the past several years. Obviously the global landscape, the state of our country, the pandemic, but also Summit's world -- our communities, our impact, our priorities and our decisions.

On the Wednesday after the 2016 election, in a message to staff (there were probably about 25 of us back then), I urged the following: "Rise above this moment to be the person that makes a positive difference in your neighborhood and community."

There's no doubt that the 50 months since November 2016 have been hard, tumultuous, have allowed anxiety to creep in. And it's still a really hard time right now. It's ok to say that. But I'd be remiss if, upon reading through some of MLK's writings and speeches, I wasn't also proud of Summit's success in rising above so many moments to make a positive difference in our neighborhoods and in our communities. Back then, our business existing in the 3-mile triangle between the Outpost, Roastery, and Basecamp. Now, we've widened our home to Asheville, Chapel Hill, Charlotte.

There's so so much we can't control. But we can fight like hell to make our voices heard, to stand up for what we believe is right (both as individuals and as a company), and to try to make our neighborhoods and communities better places to be because Summit exists there.

Hope. It's a feeling we have been trying to exude and share and spread since the outset of the pandemic, since the vitriolic election in 2016, and in each of the 50 months since. Perhaps there's never been a time in our lives when it's been harder to feel hopeful. I'm the most optimistic person I know and I've had countless days when I wasn't hopeful, when I didn't want to have to be hopeful.

But today, as Kamala Harris becomes the first woman and person of color to hold the office of the Vice President, two days after we honored the legacy of Martin Luther King, there's reason for hope. And in my reflections, I keep coming back to how Summit has allowed me to remain hopeful -- that even in darkness of cultural divide, of hate, of a global health and economic crisis, Summit has shown up to "make a positive difference in your neighborhood and community."

Y'all have done this. Y'all have joined me in making Summit a space for joy, a space for being yourself, a space for making small differences in our small worlds. A space for hope. Don't underestimate the positive impact you've had on lives, on my life, on each other.

My charge on this day is the same as it was some four years ago. "Let's continue to bring our values -- kindness, compassion, empathy, love -- into Summit, into our neighborhoods, into the coffee community. Thank you for your continued hard work and care, today and every day. Summit makes such a positive difference in our world, and our goal is for that to continue."