One of the biggest problems I face as a Sustainable Agriculture Professional living in a remote rural area is connecting with my customer. In fact, were I to follow the prevailing winds, I would not now nor never know my customer, that is the person who is actually consuming or using my products.
I believe Steemit, and other applications of the Steem blockchain, can change that.
To prove to you that this is the case, I am going to show you!
I began on steemit a mere three months ago and have dicovered an incredible network of interesting people! Seriously, its like all the boring people must have stayed behind. Along with new friends and amigos, I have also been approached by potential clients, and now I have successfully converted a product and shipped - all based on interactions on the Steemit platform!
When @professorbromide approached me (digitally) and expressed interest in trading some SBD for green coffee beans, I thought it was a great idea. Although I had never traded green (unroasted) coffee before, he had purchased them before, and was more than willing to offer his experience about packaging.
Trading green coffee made me a little nervous. Because the product does not get burnt to a crisp before shipping, we were very careful to select each and every bean by hand. Each and every bean!
Over the course of several days we selected all of the coffee, and then we looked for a scale. We ended up borrowing a scale this time, perhaps just a little too small for the job at hand, but at the top of our shopping list is now a 1 kilogram scale. This tiny one let me weigh about 200 grams at a time.
We packed up the product and found a Steem sack to throw it in.
Because our plan is to create a guide to help others follow in our footsteps, including rural colombian farmers and artesans who may have never shipped anything before, we began to think about how to show people how easy it is.
One important thing that every package for international shipping must have is the address. Without an address, no one would know where the package is supposed to go. An address has several elements, as shown below. Where I have written 'address' below as a sub element of the entire address I am talking about here, I really mean house number.
With the address attached, it was off to the post office! In Colombia, the national postal service is called 4-72, nice round numbers for the latitude and longitude of Bogotá, the capital of Colombia. This may sound strange, but most Colombians do not know about their national postal service, and instead use higher priced private services often with poor customer service. I have used 4-72 over the last 5 years and, as frustrating as international shipping can be, they have always been open, honest, helpful and quick to help. Nearly every year (when prices go up) I get bids from all of the top shipping companies available in my area for a wide variety of weight classes, and 4-72 has always been the best price.
Although my local post men and women are friendly and helpful, I sometimes get a little curious or even suspiscious about what happens with a package once it leaves my small town. We decided to send a witness, someone who could potentially travel around the world. We name him Steem Traveller.
We have drawn the Steem Traveller to watch over this journey and report back from the United States.
I filled out the necessary forms, which occasionally seem to me to be excessive. Colombia has many rules and regulations in place to try to stamp out narcotrafficking and the infamy of it. Colombia is a proud exporter of cut flowers, bananas, coffee, emeralds, cacay oil and thousands of other promising products.
After that, we are ready to go! This package will travel 262 kilometers to Bogotá where it will eventually board a plane and head for Miami. From Miami it will integrate into the US postal system until it arrives at its destination. The standard international package service requires a signature, and if you aren't home the US post office will leave a note. They will try to come back when you are home, but you may need to visit your local post office if they prove unable to reach you after a few tries.
Here it is! The final photo on this side of the Carribean! Its still America, but South.
As the world of international shipping continues to become more and more integrated and standardized, we are happy to experiment with this universal tracking number. If we are understanding the 'science' correctly, anyone of you can track this package as it soars across the world using this code:
Thank you so much for reading this far! Since you are here I believe that this topic interests you, and I want to introduce you to the Steem Around the World Challenge.
@stortebeker has created a wonderful idea of a network of artesans, makers and growers showing the world their products and gaining visibility through a series of sharings. It is one of the best and most exciting social experiment I have seen proposed on the platform so far. What's up? We need more people.
Consider what you could ship and share, consider following @stortebeker and the Steem Around the World Challenge. Consider writing an example piece for his SAWC competition (which is staying open until further notice).
And consider telling me all about your thoughts and feelings in the comments below!
I am forever grateful for all of the love and support I have received from my family, friends and of course, the @ecotrain.
