Will Forest
A 53 year old, father of three, Will built an influential career in independent music distribution. Music 1.0-2.0, if you will. (The Lp through CD era).
After leaving Rounder Records in 2001, Will spent 8 years importing handcrafts from Mexico on a fair trade basis, selling on eBay and via a brick and mortar store in Montpelier, Vermont. Many trips to Mexico, direct relationships with artisans in their families, product consolidation, importing, sales and corporate sponsorship of Mexican dog rescues via Compassion Without Borders gave him a passion for “Compassionate Capitalism”; business with a social mission; doing well, by doing good.
A baseball fan since early childhood, Will put his lifelong Yankee loyalty up for auction on eBay for charity in 2007 in protest to the way Joe Torre was treated by the Steinbrenner family. The winner of the auction got to name his new team in exchange for paying the winning bid directly to Compassion Without Borders , as well as the ancillary tax benefit.
The auction went viral. A local paper article turned into a local TV interview, which then went out to local NBC affiliates. The eBay auction site generated talk on baseball chat rooms and blogs, drive time interviews on KNBC radio (the Los Angeles Dodgers were selected as his new team) as well as other media. Compassion Without Borders got a lot of free publicity, saved some dogs and Will had a blast.
Fortunate enough to still be playing baseball at his advanced age, a shout needs to go to the Montpelier Monties of the Vermont Senior Baseball League. A finer bunch of lads you will never find who have donned a glove or swung a bat (all wood, of course). They will probably purchase the first gross of fair trade Haitian baseballs.
