The Power of Media in Building a Green Future
Last fall, I participated in a Fellowship for a nonprofit publishing company called Stone Pier Press that publishes educational content about sustainability in the food system. Their mission is to promote steps that the public can take to create a more eco-friendly and ethical food system through books, journalistic articles, and social media. With six published books, three underway, and one that is going on a year as a bestseller, they are steadily growing. Stone Pier Press has also built a thriving Fellowship program, a collection of over 500 plant-based recipes, and wildly popular gardening articles on their site that educate about how to grow your own food. I worked closely with its founder, Clare Ellis, and recently sat down with her to talk about the role of media in working towards a sustainable future.
Ari: Have you seen an uptick in people's receptiveness to food sustainability?
Clare: I really have been impressed [that] just in the five, four-and-a-half years that Stone Pier Press has been in existence, just how much more aggressive the media has become in tying global warming to the problems that we're seeing. It's very heartening, and very recent. And I think there's a lot of calling bullshit that happened during the Trump administration. [...] The urgency of this moment has produced a much more straightforward, no nonsense kind of group [...]. People who are out there just saying, ‘No, this is not a random event. This is the result of climate change. And here's how we know that.’ So that kind of evidence-based reporting has become very common. And also, [the] calling out of people who are getting it wrong [...] has become very common. There's no reporting anymore on climate denialism. And that's only been in the last, probably two years or so [...]. That took a long time.
Ari: What are some of the difficulties you've faced in trying to reach audiences in the past?
Lawns Into Meadows, a guide to turning your chemical-dependent lawn into a living ecosystem, is one of SPP’s most successful books to date.
Clare: [...] Some of the difficulties we faced are recognizing that people don't want to be told what to do. That in order to bring around action, you have to inspire, tell stories. Make it entertaining [...] There's all different ways to be engaging, but the last thing you want to do is scold [...] and so what we've been doing [...] is focus[ing] on solutions. So that you don't feel hopeless and overwhelmed when you consider the challenge of saving our planet. And, and there is so much that's [...] exciting and hopeful and encouraging in the world. And then in the course of sharing some of that information, I think it galvanizes people to want to enter in and become part of something that looks like it has a good outcome. So that's been the approach that we're aligning with. [...] It's very American, [...] we hate to be told how to live our lives. So [...] opening up a number of options and making those options appealing [...] is a way to effect change.
Ari: So in terms of your personal experience, you've actually had a long and interesting history in media. You've been the editor of multiple magazines, [...] you worked at Nickelodeon. You founded an award winning website. So how did that lead you to SPP and why?
Clare: The reason I decided to do this was because I wanted to take my skill set and apply it towards doing something I care about. And I have the luxury of doing that right now. [...] I don't have two kids underfoot right now, which is nice. [...] With them gone, we have [...] fewer bills to pay [...]. And [...] going back to Trump, [...] his being elected really energized me. [...] I [had] a side consulting group that was focusing on good food ventures. So I worked with farmers, I worked with chefs, I worked [with] plant based chefs, I worked with documentarians to try to [...] bring through their message. And then I decided that I really wanted to get more involved in doing it myself, rather than helping other people do it. And so when Trump was elected, I was already very interested in moving into books because I think, in spite of the old-fashioned nature of books, [...] the popularity of books continues to be high. Booksellers are back in business. Lots more people are reading them, [even] before the pandemic. [And] the pandemic has also been good for books. And so it was a chance for me to kind of use skills that I had toward a goal that, in our own tiny way, I hope is mattering. [...] For me, I wanted to combine these different passions, publishing and media. And then food. And this was the best way for me to do it.
Ari: Very cool. That was going to be one of my next questions. What do you think the role of media is going to be in the future of food sustainability?
Clare: Critical. Because, [...] the critical nature of media is learning how to evaluate your source, your media sources. [...] The big challenge right now is disinformation. And [...] that will continue to be a challenge. [...] But [...] there are a lot of good, solid, reputable sources of journalism out there that have become, I think, even more important. It is way more important for us in determining our future than ever before. Because so much depends on making change now, to [...] mitigate this crisis. [...] And the people that are doing that are the conduits between science and the rest of us, the readers, the viewers, the users [...]. The language that the media chooses, you know, quick to reject [...] something that's not factual and establish it as such, [and saying] ‘this is wrong, there's no evidence to support this’, that's become a much more frequent occurrence. [...] That's the conversation that reporters are now having with their audiences [...]. I do think that [we need to make] sure that those UN reports on climate change are front and center of our reading. [The job of media is] that we’re very clear [about] the concerns of these [scientists] [...] and then solutions.
Ari: I think my final question would be what do you see in SPP’s future, and what's the ultimate vision?
Clare: I'd like to produce more books. [...] I have to kind of ramp up our book publishing effort so that we have actually more of a backlist to draw from [...] as other books are out there continuing to generate income. Right now we're entirely supported by our book sales which is great. We don't actually [...] do any fundraising. And so I'd like to continue to do that and continue to run this fellowship program [...] and then see if we can come up with more partnerships, so that we can align with bigger groups. And then it's not so much just us doing our thing, but [we can] kind of lean into what other publishing houses [and] media groups are doing and be kind of [an] an outgrowth of their efforts, so it's not just dependent on me. [...] That's actually my near-term goal, is to figure out how to make sure that [SPP] is around for longer than me.
