SXSW 2013 Sampler

Great Britain 49
The consumers are happy because they get a $1,500 item from
High Street for $500, and the designers are happy because instead
of selling one item per month, they may sell hundreds.’’ 17 They
also get the reward of knowing that their work is finding its way
into the lives of thousands of people.
At the office in Notting Hill Gate, a few dozen people can
manage thousands of relationships that produce millions of dollars’
worth of sales each quarter. Remarkably, none of the workers are
employed as salespeople. Instead they work as listeners who try
to tune in to the desires of their community of customers. ‘‘How
do you sell?’’ asked Julien, rhetorically. ‘‘You sell by listening to
people. If you listen, they will tell you exactly what they want. If
you listen, you can change the system and do it better.’’
•••
Most of the innovators we met in Britain had established new
business models that engaged consumers and citizens directly and
made things better, one person at a time. Borrowers who turned
to Zopa were able to buy cars or renovate kitchens (the two most
common reasons for people to apply), and Golden Company bee
guardians earned paychecks as they acquired skills. But these kinds
of direct efforts were not the only signs of innovation we discovered.
Though no longer the seat of an empire, London remains a place
where people with a broad vision for changing the world cultivate
new ideas.
A few blocks from Regent’s Park, in the center of London, we
met two of the directors of Social Finance, an organization that
has found a way to tap private wealth to solve public problems.
Turning an old paradigm on its head, the firm is working on deals
with different levels of government, promising social programs that
produce measurably better results than existing agencies . Investors
are being courted to supply the up-front cash, while government is