By Bert Zethof

HBC's knock-off of the genuine Cowichan sweater for the 2010 Olympics line of apparel is a case study in blind corporate scale over-riding common sense.

The Cowichan sweater represented an ideal opportunity for The Bay to develop community and customer goodwill by creating a real economic opportunity for the Cowichan Tribes. Instead HBC designed its own look alike sweater made elsewhere.

The rationale that the Cowichan people did not have adequate production capacity to meet the volume needs seems reasonable on the surface. But when one considers the possibilities, it's a cop out.

The argument about inadequate production capacity is a common refrain among large retailers. For example, in agrifoods it has been a barrier to the sale of organic produce and speciality foods in supermarkets until only recently as a result of surging consumer interest.

The smart retailer has an opportunity to get ahead of consumer demand (or at least stay abreast of it) by pro-actively finding ways to work with small suppliers.

In the early eighties, I had the opportunity to work for Northern Construction Company. We won a large construction contract in the Northwest Territories but had to promise that we would meet local and Northern content targets in material and labour as required by the Trudeau Government.

We were able to do so by visiting and taking an inventory of local capabilities and then subcontracting work in small, tailored packages suitable for local suppliers to bid on. On the whole, the approach worked. While it required a push by the Federal Government to make it happen, it demonstrated the win-win possibilities of triple bottom line behaviour. It showed that a large company can gain a good market reputation by fostering local entrepreneurial activity.

At the end of the day, it is either consumer pressure or a values shift by the corporate leaders that leads a laggard company to change (or government regulation which is the last resort).

In the meantime, if you are a small supplier trying to make inroads with large wholesale or retail buyers, trying to motivate a values shift is virtually impossible if your target person isn't ready. However, you can work to cultivate your own direct customer base.

Using Warren Buffet's analogy: roll a snowball of customer interest to the point where it has a large and unstoppable momentum of its own. Then the large corporate buyer will beat a path to your door. Of course, at that point, you may not need them anymore and that's OK.