From Dave Smith

She is the daughter of a famous actor and actress. He owned the successful pool cleaning business that took care of her family’s pool. They were friendly and liked each other. She moved to the West Coast to attend college and they lost contact. He sold his pool cleaning business and also moved to the West Coast to pursue other opportunities. An avid falconer, she learned that these powerful birds of prey could soon become extinct because of DDT use. She had herself tested and found dozens of toxic poisons in her own body and became a believer in organic foods.

One day, listening to a fund-raising appeal on the local public radio station while driving down the freeway near her home, she heard them announce the name of a new donor, Peter Meehan. “Peter!” she shouted to herself. It was synchronicity. Her old pool cleaning friend, Peter Meehan, was living within miles of Nell, unbeknownst to either of them, and he had been looking for just the right business to be involved in.

Nell had talked about organic food with her dad, who owned a food company whose profits all went to charity. But he had been introduced to “health foods” before and had not enjoyed the experience… could it have been the gravy made from brewer’s yeast? So now she decided to test him again. She cooked up the Thanksgiving meal for the family and afterward asked her dad how he liked it. He said it was the best Thanksgiving meal they’d ever had. She told him it was all organic, and that she wanted to start an organic branch of his food business to raise money for organic agriculture. He told her to go do the research, but his favorite snack food being pretzels, he “didn’t want one that tastes like a dog bone.”

Nell Newman and Peter Meehan did the research, and Paul Newman gave it the go-ahead. Newman’s Own Organics was born. Cofounder and CEO Peter Meehan had found “just the right business” and the perfect partner, Cofounder and President, Nell Newman.

There was one last hitch. Paul Newman told them that they could do their own business using the Newman brand, but they didn’t have to give the profits to charity like he was doing. Nell stood up and said: “Oh, that’s just great, Dad. We’ll be the division that keeps the money! We wouldn’t even consider that.” Giving the money to causes was what excited both of them. “Do you really mean that?” Paul asked? They did. All profits, now in the millions, go into funding organic research, and the popularity of the brand has brought success not only to the company but to the many small organic farms that supply it.
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Dave Smith is author of To Be Of Use – The Seven Seeds of Meaningful Work (from which this post is excerpted) and lives in Mendocino County, California.
Photo: Nell Newman and Paul Newman, Newman’s Own Organics
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