Hello, I need to know if you are organizing action. Are there any plans in the works for a march on Washington, for Prime Time TV ads, for Talk Show spots? We need to play the game the way Monsanto, Chevron, DuPont, Hoescht, etc., etc. are playing it. Let's get the American Public, the ones who don't buy organics because they don't know what they are, involved. We are the people, we are the government. It takes more than letters to stop Multinational Corporations these days, it takes more than a few hundred people at a public hearing to sway government officials. Trust me, I know, I've been fighting Big Oil all my life. I've won one battle and lost alot. We need to ACT, words are not ACTION, they are too easy! What are you doing? I am organizing a march, and TV resources, I need help, and will give help. Lets Unite and beat this monster. It won't be easy.

Yes, I know what you mean when you say "more than just letters". I was at the Seattle USDA listening meeting last week, and it was fabulous. Nevertheless, more of the same responses from the Organic community won't change the USDA's implementation of the National Organic Program. There are big forces to overcome, and it's difficult to know exactly where the force is that we are up against.

My read on it is that the problem is the Clinton Administration's political concern about food. You see, nearly *all* the people in the US have an opinion about Organic food. Mostly it's stuff like: healthy, natural, overpriced, hippy, granola, no chemicals, good stuff. No one has an opinion about organic like: evil, dangerous, unhealthy, bad stuff.

So, let's focus on the (roughly) 10 to 20 million people in the US who will knowingly purchase some Organic food this year. Of course, we can also reach out to the environmental community, and the freedom of speech community, and the consumer rights groups, and a whole bunch of other caring groups, but let's ignore that for now.

We need to ask the current Organic consumers to tell their congress persons how they feel. The problem is that most people don't really actually take action. Moreover, at the moment, most (I would guess >95%) of the Organic consumers are *completely* unaware that this is happening.

Given all of these things, together with a couple of friends, I started the Save Organic Foundation about 7 weeks ago. Prior to that, I (a lifelong vegetarian and active Organic consumer) was *completely* unaware that this was happening. As you probably read on our web site, we have three main campaigns.

(1) Create an incredible interactive web site to educate people and facilitate their communication to Congress. About an hour ago, phase 2 of the web site went alive [you saw phase 1], and phase 3 will be ready by next Wednesday [before the Anaheim Natural Products Expo]. Phase 3 will collect names & addresses in the most amazing way, and it will be able to create comprehensive reports [indexed by Congress person] for our Washington lobbyists to do their magic. We want a million visitors to sign up by April 30th.

(2) Create and distribute excellent informational materials to all of the high profile consumer locations where people will care about this issue. We have postcards, flyers, posters, and an ad campaign for national magazines.

(3) Produce The Concert to Save Organic in Los Angeles on April 26th. We have several high visibility performers who have committed to the concert, and many others likely to join on shortly. We want an MTV simulcast and a huge amount of popular media coverage.

Everything is about getting people to know this is happening and to visit our web site (http://www.saveorganic.org/) to make a difference. So, please tell people to do that.

Also, keep us posted on what you are doing in Seattle and other places. Please feel free to circulate this email. Hope all is well. Seattle was nice and sunny while I was there. Cheers.

-Mark Epstein. mark@saveorganic.org

The SAD NEWS:

From: Mark Epstein <Mark@flowsys.com> To: "'Soula Culver'" <ksvp@SineWave.com> Subject: RE: what's up Date: Wed, 1 Apr 1998 00:44:04 -0600

I've got sad news regarding the April 26th concert date. It's been cancelled. We set a deadline for ourselves that if we didn't have more confirmed performers by last Friday, then we would have to postpone. We're working now with Farm Aid to create *Farm Aid goes Organic*. We're also trying to include the Organic issue into Lilith Fair, and other concerts this summer, including a wonderful environmental concert in Sedona. We may still do a Concert to Save Organic, specifically, but we have to wait and see. There will be a huge visibility of the issue and our web site all over linked with Earth Day.