Well, it’s official. Earthbeats is a thing! We took the plunge (or leap of faith or whatever) required to start a new project and it’s really happening. We’ve launched our social media channels and website, hired an intern and now we’re preparing for our first long-term herb hunting trip. It’s taken about three months of solid love and dedication for this project to get us here. As much as we’d like to be Wonder Woman and say we accomplished all this ourselves, it’s just not true. We had so much help and support from so many people that we decided to dedicate our first blog post to the people who really made Earthbeats happen.

First, we were incredibly lucky to work with some very talented graphic designers at the beginning of this whole process. We reached out to a couple very amazing friends who helped us out by producing truly phenomenal logo designs even though the only thing we gave them to go on was a handful of words we liked. Seriously, you guys are amazing. The winning design and Earthbeats’ current logo comes from the wonderfully artistic and visionary mind of Célia Bécamel. She was able to capture the essence of Earthbeats like no other and we are eternally grateful that she lent us her brain for a few days.

Second, we would still be scribbling website designs on cafe napkins if Carter Chandler hadn’t come along. He took our child-like scribblings (literally done with crayons) and turned it into what you see before you, a fully functioning and beautiful website. The best part? He did it in under a week. His mix of technical knowledge, creative vision, and let’s face it, patience made him beyond wonderful to work with.

Thirdly, our friends here in Nepal have been particularly helpful and supportive. Thanks to Cheryl for putting her photographic eye to good use as our personal photographer for a day and to Sam for letting us drive her crazy with Earthbeats talk but still providing suggestions and support when we were building the foundation of this project. Huge shoutout also goes to our friends and family back home who endured early morning phone calls and random questions about “what does an earthbeat sound like to you?”. Thanks so much for your remote support! 

Last but not least are our amazing partner organizations! This project actually wouldn’t exist without them. In fact, we wouldn’t even be in Nepal without them so they deserve the biggest shoutout of all.

Uniterra might be the most important partner in this whole project. It was this Canadian development program that brought us both to Nepal and placed us with Nepali partners to work with. It’s Uniterra that is helping to fund our project and it’s Uniterra that the proceeds from our first product sales will go to. If you want to learn more about this incredible program, or if you’re Canadian and interested in trying your hand at development work (why not?), check them out here.

Uniterra also introduced us to the whole host of other partners, organizations, cooperatives, and entrepreneurs we’re working with on this project. They’ll all be introduced in a later post in more detail but know for now that we’re working with some big movers and shakers in the herbal sector of Nepal. A huge thanks to Sagun Bista who has supported and championed this project from the very beginning! 

So once again, Earthbeats’ existence is due to the unwavering support of some very special people. Thanks for believing in us and this super crazy adventure guys, it means the world!