Make Your Mark

Growing up, New York was really like my candy store. There’s always this feeling that anything can happen—that’s really what New York is about.

– Ariel Palitz

    It is human nature that whenever there is a large crowd, and free stuff, one MUST go over and check it out. This is especially true in New York, because when does stuff ever get handed out, FOR FREE, in NYC? Surprisingly, yes, that is a very true story for a company called Guayakí Yerba Mate, which I encountered one afternoon while in Central Park. Yerba Mate possesses strength of coffee, the health benefits of tea, and the euphoria of chocolate, all in one beverage. After talking with one of the employees, and learning that the goal of this brand awareness initiative is to raise environmental and social awareness in New York City, in addition to educating people on what Yerba Mate is, I decided to take matters into my own hands. Thus, I carried out some research of my own, and quickly I was able to easily find their website. There I learned more about the history of the company and how it came to be. Long story short, after co-founders, Alex Pryor introduced Yerba Mate to David Karr, they “set out to share Yerba Mate with the world, recognizing that people were in need of a nourishing source of energy and a healthy dose of optimism.”

    This recognition implemented a vision inside of them. A vision that channeled their “activist mentality to pioneer a revolutionary Market Driven Regeneration™ business model that empowers customers to drive tangible change with every purchase of Guayakí Yerba Mate.” This is exactly what they did. Upon further research from their website and Instagram, I gained more insight as to why they were in New York City for the month of July. One of the goals of Yerba Mate was to pass out 50,000 cans of Guayaki in during their month in New York and personally, I could not think of a better place to achieve this goal than in one of the most heavily populated cities in the world. Furthermore, based on their business model that “empowers customers to drive tangible change with every purchase of Guayakí Yerba Mate”, a City that embraces change as part of its culture like New York, truly could not be a better place for this company to build brand awareness.