andy ellwood

I reserve my political and religious rants for those that I have an established rapport with and in settings that are conducive to conversation and respectful debate.  Usually.  But, this is a rant on a subject that hits too close to home for me, both in geography and in ideology, to wait for that kind of setting.

There is a group of Americans, New Yorkers, that purchased a building in Lower Manhattan over a year ago.  The building has been vacant for years and sold for an amazingly low price.  It is in a very slow part of the city without much action.  You have to be intentionally walking down that side street to even see the building.  These Americans want to renovate the building and make it a good spot for the neighborhood and a place that can revitalize this old building and this slow block in the city.

But, these Americans are Muslims.

So therefore it is an issue.

The absolute travesty of the “debate around the Ground Zero Mosque” is we even need to have this ‘debate.’ The fact that there are other Americans that feel that this is a contentious subject of conversation makes me extremely sad and extremely angry.  Sad that this isn’t an announcement in the local paper but a debate that the citizens of the freest country in the world feel the need to have.  Angry at the misinformation and sheep-like behavior of its opponents who obviously haven’t spent any time looking at the facts of the situation. The intentional ignorance and suspicions espoused by those saying that these Americans shouldn’t have the same rights as any other American based on their faith is ludicrous.

The Park51 project is going to be a community center run by one of the most publically moderate iman’s in the world.   Since the horrific acts of September 11, 2001, Mr. Abdul Rauf has decried the extremists in Al Qaeda and has been one of their most vocal opponents in the Muslim world.  The community center that will be housed at Park51 will be open to men and women, will have basketball courts and a cooking institute, and will also be a meeting place for the leaders of several interfaith communities that Mr. Abdul Rauf has been a leader of for years.

If could be said, that for those reasons, women and non-Muslims being allowed inside, Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich share the same perspective on the project as Osama bin Laden.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg was spot on when he spoke to the issue in early August: “If we were to treat Muslims differently than anyone else. In fact, to cave to popular sentiment would be to hand a victory to the terrorists – and we should not stand for that.”

The best perspective I’ve heard on this ridiculousness of this controversy comes from the media personality I dislike more than any other.  But, on this subject, and perhaps only this subject, Keith Olbermann and I agree. (Seriously, I really dislike this guy, but this is worth taking the 12 minutes to watch)

But, as a skeptic of the media in general, I went down to Park51 this weekend to see what all the fuss was about. What I found was what I had hoped (and known) I would find: New Yorkers of all walks of life going about their day to day, enjoying the freedom that we all have here in America.  The freedom that was, is, and always will be worth fighting for.

Freedom of Religion from Andy Ellwood on Vimeo.

Today is a day of celebration.  Today is the day that I found a grocery store in New York that carries REAL salsa, not “that stuff made in New York City!”  There is a big difference. (Classic Pace Picante commercial) Even if the jar was on the bottom shelf underneath all the other “mexican sauces,” there is just something right about eating salsa made in Texas.

But, that said, the hunt still continues to find really good Tex-Mex in NYC.  There are a couple contenders (Mole, Zarela, and La Esquina) but no true victor.

As the idea of location based experiences continues to emerge as “a potential multi-billion dollar idea” there is more and more interest in how to do it right.  CNBC explores some of those ideas and spent some time with Gowalla CTO Scott Raymond discussing privacy. (VIDEO)

I made my cameo appearance in this piece as well as I debuted my modeling, shopping, and checking in skills at Paul Frank in New York City.

The highlight of that experience was after we finished shooting the B-Roll footage of me rocking my pocket square and Gowalla check-in, another shopper walked up to me and asked in all seriousness, “Are you Paul Frank?”

Last night over beers, I asked a friend of mine a simple question:

Me: “What motivates you?”

Him: “Money.”

This has been, and continues to be one of my all time favorite open ended questions as there are so many different ways to answer it.  Will the response be direct, sappy, inspirational, or long winded? In the brevity and truth of his response, he summed up something that has been lost in the participation trophy self esteem obsessed society we find ourselves in: self interest, or, put another way: greed.  In an effort to make sure everyone plays nice and gets along and doesn’t have their feelings hurt on the playground (literal and real), we’ve taken away the hunter and kill or be killed natural instinct.

And, then I thought about that a little bit more, and realized, it is in my self interest to not change the system that is pumping out pushovers and pansies into the business world.  Their whining will make it that much easy for me to win.

“You’ve got to cross the line every once in awhile to know where it is.” – Sam Parker

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make one.” – Elbert Hubbard

“It isn’t easy to be frank with yourself. But, if you wish to find your particular success in life, it is the most rewarding action of them all.” - Brownie Wise

“Why do I rob banks? Because that is where the money is.” – Willie Sutton

When I started with Gowalla back in February, I made a short list of “Future Partners.”  There were some ambitious ’stretch’ targets and some personal favorites, brands that I personally admire and had hoped to find the right way to work together with.  Since then, we’ve had the chance to work on unique and creative campaigns with some of our ’stretch’ targets (NBA, CNN, USA TODAY, National Geographic, Charlie Crist in FL… etc.) and there are some really exciting ones on their way in the next few months as well.  But, today, we are announcing a partnership with one of my personal favorites and a brand I have admired and supported from the first day I heard about the work they were doing: TOMS Shoes.

Thanks to TOMS’ ongoing partnership with AT&T, we are giving away 1,000 pairs of TOMS, the chance to go on a trip to Argentina with TOMS, and thousands of discount codes on Gowalla over the next 2 weeks.  For all the details check out the official Gowalla Blog.

My personal passion for TOMS isn’t just because they are my default shoe of choice and I have worn my current white pair to the brink of disintegration, but because of the much bigger story they are telling.  For each pair of TOMS purchased (and given away through Gowalla) there is going to be a pair of shoes given to a child in need some where around the world. “One for One” is the mantra of social change that is being pushed forward by TOMS and their team.  And, since 2006, they have sold over 1,000,000 pairs of shoes, and this fall are going to be delivering the 1,000,000th pair of shoes to kids in need.

If you don’t have a pair of TOMS and tried on the social change that comes with your purchase, there are two things you can do today:

1) Go out with Gowalla and try and win a pair or a discount code

2) Go to www.TOMS.com and pick out a pair.

We need more companies that understand the opportunity for impact that they have, not just in one time “check it off the list” charitable contributions, but with a true understand and integration into the very soul (or in this case sole) of their company’s mission.  And when I find companies that understand that and build sustainable models around that, I am not just going to be a consumer, but an advocate.

From day one of our relationship, Annie and I have loved to travel together.  We have found nothing else quite as thrilling and exciting as exploring a new city together and creating memories through those experiences that can only be gained  while encountering something for the first time.  So, in honor of her birthday, we took off for Canada this weekend and have  had an amazing trip thus far, with a couple fun days still ahead.

We are continually reminded of the fact that there is one decision on which the entire success of the trip hinges: the choice of hotel.  And, with Annie’s passion and expertise for hotels and the work she is doing, we have been supremely fortunate with our choices thus far.  Our first night, before crossing the border into Canada, we stopped at the Sagamore on Lake George in Upstate New York.  From the first moment we arrived to the bittersweet moment when we departed the next day, every angle from every vantage point on property was a picture waiting to happen. It is the most that I have ever personally paid for a hotel room and, within the first hour of our arrival, the least I have ever cared how much a hotel room cost. It was that amazing.

Our second destination of the trip was Quebec City.  On our approach through town, we passed hotel after hotel in the modern and then the touristy parts of town, but our directions said to keep driving and our destination would be on the right.  But the only thing that I keep seeing on my right ahead in the distance was a towering castle with green cooper roofs and spires borrowed from fairy tales.  But, when the road we were on dead-ended with a magnificent view of the river, it finally set in that the architectural masterpiece on our right was in fact our hotel.  From the lobby to the views to the proximity to Old Town Quebec, the carbon copy of the beloved quaint villages of France, the Fairmont Le Chateau Frontenac proved to be magic embodied in a hotel, the most photographed hotel in the world.

But, as our (much needed) vacation and (much deserved) celebration of Annie’s birthday continues now in Montreal and Mont Tremblant, I take back the statement the the most critical decision you make about a trip is which hotel you stay at.  That is the second most important.  The first and most important decision you can make is this: who you travel and share your adventure with.  I know the significance because I know that I am the lucky one. I know the importance because I know what it is like to have the more than you know you deserve.  And, I am extremely honored to say, I know this better than anyone because I have Annie.  Not just on this trip to Canada, but on the journeys and challenges that have been ours to share in the past and the adventures and dreams that await us in the future.

Happy Birthday to my Love.  Happy Birthday to my Annie.

Excited about being up and showered and ready to kick start this week before my alarm had even gone off, I quickly grabbed a little breakfast to take with me on my walk to the office this morning at 6:15. I quietly grabbed a bagel and silently spread on some peanut butter and wrapped it up in a paper towel, ready to go. It was shortly there after that I found out that our jar of Peanut Butter looks a lot like our jar of Curry Paste, but Curry Paste doesn’t taste that great on a bagel.

“Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.” – William Ellery Channing

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.

“The test we must set for ourselves is not to march alone but to march in such a way that others will wish to join us.” – Hubert Humphrey

I recent had the chance to speak at the NYU Stern School of Business as a part of the L2 Mobile Clinic for Luxury Brands about Gowalla and how brands are choosing to engage.  The Huffington Post has recently posted the video of my speech. (WATCH HERE) As more and more brands have expressed interest in working with Gowalla, the creative ideas and engagements we have had the chance to build have been just phenomenal.