About forty yards from my current home is a small neighborhood coffee shop that's ran by my neighbor, a lady who shares the other half of this converted shotgun with her young son and another woman. We've developed a low intensity friendship in recent months (not hard to do, as this coffee shop is constantly bustling with neighborhood activity). Now that the school year is ended and my days are filled with decadent leisure, I approached her with a business proposition: I can make a pretty good granola bar, and I wanted to sell them on her countertop. She agreed, and the results have been encouraging so far. The first eighteen I baked have almost sold out and I'm delivering another tray to the coffee shop on Tuesday. If you live in New Orleans, why not stop by and have one?Though this won't make me any real money anytime soon, I'm excited about the prospect of it being an ongoing side project...especially if I can find other outlets in the city to sell my wares and it becomes worthwhile to order supplies in bulk. But there is one problem that's nagging at the back of my head. Because of this issue, the wholesome, caramel-sweet, berry-tangy crunch of the toasted whole grains of my granola bars are slightly laced with the chalky aftertaste of guilt.
Can anyone guess why?
Because you've laced them with poison?
ReplyDeleteNo, no. Because you will no longer be willing to give them as a gift to your friends when they have babies?
Wait! I've got it! Because you STOLE the recipe and are now profiting from that THEFT.
Just remember, samtron77e, possession is 9/10 of the law.
Because it is a thing you are doing and therefore you must feel guilty?
ReplyDeleteI second the stolen recipe.
ReplyDeleteGod damn you all. I DIDN'T STEAL IT, I JUST...I mean, first off, what is theft? This is an IP issue, right? And our generation has a different value system about intellectual property because we grew up with Napster and stuff. Ok?
ReplyDeleteSo, to my knowledge, the recipe is used commercially only by one person in a different city that's over seven hours away from here. No one is being hurt in the slightest. We're all getting along here. And if she knew that I was using the recipe, I think she would...be...proud...I hope? I think possibly?
Barry, could you please make that argument that you once made to me about information piracy being qualitatively distinct from material theft because when the intangible property in question is duplicated the act of copying it in no way affects the integrity or intrinsic nature of the original copy? That argument that I argued against? Remember that one?
I mean, just because I happen to be using the same recipe as the person who taught me everything I know about baking, a good and generous person who has suffered a lot in her life and makes her honest living from the fruits of her baking labors, just because it HAPPENS TO BE THAT SAME RECIPE doesn't mean it's...you know. Words like "theft" just, they just don't, they just aren't helpful, really, with all the connotations...
Should I ask her permission? I should. Should I?
Soylent green is people?
ReplyDeleteDon't ask anyone anything. This here's a dog-eat-dog world and you'd best be the dog doing the eating. Besides, wouldn't this baker woman *want* you to not starve on the streets of NOLA? And if she would want you to starve then for sure forget her.
ReplyDeleteDon't ask her. I won't tell anyone. Or, change the recipe.
How did you memorize a recipe? Impressed.
Hm. I was going to come in here and suggest you sell your Benji Bars on Etsy...
ReplyDeleteSo, did she teach you how to make and bake things which eventually led to you knowing how to put together some great granola bars? Or did she give you a little recipe card made in 1952 on a typewriter?
I dunno, Benji,
ReplyDeleteWhen Michael Campbell (aka Hippie Mike) basically stole the burger recipes from Nathan Miller while working at The House, and then used them to successfully get into one of the top culinary schools in the nation, I felt there was some legit. int. prop. theft going on, and I marked the guy pretty harshly.
I can see this as somewhat distinct from that situation, since there's no professed intent to turn this recipe into a massive marketing campaign for Hardy's Hearty Granola bars or anything like that (is there?), but still, the same basic concept of profiting off of someone else's hard work without sharing it with them is there. Maybe you should just name them after her?
Honestly, though, I find myself much more disappointed in the horrendous grammatical mistake you made in this post. Can you find it?
James, was is "that's ran"? 'Cause it should be "that's run."
ReplyDeletesamtron77e, I think you SHOULD market the granola bars to new mothers, especially those who are nursing and who had a c-section. Mothers out there need these granola bars. God knows I did. And still do. Now that I'm thinking about it, I'll take your first case.
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ReplyDeleteNo, she didn't just teach me to bake, after which I applied those skills to make the recipe. I am using the same recipe that she used, because it's an awesome recipe (though I've experimented with it somewhat).
ReplyDeleteJames, I have no idea what the grammatical mistake is, but I think your point is valid. Thank you for making me think about it some more. I guess I'd say the difference is partly this:
Unlike the culinary school dude, I'm not trying to claim the creative aspect of the recipe as my own. In the situation you're describing, the originality of the recipe was the point -- it's why they admitted him to culinary school, right? So in this sense, I'm not laying claim to the recipe as much as I am utilizing it. Of course, I'm still profiting off of it, but it'd be like the difference between playing a cover of a song and getting paid for performing it and claiming that you wrote the song and getting paid for recording it.
After looking around online a bit, it seems like any claim to recipes as intellectual property is usually pretty tenuous, since changing just a couple of ingredients or ratios can be legitimately considered a new recipe.
Ethan, I need your expertise on this one. Where are you?
Still unsure.
I'm pretty sure it's not illegal. This is why soda companies keep their recipes locked up because once they're out, that's it.
ReplyDeleteAfter thinking some more about this, I think you should just ask her if she'd like a percentage of the profit you make from the bars. She'll probably say no and that is that. I agree with James, naming them after her would be nice as well.
ReplyDeleteRest easy old friend: That distant bar-monger can't raise a copyright cause of action on a recipe *at all*, only any colorful narrative about, say, the raisins being "happy soldiers of the crunchy column."
ReplyDeleteOn the trade secret end though..... SHE TRUSTED YOU BENJI :(
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ReplyDeleteaw, man. I feel like with recipes there is definitely a culture of sharing and passing along improvements - like with the open source movement or science in general - that goes back forever. I also agree that stealing and presenting something creative as your own to be judged entirely on it's creative merit is totally whack, but these are different issues entirely. 95% of what those people are buying when they buy benji's banjo bars is not having to go to all the trouble of making granola bars themselves.
ReplyDelete