The Galway pub with free beer for those who lend a hand

A new moneyless pub will rely on donations of energy and time to create a business that is tied to the people and land that support it

What holds your business back from truly reflecting how much you care about the world? What stops you making decisions based on ecological impact, or social wellbeing, even when you want to? The answer, I would guess, is money.

However good your intentions, whether you’re a large corporation or a social enterprise, a not-for-profit or a co-op, money is always the bottom line. Simply put, you need to survive, and survival, in the financial economy, means cash.

In a culture where “what’s good for business is good for society”, the implications of this are huge. Not only does it mean that destruction and damage continue almost unabated, but it has massive consequences for how we understand ourselves. We become people who can’t protect our environment, who can’t prevent others being harmed, and who propagate devastation no matter our intentions. This is how we see ourselves and our world. We are disempowered, and disconnected. We shrug and become apathetic. We accept it as a matter of course.

There are, however, other ways – of doing things and of seeing ourselves. Here in County Galway, Ireland, we’re in the process of setting up a community space that fundamentally challenges the notion that services and products have to be beholden to – and limited by – money.

Inspired by what anthropologists call gift culture – the oldest and historically most widely adopted model of economy – we’re converting an old pig barn into a moneyless pub, workshop space and dormitory, there to be used by the community (both local and further afield) completely for free. Free courses, free events, free food, and free drinks.

The idea is to create a business that is intimately tied to the energy and resources of the people and land that support it. The food will be grown on the three acres of organically-farmed land around it, as will the ingredients for the wines and cider. It will be run on a donation basis – where a “donation” can be time behind the bar, carpentry skills, or a tasteful rendition of Hotel California later in the evening – so that everyone understands that they have something to offer. This way, if the land becomes sick, or the people become disenfranchised, the venture itself suffers. The health of the whole project is dependent on the health of the local environment and the community of people it serves.

It’s a whole new way of understanding what business can be, and a whole new way of understanding who and what we can be (and it’s no surprise that the two are intimately linked). We can all feel valued regardless of how much money we have, and we can all feel integrally connected to everything else, with an ability to witness that our positive actions can have positive effects. This is only one of many ways to challenge what business can be, and show what a truly sustainable business looks like, but it’s an exciting experiment.

Sticking to the spirit of the gift in which we want to continue, we have launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise the necessary funds to help us raise the barn. In doing so, this free community venue will be created by the very people it seeks to serve. We see this as an important transitionary tool to help us move from old traditional structures to new, more thoughtful ones, and are encouraging people to get involved.

Repost from The Guardian Sustainable Business Blog article The Galway pub with free beer for those who lend a hand