Just Cured - Experience Fine Foods

I find myself asking this question frequently these days.† Surprisingly, I ask not out of frustration or impatience.† I saved other questions for the times some impediment or another got between me and getting Just Cured’s products to market.† Rather, I have been asking this question as a matter of reflection and introspection.

I ask myself because others ask me.† As I move Just Cured from the development phase to full production and distribution, I am speaking with many people for the first time: prospective customers, consumers, suppliers, members of the press and more.† Invariably, they ask what prompted me to switch careers from transactional lawyer to smoking and curing fish.† The answer to that question is becoming clearer to me.† The answer is too long for a two minute conversation, so I write about it here.

I read the other day that the 250 largest law firms (the National Law Journal 250) employ 115,000 lawyers in their U.S. offices.† Using my former firm as a guide, about 15% or 17,000 are engaged in business transactional practices.† Double that number to take into account lawyers in smaller firms and employed directly by businesses engaged in sophisticated transactional legal work on a daily basis.

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There are 35,000 people (more or less) out there who do what I used to do.† And they all do it well.† The competition wasn’t a problem for me; it was the commoditization of the service and the practice.† Each lawyer brings a slightly different perspective to a transaction; but in the end, we each achieved similar results for our respective clients and went about doing so in much the same way.† I often thought that if the lawyers on a particular transaction switched sides, we’d still end up with the same documents.† In many ways we were fungible; spin the wheel, send in another of the 35,000, life (and the deal) goes on.

While the practice was intellectually stimulating and the transactions were often important to the economy, I ultimately couldn’t see where, or whether, I was making a difference.

I cannot tell you how many specialty smoked and cured salmon producers there are in the country, but the number is tiny.† And the Just Cured product is different from all the others.† I can pick it out of a blind tasting — and I am quite sure most consumers could as well.† I am very proud of the products that we have developed and are beginning to market.† Offering something unique is important to me; and I think I have achieved that goal.

Will Just Cured make a difference?† The more time I spend in this business, the more convinced I become of two things — the most important aspect of our lives is the energy and time we invest with our families and other loved ones, and the food we share is integral to the celebrations and gatherings that are so very important to us.† I feel that† Just Cured and I, by being part of the special gatherings of others, can add to and enhance their significance.† When I provide the food that strengthens the bonds of people I don’t even know, I feed my own soul.† At least for now, that’s difference enough for me.

Well, how did I get here?† Maybe I am still not sure.† I am well on the way, however, of understanding why.

Every time I hear that song, I am reminded of an event from my legal career.† It was sometime after 3 a.m. on the morning of a singificant closing, the fifth night in a row of no to little sleep.† My counterpart and I could barely speak, much less think clearly.† We had been back and forth several times that day over one provision in one of the hundreds of closing documents.† Ultimately we determined the provision did not need to be changed.† When it came time to finalize that document, she asked me how that sentence was supposed to read.† We stared at each other and then the document for several long seconds and finally simultaneously spoke the words to each other — Same As It Ever Was.