Why Meraki exists.
The system isn’t broken – it’s working exactly as it was designed. That’s the problem.
The climate is breaking, inequality is growing, media is under pressure. And around the world, democracy is being tested in ways that were once unthinkable. Too often, the economic system treats these as side effects, rather than signs that something’s fundamentally off.
We didn’t arrive at these realizations from the outside. We lived them. We contributed to them. We were part of the problem.
While building Savings United, we saw from the inside how the commercial system rewards short-term thinking, extraction, and unchecked growth. We worked with major media outlets and watched independent journalism stretch itself thinner and thinner just to survive. And slowly, we began to understand how deeply concentrated wealth shapes the rules – who gets seen, who gets heard, who gets left out.
Rethinking everything.
At the same time, it was becoming harder to ignore the bigger picture: We don’t just need to tweak the system. We need to rethink how we do almost everything. How we produce energy. How we grow food. How we make and move things. And yes – how we advertise and sell, how we finance media, how we decide what’s worth amplifying in the first place.
So we asked ourselves: if change is needed across the board, why not start here? Why not begin with the company we helped build – and see what happens when we turn it toward something better?
To make that shift in a meaningful way, we knew we had to create space for it. So we made the decision not to sell and instead bought out our former shareholders, including venture capital firms, media houses, and family offices. It wasn’t easy, but it gave us the freedom to rethink things without having to compromise on direction or pace.
Even a couponing company, reimagined with purpose, can be part of the solution.
That’s where Meraki began. Not from a clean slate, but from the responsibility to work differently with what we’ve helped build. And from the understanding that real change isn’t linear. It moves in cycles. We double back, learn again, try again. That rhythm is part of the work.
Change isn't a straight line.
Meraki is what it looks like when we take what we’ve built and choose to use it differently – backing people, ventures, and ideas that challenge the status quo from the inside out. We approach that work with curiosity, urgency, and humility, knowing we’re still learning what needs to change and choosing to begin with ourselves.
Progress doesn’t follow a straight path. It circles, doubles back, shifts direction. But by working openly, and learning as we go, we hope to offer something meaningful – however small – to others finding their own way forward.
