Currant's 2022 Dreams & Schemes
Gathering 2021's greatest hits, forming our 2022 roadmap, and dreaming up what an independent food media collective could be — January 5, 2022.
Hi food friends,
Today’s letter is a fun one. A spontaneous visual story. A concurrent 2021 year in review and 2022 look ahead, if years even mean anything at this point.
I think back to our 2020 Annual Report, which was a whole mini operation, a defiant celebration in response to the year of life and death. And then 2021 passes like a slow motion hurricane and the small joys and big griefs seem to take over and what does this indie food media collective have to offer in the face of it all?
Currant is a collective. And a collective is made of humans, humans who are a process of defining who we are, what we are, and why we are. During June of 2021, we pitched these questions to ourselves: Why do we exist? What are our core values, rituals, and artifacts? What’s our truth and how do we tell it? Who belongs? How do we engage and organize?
“Brand strategy,” one might call it. The following month, I watched Sara Hendren’s talk at EYEO 2016—Design for Know-Nothings, Dilettantes, and Melancholy Interlopers—and got randomly really inspired. This all contributed to our relaunch as a media collective in August, which stands as our highest performing announcement yet. Most importantly, it served as validation from a fascinating breadth of newly engaged audiences: food writers and critics, creatives and strategists, nonprofit organizers and VCs, dentists and scholars.
Currant’s first little existential crisis also yielded a secret nugget of a manifesto tucked away in our website footer that might even communicate our values better—or at least, more playfully—than our about page. Was it necessary for me to sit and assign custom mouseover animations to each block on a page that no one sees? Did I do it anyways? Naturally.
Based on the reception we get when we actually try to market ourselves, we know there's something bubbling, trembling, rustling here in our approach to food; we're just figuring it out right alongside you. The sorts of challenges and opportunities we see:
• We’re free from editorial rigidity—no one from our team comes from traditional media.
• There's no SEO playbook to follow—alas, we’re in the harder business of changing search behavior, not optimizing for it.
• There’s no clear structural precedent—we’re inspired by community models from all corners of the internet and real life.
Anyhow. I’m going to stop throwing spaghetti at you (for like, the next two paragraphs) and go ahead and share our top pieces and press. Of the nine interviews and profiles we published in 2021, our three greatest hits:
• Jonathan Nunn on London, the Power of the Margins, and Cookie Monster's Greed — who published a piercing exposé on Doordash and Deliveroo in The Economist
• Lucas Sin Redefines the Chef — whom Food & Wine named a Best New Chef of 2021
• Bettina Makalintal Talks Food Trends and Twitter — who joined Bon Appétit as a editor, previously at Vice’s Munchies
A couple interviews wherein I share why I founded Currant and how I see it shaping food media, and a much appreciated testimonial:
• Vicky Gu Asks More of the Reader, Lunch Rush, June 17, 2021
• The Messy Business of Food Media, Daisy Zeijlon, Nov 2021
• From ex-Hypebeast editorial director and current MAEKAN EIC Eugene Kan:
"I also really like Currant Magazine’s approach towards the future of food and food culture. The insights and trends they bring to light are often ultra-relevant without being overly dense for the common non-industry person."
—Why is this interesting?, Aug 9, 2021
Behind the scenes of all this, we spent a good half year planning and producing our newly launched Climate, Changed series:
We’d planned to have the first installment published by now. But it turns out synthesizing five documents of raw reporting, an extensive climate report, and umpteen photos and videos—while storyboarding, designing, data visualizing, producing, and marketing—isn’t easy to prioritize, no matter your ambition. People are paid to do this full time (e.g. the NYT graphics team), so us doing this outside the demands of life in the age of corona, plus labor under the age of capitalism is…a lot. We might set up some sort of donation avenue so folks can contribute. Here is what it took to storyboard just the landing page:
More to come, hopefully soon. In the interim, we’ve been stoked to find the pulsing heartbeat of Currant in our Discord. From a member: “I find the perspectives here exciting, and some of the things that pop-up remind me of the "old web" discovery down rabbit holes.” (Old web! The highest order of compliment.)
On that note, join us anytime! It’s very chill. We’re very chill. We’re hanging out and workshopping our 2022 community roadmap together in mid-January, and you’re invited:
Time and date details will be announced in the Discord. It’s a blessedly low stakes space to talk about food and really anything in relation to it which means, food and everything. We span four continents (North America, Europe, Asia, Africa) and maaany industries (food, media, software, healthcare, academia, etc). I know that’s a broad sell but if it sounds a group you’re interested in jamming with, fill out the form here for a link to join:
So, where on the map does this all place Currant? A publisher? A weird blobby media org? If we were to dream—a hybrid research group? A brand studio? A dinner party? A policy influencer? An industry consultant? A _______? The crazy part is, with emerging community blueprints and the growing audience we have here—Currant could be any permutation of the above. Simmer on that.
What you can do in the meantime:
1) Sign up for our newsletter (form below) if you haven't already, and tell a friend to.
2) Tweet this letter on Twitter.
3) If you’re interested in contributing to the team, check out our open opportunities and working ethos here.
Thanks for reading, and as always, stay hungry,
Vicky Gu
Founder & Managing Editor
Team
Sarah Cooke
Editor
Clare Lagomarsino
Graphic Designer
Renee Hunt
Marketing & Audience Lead
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