Sacred Commerce: Business as a Path of Awakening - Softcover

"We are avid fans of anyone who can truly make a difference in these challenging times. Café Gratitude is a model for a successful business, and Matthew and Terces have proven they understand the importance of bringing respect, reverence, and love into the workplace. We're thrilled they have chosen to graciously share their wisdom and experience with this book. There's hope for us all."
--Woody Harrelson and Laura Louie, environmental activists and cofounders of Voice Yourself

"The Engelharts have an intriguing and preposterous notion: Companies can now serve as centers of self-realization and CEOs can nurture a business community's spiritual transformation as well as a healthy bottom line. This is cutting-edge stuff and I'm cheering them on."
--Chip Conley, Founder and CEO of Joie de Vivre Hospitality

"Café Gratitude is in the humankind business. The Engleharts' commitment to a sustainable, socially just, and spiritually fulfilling business presence is hopeful in an era of cynicism and indifference. I have benefited from and am inspired by their valiant stand for making love the bottom line."
--Michel Franti, musician and filmmaker

"Sacred Commerce: Business as a Path of Awakening blends quotations from famous religious and political figures (Rumi to St. Francis of Assisi to Gandhi) with the couple's business philosophy and anecdotes from their experience to provide either an instruction manual or a manifesto--or both--for doing business that honors people's lives."
--Easier Being Green

"Reading [Sacred Commerce] has completely changed the way I look at business. Of course there is nothing wrong with paying the bills, but if we are not enjoying the process and offering something of value to the people who need it, what is the point of business?... Terces and Matthew Engelhart break down their thoughts on making commerce sacred, and it really struck home..."
--unCooking101

"Sacred Commerce" takes the view that the empty promise of materialism is finished and that the coming exorcism will require Sacred Community. Authors Matthew and Terces Engelhart, who are owners of a successful chain of organic vegan restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area, present the view that love before appearances is the antidote to our spiritual, environmental and social degradation. Discussing topics such as mission statements, manager as coach, human resources as a sacred culture and inspiring meetings, they provide a manual for building a spiritual community at the workplace - a vital concept in this day and age when for most people the pursuit of livelihood occupies the majority of their attention.Business, the authors explain, is all about providing a service, product or experience that the market wants, and no business can succeed when it misses this point. However, one must incorporate the idea of "Sacred Commerce", business as a spiritual as well as financial enterprise. Offering the idea that every business is the opportunity to make a lasting impression in the lives of both clients and employees, the Engelharts share tools and ways to fulfil this vision.

"Sacred Commerce" is the perfect mix of personal and practical - a guidebook written by people who have felt success, not just spent it. In a world where increasing numbers of people are dissatisfied with their work, the Engelharts show that you don't have to suffer personally in order to pay the mortgage.