The Grocery Business is Dye-ing – Guest Post

The Grocery Business is Dye-ing

An investigation into a small chain of grocery stores and a conspiracy to transition the corporate workforce into a permanent test/trace/track digital identity system via mandates and exemptions.

By Christopher Roth

Part I

After hearing the interview segment with Mary who called into the Lars Larson radio program on January 26, I was inspired to dig a little deeper into New Seasons Market.  (Podcast#102522, min 32:45-40:30) .

Mary told Lars that New Seasons is moving forward with an employee vaccine mandate for their employees with a February 9 ‘exemption deadline’ and a March 17 vaccination deadline despite the recent Supreme Court decision.  This was interesting considering that in most places, Covid restrictions are being relaxed and repealed.  In some countries restrictions and mandates are being eliminated entirely.

So why mandate the vaccine now?  Even the FDA, as of December 7, 2021, is not sure if the only ‘approved’ vaccine (Comirnaty is approved on a  BLA and is “legally distinct” from the other vaccines offered via EUA) protects against asymptomatic infection.  In fact, the FDA does not have data “available to inform about the duration of protection that the vaccine will provide.”

New Seasons Market is a direct competitor to Whole Foods and provides health-conscious choices with a focus on sourcing from local farms and ranches when possible.  With their strong connection to the community, many of their customers prefer New Seasons over the larger corporate stores.

So, considering this community-based connection, what kind of company mandates vaccines at this stage in the game?  Who is running this company and why are they ‘going long’ on vaccine mandates, mandatory testing, masking, and an apparent policy of employee segregation?

Typically, if you visit a large (3000+ employees, presence in 3 states) company website, there is an ‘about us’ page with governors, owners, headshots, something – right?  At the very minimum, there should be a link buried on the bottom that will connect the user to the main ‘ownership’ or ‘Board of Directors’ information.  New Seasons Market does not have this information on their homepage.

I have shopped at New Seasons Market for over ten years.  This lack of transparency irked me, especially considering New Seasons Market  was certified as the world’s first certified B Corporation grocery store.  How is hiding your Board of Directors an example of company transparency?  Now I was intrigued, I had to know more.

It turns out, the Governing Board of New Seasons Market is a confusing façade of marketing brilliance.

In 2000, New Seasons Market really did start as three families getting together to change the way people access food.

Ownership changed and evolved, but it remained largely private and community based for over a decade, including the infamous Portland area activist and wealthy philanthropist Stan Amy .  Even a Portland mayoral candidate was roped into touting the New Seasons brand to gain traction in her candidacy.

In 2013, Endeavour Capital  acquired a majority share and things began to change rapidly.  Longtime CEO Lisa Sedler departed and created her thriving spin-off business Green Zebra Grocers.  From 2013-2019 the company pursued a rapid growth strategy, purchasing the California Bay area chain New Leaf Markets while simultaneously expanding into the Seattle area with expensive real estate and new construction developments.

Things started to get tough for New Seasons.  In Spring of 2018, CEO Wendie Collie left unexpectedly.  “The reasons for Collie’s exit are murky” writes Don McIntosh.  Kristi McFarland and Forrest Hoffmaster assumed roles as ‘Interim Co-CEOs.’

In late 2019 the rumors of a bigger play in action were solidified when New Seasons Market, brokered and undersigned by Endeavour Capital officially sold to Good Food Holdings.  Good Food Holdings , which was acquired by Emart in 2018 is ultimately part of The Shinsegae Group a powerful South Korean Conglomerate.

Eventually, Forrest would formally take the role of CEO, but only for a short time before current CEO Nancy Lebold was ‘selected’ in April of 2021 to take the reins from Forrest.  At least on paper that is.

Nancy replaced Forrest during the height of the “Global Pandemic,” an important distinction.  Vaccines had only become available several months prior to her arrival.  She continues to be the public face of the company.

On January 20, 2022, New Seasons Market decided to unilaterally push forward with mandatory vaccinations for all their workers in Oregon and Washington — but not California – an important legal distinction.

The debate around vaccine efficacy, reinfection/natural immunity, and breakthrough variants of concern has been intentionally left out of this investigation.  It is, however, important to take note of several distinct events on the company timeline in the last twelve months:

In a January 29, 2021, post to The Pantry (New Seasons internal employee hub) staff was told:

“Will the company require staff to get vaccinated?  No. While the CDC and state health officials recommend that almost everyone over the age of sixteen get a COVID-19 vaccine, we understand that is a personal decision.”

The November 4,, 2021 announcement by The White House that all companies with over one hundred employees would be required to have their employees vaccinated did change the ‘tone’ at Company Headquarters.

In a January 7, 2022, Pantry announcement, New Seasons Market Vice President of Operations Bobby Vaziralli (aka Ali Vaziralli?)  posted Covid-19 updates and alerted all staff that “all COVID-19 policy decisions are based on guidance and recommendations from federal, state and local authorities.”  Vaziralli continues: “while we don’t have operational changes happening right now, we anticipate guidance to evolve in the weeks and months ahead.”

Guidance?  Guidance from whom exactly?

On January 13, 2022 SCOTUS issued a majority opinion striking down the OSHA mandates – including  mandatory masking and testing as ‘acceptable accommodations’ to those seeking a vaccine exemption.

On January 20, 2022, by means of Press Release and a company wide email blast, it was announced that New Seasons would be going forward with the OSHA rules regardless of the Supreme Court’s decision.

In the company wide Pantry Post from we learn that:

 “While [the OSHA mandate] was blocked by the Supreme Court, we believe implementing our own vaccination requirement is the right thing to do based on the current state of COVID-19 spread in our communities.”

Then, in a brazen display of cognitive dissonance, in the very next paragraph, the post states:

 “Why aren’t New Seasons Evergreen and New Leaf requiring vaccination for staff in NorCal?  Those decisions are complicated and regional leadership is making the decisions they feel are best for their staff and customers in their respective markets.”

Who exactly is the New Seasons Regional Leadership?  Who could a journalist ‘reach out to’ for comment on this complicated decision?  Why did ‘regional leadership’ not consult with anyone in the Portland/Vancouver area prior to making this decision?  The questions begin to mound up.

Outside of the whiplash you might experience from the complete disconnect in their company policies, you might want to retain TWO final details relevant to the legalese in their new policy before our investigation moves beyond the purvey of New Seasons Market.

In the opening paragraph of the 1/20/22 Pantry post:

 “As of now, a booster dose of a vaccine, although strongly recommended, is not currently required to be considered fully vaccinated.” 

This is important to ALL employees regardless of their current vaccination, as New Seasons has stated they fully intend to comply with any updated definition from the CDC.  In fact, this is the most important point in the investigation thus far.  If, (and I know it is a big if) the CDC does adjust the definition of fully vaccinated, then all current employees would have to submit proof of the required number of boosters.

Under the Exemption paragraph:

“Staff who receive exemptions will be required to, at a minimum, undergo weekly testing for COVID-19 and wear face masks at all times at work, including when state or local masking requirements are lifted.  We’ll share more information about the testing process with staff who are required to test by mid-March.”

Thus, as the facts have been presented as accurately as possibly, we can conclude from the first part of our investigation several key takeaways:

1. New Seasons Market is moving forward with mandatory vaccination regardless of the SCOTUS decision on vaccine mandates and testing
2. New Seasons Market is proceeding with a (still undisclosed) testing policy for, at this time, unvaccinated workers only.
3. New Seasons Market has indicated that, should CDC guidance change, current employees who are fully vaccinated may need to receive a booster to maintain ‘fully vaccinated’ status. Those whose status lapses will be considered unvaccinated and can either get boosted or apply for an exemption and wear a mask during the transition.
4. Employees exempted from the vaccine (company implies exemptions will be easy to obtain for those that need/want them) will undergo, at a minimum, weekly testing. Exempted employees will also be required to mask even after local/state regulations are lifted.
5. Masking in a high consumer environment will be fully used as a company policy. The mask will inadvertently be used to condemn the exempted or not fully vaccinated employees to other staff and customers.

New Seasons Market joins the ranks of a small but growing list of companies who have indicated they too will proceed with the Mandatory vaccine (or Exemption + Mandatory Testing), including Columbia Sportswear, Carhart Clothing, and Tyson Foods.

Part II

The second part of our investigation will present additional facts as we attempt to answer our principal question: Who is running New Seasons and why would Company Leadership be proceeding with these policies?  As we answer these questions, speculative interrogation and hypothesized connections may intertwine with the evidence.  Please draw your own conclusions and feel free to question the synergies presented.

Who is running New Seasons?  Well, we know Nancy arrived in April of 2021, and technically, on paper, the CEO is the principal executive.  But who are the other Board Members who signed off on the new Covid-19 Vaccination Policy?  Who else would an employee address their grievances to?  At the time of this writing, the full Board Member list is not available.

But the advent of internet sleuthing is a beautiful thing and allows us to gradually piece together the puzzle.

Google… “new seasons market board of directors.”

The home page is a company page (they don’t maintain their back end, do they? Shows ‘Stan Amy’ who sold his remaining share years ago.  The Stan Amy link is an apparent placeholder and for now loops back to the homepage.

The second page listed is a generic information sharing site… ‘Comparably’… ok now we are getting somewhere.  Comparably was apparently outdatedly…Forrest was gone, so Comparably was off the… wait a second, wait just a second…who is this Justin Dye person?  He is listed as the ‘Lead Director.’ Lead Director – that sounds important.  According to Comparably, Justin started with New Seasons in March of 2018.  According to his LinkedIn profile, Justin is based out of Boca Raton, Florida and, including his role as Lead Director at New Seasons, is working at no less than five companies.

Please recall that in the March 14, 2018 article by Don McIntosh in Northwest Labor Press  we learn that that CEO Wendie Collie, who had been in her position since 2012, abruptly departed on February 6, 2018 as part of a “strategic shift in business directions.”  In the same article, Don asked then Co-CEOs Kristi McFarland and Forrest Hoffmaster via email:

“Who owns New Seasons and who sits on its Board of Directors?”

“The ownership of New Seasons includes Endeavour Capital who own 64 percent and the founders of both New Seasons and New Leaf stores and many of the friends and families who originally invested in the two companies.  The board currently includes Stephen Babson and Bradaigh Wagner of Endeavor Capital, New Season’s founder, Stan Amy and New Leaf’s founder, Scott Roseman.”

As Justin is not listed in this correspondence, we can only assume he came onto the Board shortly thereafter.  Was there a connection leveraged through Endeavour Capital to have him ‘placed’?  We know that Stephen Babson, Managing Director of Endeavour Capital, also sits on the ripKurrent Senior Advisor Panel and would you look at that… Stephen is also listed as a ‘New Seasons Market Board’ Member.  Well, what a coincidence!

Considering Endeavour Capital sold New Seasons to Emart in January of 2020, I suppose it is a strategic advantage that Endeavour offered Mr. Babson’s expertise in the Private Equities Market to continue to sit on the New Seasons Board through the transition. Oddly enough, Mr. Babson is also listed on the ripKurrent website as a Board Member of another Northwest company, Columbia Sportswear  one of the other NW companies to push forward with vaccine mandates despite the SCOTUS ruling.  But you will not find any mention of Stephen Babson on the Columbia website or Endeavour website.

Now it is time to learn a little bit more about Justin Dye and why he might have ‘emerged’ as a good fit to serve on the New Seasons Market Board of Directors.

While Mr. Dye’s LinkedIn profile offers a more in depth overview of his timeline, I prefer this succinct summary featured on this June 6, 2019 SEC disclosure:

“Mr. Dye has 25 years of experience in private equity, general management, operations, strategy, corporate finance, and M&A. Prior to founding Dye Capital & Company, he served as an integral part of the private equity consortium that acquired Albertsons Companies (“Albertsons”) and led its expansion through over $40 billion in acquisitions, divestitures, real estate and financing transactions.  During his 11-year tenure as Chief Strategy Officer, Chief Operating Officer, and Chief Administration Officer, Albertsons grew sales from approximately $10 billion to over $60 billion with over 2,300 stores and 285,000 employees.  Prior to Albertsons, Justin held roles at Cerberus Capital Management, General Electric and Arthur Andersen.  Justin serves as lead director for New Seasons Market and is a member of the DePauw University Board of Trustees.”

Well, that is quite a resume, isn’t it?  Why would New Seasons want to hide their affiliation with such a leader, an Icon, in the grocery business?

As of 2021, New Seasons gross revenues company-wide barely exceeded $500 million.  In 2018, they would have been less, but let us use $500mill for arguments sake.  What interest would Mr. Dye have had in becoming a ‘Lead Director’ on the Board of Directors with a little chain of grocery stores?  To go from the second largest grocery chain in the country to a blip on the map.  Hmm… add that to the heap of questions.

In May of 2017, Justin left his role at Albertsons.  Justin was “widely viewed” as the successor to CEO Bob Miller.  Bob Miller was “brought in” when in 2006, “the private equity-giant Cerberus Capital Management bought into Albertsons.”

Cerberus, Cerberus… where have I heard that name before?  According to his LinkedIn, Justin had not worked at Cerberus Capital Management since 2006, right around the time they bought in to Albertsons.  Probably just a coincidence that Justin chose to quietly leave the company to “seek a job in private equity again or as a CEO of another company.”

Cerberus is more than just a Private Equity firm, something we will revisit in the authors notes of this investigation.  But for context, here is a brief overview of the old-world origins of Cerberus:

Cerberus, as some of you know, was to the Greeks, “a vicious beast that guarded the entrance to Hades and kept the living from entering the world of the dead… he had three heads of wild dogs, a dragon or serpent for a tail, and heads of snakes all over his back.”

Kudos to the marketing team who chose ‘Cerberus’ for the name of their private equity company.

2017-2019 was indeed a very busy time for Justin.  After he left Albertson’s, he formed and joined the leadership team of a series of no less than six companies that are still in existence today:

1. RipKurrent – January 2017, Chairman and Founder: “We are master systems integrators who use artificial intelligence and machine learning to save our clients 30-50% in energy costs.”
2. New Seasons – March 2018, Lead Director, Board of Directors – See Part I.
3. PJ Solomon – September 2017, Senior Advisor. About us: “In June 2016, Solomon Partners entered into an alliance with Natixis, a French financial services firm owned by Groupe BPCE, to create an enhanced global M&A advisory and financing platform. Through the partnership, Solomon Partners continues to provide the experience of a boutique culture with an expanded global reach across Europe, Asia, Australia, the Middle East, and the Americas”
4. Tella Digital – December 2019*,   See ‘Products’ tab, services, etc.  YouTube video shows “Tella is the connected omnichannel solution bringing together online and in-store marketing.”  A product is offered for sale that is a “hand sanitizing digital kiosk.”
5. Dye Capital & Company – April 2017, Managing General Partner. His bio reads: “Prior to Albertson’s, Justin was an operating executive for Cerberus Capital Management and held general management and corporate development roles at General Electric.  Interests include Climate Friendly, Technology and Innovation, Big Data and Analytics.
6. Schwazze (formerly operating as ‘Medicine Man Technologies’), December 2019, Chairman and CEO.Homepage statement: “As a verb, Schwazze is a cultivation technique that prunes a living organism to create more growth.  For us, it’s a call to action. At Schwazze we are focused on innovation, unparalleled thinking and creating the next era of cannabis.” His bio page has a quote “Think about what we’re building here… we’re taking care of customers, offering new, innovative products that are safe, and creating healthier and happier lifestyles for consumers.”

RipKurrent, Tella Digital and Dye Capital are all based in Boca Raton Florida.  Actually, they are all based in the exact same office.  As Mr. Dye’s biographies indicate, he does enjoy tennis, so Boca Raton is naturally a better environment to live in.  Regardless of being Lead Director of a small grocery chain based in the Pacific Northwest with only 3,500 employees, tennis gonna tennis, you feel me?

Thus, in the conclusion of the second part of our investigation, we can ascertain several important observations:

1. Nancy Lebold is the Chief Executive Officer of New Seasons Market
2. Justin Dye is the Lead Director of New Seasons Market
3. Justin Dye is currently either a manager/partner/owner/operator of five additional companies
4. The New Seasons Market ‘Covid-19 Vaccination Policy’ was approved by Nancy Lebold and the ‘Company Directors’ (yet to be officially named as of this writing).
5. Several of the companies Justin Dye is affiliated with offer ‘cross propagating’ opportunities.
6. Justin Dye employs at least one known New Seasons Market Board Member (Stephen Babson) at another of his companies (ripKurrent).

Part III

The third part of our investigation is entirely speculative.  Based on all the previously presented facts, we will now take several attempts at synergizing the information into a cohesive understanding that explains the initial pain points of “Mary” and answers the fundamental question of “who is running this company?”

Endeavour Capital, via Stephen Babson, may or may not have provided the strategic introduction to Justin Dye and secured his position on the Board of Directors.  Endeavour rarely holds assets as long as it held New Seasons before ‘fully divesting’ in 2019.

Justin arrived at New Seasons shortly after Wendy left.  The company culture shifted.  But nothing pales in comparison to how things changed during lockdowns/pandemic policies.

Regardless of unionization efforts and previous labor struggles, many grocery store employees, convenient store employees, food service workers, restaurant workers, and all of the rest of them across all industries, have experienced ‘pandemic-fatigue.’  Following panic-buying, knee-jerk compulsory masking (State violence), and all the rest.  In 2020 the ‘exemption requests’ to compulsory masking were met with run-around from human resources and no definitive rulings from EEOC, despite ADA attempting to celebrate its 30^th birthday. One can only guess what this round of mandates will be consisting of.

Now, in 2022, ‘vaccine mandates’ from a Covid-19 Vaccination Policy that is not a regulatory policy, but a company policy, further eclipse the transgressions from 2020.  Even so-called ‘exemptions’ will be met with mandatory testing and compulsory masking.  But, at the time of this writing, New Seasons Market has directed this policy to take effect only in OR and WA and not in their CA locations because ‘the Company Directors’ recognize “these decisions are complicated.”

Despite their attempts to conceal their intent, they have accidentally ‘Spilled Their Candy in the Lobby’.

They have demanded their ‘unvaccinated’ employees submit a request for exemption within three weeks (January 20 until the February 9 deadline).  The exemption, if approved, will only submit their consent to, at a minimum, weekly testing, and compulsory masking regardless of state or local regulations.

In a January 28, 2022, Pantry post CEO Nancy Lebold reasserts their company’s decision, despite pushback from customers and staff, surrounding mandatory vaccination.  She points to the Biden Administrations withdrawal of the proposed rule while simultaneously indicating through an AP Article that a new, permanent rule is being drafted and will be attempted again.  Nancy further reinforces the exemptions available: Disability Accommodation, Medical Exemption, Religious Exemption.

In the second to last paragraph:

“All exemption requests will be carefully reviewed case-by-case by the Benefits team at Store Support and in partnership with Good Food Holding’s legal counsel (emphasis added), using federal, and state guidance to determine whether a request should be approved or denied, and input from staff members, as appropriate.

All staff members who receive an APPROVED EXEMPTION will be required to test weekly.  The final number of staff who need to test will guide our final decision on the test we use.  All staff who test under the exemption process will receive specific instructions from their leadership team”

Before we address testing policy – a brief question – why would the CEO of New Season’s be partnering with the legal counsel of another legally distinct company?  As best as we know Good Fold Holdings sold to Emart shortly before New Seasons in 2019.  Even more perplexing is that Good Food Holdings is California based, and as previously addressed, all the California stores in the New Leaf brand and the stores underneath Good Food Holdings are foregoing the company wide Vaccine Mandates at this time.  So why, why would New Seasons Market be aggregating data and submitting every single Vaccine Exemption request from its Oregon and Washington stores to the Legal Team of a different company that operates in the State of California?

The ‘testing policy’ has not been fully disclosed to employees in advance of the demand to submit exemption requests and by the Company’s own admission they do not know what kind of test they are going to use?  Hmm… that doesn’t seem very strategic from an operations standpoint.  Good thing we are flush with anonymous sources in this investigation.

One store recently received a shipment of test kits from iHealth that are not offered in the store as a product for sale.  The case was side marked ‘Operations.’  The ever-popular ‘nasal swab’ from iHealth is offered at only $8.99/ea on their website.  I am sure there are bulk pricing options.  Nasal swab tests are the least expensive versus saliva or blood testing.  Simple cost-benefit analysis and the precise number of how many employees that will be needing the testing seems to be weighing on the Board of Directors minds as they aggregate the data and formulate the official testing policy.

How can an employee reasonably and knowingly submit an exemption request without first knowing the testing policy their employer intends to put in place?  Many people who are ‘exempt’ from the vaccine could, theoretically, also be exempt from the nasal swab, saliva or blood antigen test as well could they not?  Shouldn’t we be talking about Exemptions to testing for various Disability, Medical or Religious reasons?  Will the company be offering ‘testing exemptions’ as well?

How can the company subject their employees to a vaccine disclosure and mandate without the company itself knowing what its own testing policy and testing methods will be?

Why is the testing policy intentionally obscured and yet simultaneously strongly addressed?

Nirup Krishnamurthy, who serves alongside Justin in several of the ‘Dye’ brand businesses (Partner of Dye Capital, CIO of ripKurrent, President of Tella Digital and COO of Schwazze), was described by Justin as “a huge talent” and his “leadership and applied science background enables ripKurrent to develop next generation facility intelligence solutions that will drive substantial efficiencies for our customers.”  Nirup was appointed to the “ripKurrent Innovation Center (RIC).”

“The RIC focuses on the use of advanced and emerging technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Blockchain technology, 3D Virtual Reality, and Advanced Statistical Tools to drive competitive advantage for ripKurrent’s customers.”

Why bring up an affiliate and business partner of Justin Dye at this stage in the investigation?  Well, because behind every powerful man, there is an even smarter, albeit more dangerous man.  Nirup may be the smarter man.  But smarter does not necessarily mean more dangerous until his creative energies synthesized and appropriately leveraged.

Nirup has served Fortune 500 companies for over twenty-five years.  He was Chief Information Officer for United Airlines where he “helped oversee one of the largest turnaround restructurings in corporate American History.”  And Nirup worked from 2005-2009 at the Northern Trust Company where he focused on “how to prepare an IT department for Globalization” & “the future of infrastructure outsourcing” However, according to HMG Strategy:

 “Since 2009, Nirup has diversified into an executive consulting/advisory role and has helped several companies in the technology services and healthcare sectors on business development, strategy planning and business transformation efforts.”

While it is speculative to suggest Nirup has honed-in on where he is spending most of his time these days, he does now hold critical leadership roles with the Dye brands.  Schwazze, in particular, looks like it will be emerging as a major player in the Colorado and National Cannabis marketspace very soon.

Remember, “as a verb, Schwazze is a cultivation technique that prunes a living organism to create more growth.”  Initially, they called the company ‘Medicine Man Technologies’ but it is easy to get paranoid of bad deals in the cannabis industry.

To distill down the third part of our investigation:

1. We know with a certain degree of certainty now that Justin Dye is the Lead Director (among others) of New Seasons Market.
2. Stephen Babson sits on the New Seasons Board even though the company he Directs (Endeavour Capital) sold New Seasons to Emart in Jan. 2020.
3. Nirup Krishnamurthy a close business partner of Justin works at four of Justin’s other companies.

We still cannot, without synergizing all of this information, answer the question of “why would Justin Dye want to sit on the Board of Directors of New Seasons Market?  Justin Dye… the same guy who led the growth of Albertson’s from $10B to $60B and 285,000 employees, creating one of largest privately held companies in the U.S.  Why, why Mr. Dye?

Part IV – Conclusion

The final part of our investigation is purely speculative.  However, all the assertions have been made in good faith with the information sourced above, using deductive logic and reasoning.  Questions that are framed incorrectly or assumptions that appear to reach too far should be further addressed or specially called out for clarification.  The conclusion is the ‘jumping off point’ for additional investigative research.

Justin Dye came to New Seasons in 2018… almost two full years to the day from the March 13, 2020, Executive Order putting the US into lockdown for “two weeks to flatten the curve.”  Perhaps Justin was intended to be the ‘rain-maker’ to help the struggling company secure foreign buyers.

Stephen Babson and his team at Endeavour had previously put together ‘Good Food Holdings’ which the South Korean conglomerate Emart found appetizing.  Is it possible that Stephen simply asked his buddy Justin to sit on the Board at New Seasons long enough to close with Emart?  Stephen did have a preexisting relationship with Emart afterall.

Pretty boy Justin aka “Mr. Albertsons” joins the New Seasons board.  Emart buys New Seasons.  Presto change-o the job is done.  Everyone makes some money and moves on, right?  Wrong.

Justin decided to remain on the Board of Directors even after the January 2020 deal closure with EMart.

Justin founded Tella Digital in December of 2019… three full months before the “Pandemic” officially started.  Tella Digital, on the surface, is a marketing company providing “full service, online, and on-premises digital experience solutions, custom designed to connect businesses with their customers.”

Their homepage video boasts Tella as the “connected omnichannel solution.”  Hmmm.  Omnichannel?  What is this marketing term Omnichannel?  In another striking coincidence, current Albertson’s CEO Vivek Sankaran says their “omnichannel solution is working.”   

Tella Digital offers their services to “Retail, Grocery, Luxury Living, Cannabis, Healthcare.”

Currently, Tella Digital is only offering one product for sale on its website – a ‘hand sanitizing digital kiosk.’  This is an interesting pairing for a marketing agency offering omnichannel solutions, wouldn’t you say?

The measurements are 14Wx7.3Dx46.3H. Whoa… that is a HUGE digital ‘hand sanitizing digital kiosk’.  Judging by the photos on their website, the screen size alone looks to be 10Wx20H.

One of the wonderful things about the suite of services and products offered by Tella Digital, is that a company could decide, if it wanted to, to implement the ‘connected omnichannel solution’ with its employees, instead of its customers.

I wonder if a company like New Seasons Market would potentially benefit from the omnichannel solution?  New Seasons has experienced quite a bout of sinking employee morale even after the merger with Emart.  And the pandemic has taken an even greater emotional toll on the workforce.

If the CDC does decide to update its definition of ‘fully vaccinated’ to include additional boosters, it is a fair assumption that anyone who has already submitted proof of vaccination will most likely go and get boosted and re-submit proof, perhaps into perpetuity.  Thus, as this Covid narrative continues to drag on (and it will continue if we let it) the system of tracking boosters and employees who are fully vaccinated becomes clunky.  The 20^th century paper card is at a best, a vestige from a foregone era.

The Covid-19 vaccination card only contains room for four total doses.  Some people will be needing to get a new card soon.  Or some people can be transitioned to the omnichannel solution—also known as your personal digital ID stored on the Blockchain.

With a little imagination, one can see how the product offered by Tella Digital (already built with ethernet & wi-fi capabilities) could be quickly retooled with different software capabilities, hardware capabilities, etc.  The Tella Digital ‘hand sanitizing digital kiosk’ could be imagined as an employee timeclock and health, vaccination, and biometric status checkpoint.  And it could still sanitize your hands!  One could question why a hand sanitizer would need a digital screen at all.

Most confounding is that the Tella Digital kiosk comes with “touch screen or non-touch screen options.”  Why will I have to sanitize my hands after touching the screen?  Why touch the screen in the first place?  Are hand sanitizers intended to be loitering stations?  In the age of TVs at gas station pumps, I suppose no space is off limits for commodification.

Well Mr. Dye, why did you decide to join the Board of New Seasons?

In the modern era of corporate mergers, data, analytics, and revenue forecasting is how deals are done.  Justin Dye is a closer.  Justin is somewhere around fifty years old, and he is early in his career.  Justin Dye is in the upper echelons of American businessman and holds prominent influence in several key industries.

After leaving Albertsons in 2017, his career and entrepreneurial aspirations (Dye Capital, Schwazze, ripKurrent, Tella Digital) are just getting started.  He is well financed and intends to take his aspirations (and those of his investors) to new highs.

If you want to sell “a purple widget” you are going to need real world analytics and performance data to convince a company like Albertsons, with 285,000 employees, to roll out a purple widget company wide.

Let us be less dense:  If you are going to mandate your employees be ‘fully vaccinated’ you will need a tracking system.  If the unvaccinated employees who are granted ‘exemptions,’ (or new hired employees who apply with a pre-existing exemption – that is going to be weird isn’t it?) are required to test at least weekly, you will need a tracking system.  And, if employees who have lapsed in their booster regiment, falling from ‘fully vaccinated’ to ‘partially vaccinated’ who will also be required to test, at least weekly, until they get their booster, well you will need a way to track this data as well.

Short of grossly expanding the human resources departments of every single New Seasons Market (In OR and WA), an internal omnichannel solution might be more appealing.

Would an ‘omnichannel’ employee ID also be officially linked to a larger, digital health ‘Blockchain’ ID?  This is difficult to say for sure, but at the very minimum, an omnichannel solution is a dress rehearsal for the main event.  Connected to the cloud and partnered with secure CDC partners like ORACLE , the omnichannel solution could be seamless and adaptable.

It is a possibility that Mr. Dye selected New Seasons Market as a testing ground for policy and technology/analytics that will be collected for other projects to help advance his entrepreneurial pursuits.

The symbiosis of his current suite of companies lends itself well to rapid growth and expansion.  Combined with the expertise of Nirup Krishnamurthy, advancing the test/trace/track matrix as means of data harvest could be in-line with the push for companywide vaccine mandates.  As far back as 2006, Nirup was working with Northern Trust Company on their Passport Technology.

The investment into the technology and the infrastructure has already been made.  If the test/trace/track matrix proceeds, Justin, and his colleagues, stand to make billions.  If the test/trace/track matrix is abolished, or if workers stand against the new policies in sufficient numbers and push back, Justin stands to lose hundreds of millions of dollars and an unquantifiable amount of street cred.

New Seasons Market is only one business that is Dye-ing.  There are many others on the front lines.

Whether the employees of New Seasons Market realize it or not, they are on the front lines of the greatest labor battle of the 21^st century.

Will the test/trace/track matrix succeed?

Or will the grocery business Dye, once and for all?

~

Authors Notes:

Cerberus:

Cerberus Capital Management boasts an impressive roster of Directors, including VP Dan Quayle.  Cerberus Capital Management is where Justin cut his teeth and led his first big deal with the Albertson’s acquisition.  But beyond the purvey of ‘business’ the mythological beast and the symbolism in the modern era of Cerberus is striking, especially when evaluated from the modern era struggle of labor and workers rights against the aristocracy.

The various drawings and subtle details of the beast Cerberus vary… however it is generally understood Cerberus was three-headed canine-esque monster of supranatural strength and agility.  Cerberus was set to guard Hades (the world of the Dead, or in this interpretation, the hellish world of the grocery industry labor force) from letting the Dead escape and cross the river Styx.

Important to note also is that Cerberus was there to guard Hades from the Living as well.  One wonders if at times some of the Living would have attempted intrusions into Hades and led attempts to organize the Dead into rebelling and perhaps even ensnaring Cerberus?  Thus, the role of guarding Hades was a two-way street.

According to monster.wiki: “Cerberus was the offspring of Echidna, a hybrid half-woman and half-serpent, and Typhon, a gigantic monster even the Greek gods feared.  Its siblings are the Lernaean Hydra, a serpent woman; Orthus, a two-headed hellhound; and the Chimaera, a three-headed monster.”

The Cerberus family tree sure puts the ‘fun’ back in dysfunctional, doesn’t it?

Companies like Cerberus Capital Management do not choose a name by accident.  The leaders of these companies are ivy league educated and are well versed in the classics.  Symbolism is a language of the elite, and it is their symbolism that will be their downfall.

The final and twelfth labor of Hercules was to capture the beast Cerberus.  The insurmountable task was accomplished in part by negotiations.  Hercules found Hades and first asked permission to enter the world of the Dead and capture Cerberus.  Hades granted him position, provided Hercules could capture Cerberus without using weapons.

Hercules overpowers Cerberus with his bare hands and slung the Beast over his shoulder.

As in any Greek Tragedy, there is an air truth and application in modern times.  When the founding members chose to form and name the company Cerberus, they knew, that in doing so, they would one day confront Hercules and be defeated.

When will our modern day Hercules emerge and once again cross the symbolic River Styx into modern day Hades and overpower the modern-day Beast of Cerberus?

Etymology of a name:

In the 1990 novel Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salmon Rushdie writes: “To give a thing a name, a label, a handle; to rescue it from anonymity, to pluck it out of the place of namelessness, in short to identify it–well, that’s a way of bringing the said thing into being.”  Thus, the surname ‘Dye’ was first recorded in 1316.  The name is “itself a pet form of the Medieval English female given name Dionisia, from the Greek Dionysia (feminine) or Dionysios (masculine) meaning “the Divine One of Nysa”, (a holy mountain in modern Afghanistan).”

Dye noun\ ˈdī  \

Definition of dye

1: color from dyeing

2: a soluble or insoluble coloring matter

Dye verb

dyed; dyeing

Definition of dye (Entry 2 of 2)

transitive verb

1: to impart a new and often permanent color to especially by impregnating with a dye

2: to impart (a color) by dyeing

intransitive verb

: to take up or impart color in dyeing

Dying vs. Dyeing: “before the nineteenth century, the spelling distinctions were not always observed”

Alternate Spellings: Dei, Di, Die

Die

noun

\ ˈdī  \

plural dice\ ˈdīs  \ or dies\ ˈdīz  \

Definition of die (Entry 2 of 2)

1 plural dice: a small cube marked on each face with from one to six spots and used usually in pairs in various games and in gambling by being shaken and thrown to come to rest at random on a flat surface —often used figuratively in expressions concerning chance or the irrevocability of a course of action the die was cast

2 plural dies, architecture: 

3 plural dies: any of various tools or devices for imparting a desired shape, form, or finish to a material or for impressing an object or material: such as a

(1): the larger of a pair of cutting or shaping tools that when moved toward each other produce a desired form in or impress a desired device on an object by pressure or by a blow

(2): a device composed of a pair of such tools

b: a hollow internally threaded screw-cutting tool used for forming screw threads

c: a mold into which molten metal or other material is forced

d: a perforated block through which metal or plastic is drawn or extruded for shaping

Union Busting:

The United Food and Commercial Workers Union represents 835,000 employees. Who does Mr. Dye know on the UFCW leadership?

The employees of New Seasons Market are diverse and embrace equality. They support their local community and have worked tirelessly through the pandemic.  They have no representation.

The Egregore of Elite (and LinkedIn Discoveries)

Egregores manifest through collective thought.  Egregores can be created accidentally, or intentionally.  Likewise, the power of an egregore can be experienced accidentally, many blissfully unaware of the influence It holds over them, projecting their anger and frustrations towards their boss or human resources manager when, in all reality, these ‘superiors’ are also under the same spell of the Egregore in common pain and emotional turmoil.

Every once and a great while, like the brightness from a light house of antiquity magnifying its beam through the crystal glass lens, then sending the light through the dense fog for miles upon miles upon miles into total darkness, an Egregore will be caught like a marauding pirate ship set to invade the coastline, accidentally revealed in a flash of blinding light, showcasing the ritualized belief for what it is – a social construct.

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has”  ~ Margaret Mead

Is the test/trace/track matrix system being pushed by powerful corporate interests Nationwide (globally actually) an accident?  Or is there an intentional crafting that is taking place in secret, behind closed doors?

Justin Dye graduated from DePauw University. DePauw is a top-tier Liberal Arts University dedicated to educating a limited enrollment of around 2,000 students.  It may be difficult to get a sense of campus culture due to lockdowns and a reputation for silencing dissent.

Although, to be fair, 1^st Amendment Challenges and silencing dissent are not uncommon practices in even lesser colleges and universities these days.  Thus, as Justin has learned, certain endeavors should be kept in confidence.

One of Justin’s LinkedIn groups, (in addition to the DePauw Alumni Association) is DePauw Delta Rho ATO.  An exclusive group with under 250 members, all the alumni of Stonecroft are eligible to join Delta Rho.  Delta Rho on the DePauw campus is a chapter of the ATO or Alpha Tu Omega  National Fraternity.  Alpha Tu Omega or ‘ATO’ was founded at the Virginia Military Institute in 1865.

The founder of ATO was Otis Allan Glazebrook who’s quote is featured on the ATO homepage:

“To bind men together in a brotherhood based upon eternal and immutable principles, with a bond as strong as right itself and as lasting as humanity; to know no North, no South, no East, no West, but to know man as man, to teach that true men the world over should stand together and contend for supremacy of good over evil; to teach, not politics, but morals; to foster, not partisanship, but the recognition of true merit wherever found; to have no narrower limits within which to work together for the elevation of man than the outlines of the world: these were the thoughts and hopes uppermost in the minds of the founders of the Alpha Tau Omega Fraternity.”

For most of the professional class who made it past high school, fraternities and sororities were a mere social experience during their college and university escapades.  However, for a select few these times are steeped in ritual and understanding of the esoteric Greek teachings.

Deny it if you choose to, but Fraternities and Sororities are vestiges of Greek culture that refuse to ‘fall off’.  Even as Cerberus refuses to leave His post at the River Styx, the living continue to get devoured, day by day, test by test.  And as a result, the curating of executive talent and subsequent placement by ‘higher minds’ are heavily conducted through the modern-day Greek Fraternities.

Mr. Dye’s LinkedIn ‘Influencers, Companies, Groups, and Schools’ offer a few final insights to understand the Egregore of his personal creation.

The exclusive Family Office Club being the most notable group on his LinkedIn, we learn his obsession with Wealth is real.

Besides DePauw, his notable scholastic associations include Rajagiri Centre for Business Studies.  Their website boasts:

“The education at Rajagiri goes beyond academics and concentrate on the development of the holistic personality of the students.  Rajagiri Believes in continually raising its bar and is relentless in its pursuit of excellence by nurturing management professionals with exceptional creative ability and social sensitivity”

Those who are healthy and comply will provide traditional ROI via typical product/consumption outcome models.  On the downside, those who are “sick” (i.e. unvaccinated, exempt, un-boosted) will feed the telehealth digital ID Beast System and system efficiencies (Tella Digital, ripKurrent, etc. and like technologies) will return greater reimbursements at faster rates, not unlike the modern day CMS Medicaid and Medicare delivery models for senior citizens.   Those Operators who can code (medical billing) the fastest with the least mistakes, get the greatest rewards (fastest CMS reimbursement rates).  All employees will be funneled into an omnichannel solution.  Healthy or sick.  Vaccinated or Unvaccinated. In a pure Beast System, Technology grows stronger in either outcome and the profits of shareholders will grow so great they will Dye from Laughing.

When we simmer down the muck and remove the impurities, we see a man finding a way to profit from both the conductive and deductive actions of ordinary Humans in the workplace.  He who grows wealthier from both life and death is not a steward of either Life or Death.  He who profits from such love and hate is neither human or non-human.  He is not good nor evil.  He is beyond the purvey of such duality.  He is the embodiment of an Egregore.  He embodies myth and ideology only.  Only tragic irony or the pure rejection of his existence can alter his protectory.