We explore the intersection of adventure, innovation, and sustainability with Jacques Barreau, co-founder of Grain de Sail. This pioneering project is transforming maritime shipping with wind-powered cargo vessels, carrying organic chocolate and coffee across the Atlantic. Jacques shares how he and his twin brother, Olivier, turned their passion for eco-friendly transport into managing this complex project, which spans food production, shipping logistics, and international partnerships.
Chapters
00:00 … Intro
03:17 … The Launch of Grain de Sail
04:50 … Starting with Coffee and Chocolate
07:12 … Understanding the Scope
09:08 … Planning the Routes
12:21 … Old Techniques with Modern Technology
12:43 … Timing of the Trip
13:36 … Crew and Capacity
14:10 … Grain de Sail I vs. II
17:01 … Grain de Sail III
18:59 … Managing Complexity
20:46 … Decision-Making and The Chocolate Specialist
24:24 … Jacques’ Career
25:07 … The Cost of Facing Resistance
28:47 … Hiring the Right People
30:33 … To Master the Whole Value Chain
32:29 … Buy-In from Stakeholders
34:08 … Keeping True to the Mission
35:30 … Other Products to Transport
38:57 … Financial, Environment and Social Equity
40:42 … The Rewards
42:38 … Find Out More
43:53 … Closing
Intro
WENDY GROUNDS: Welcome to Manage This, the podcast by project managers for project managers. Today we’re going to jump right in because we have a lot of conversation with our guest, Jacques Barreau. We are talking about an adventure of organic chocolate, coffee, wine, and a few other products. And so it’s a good one to talk about. If your morning coffee, your evening wine, or your favorite chocolate bar could come with an adventure across the high seas without leaving a carbon footprint, would that not be a much more pleasurable taste?
BILL YATES: Absolutely, yeah. I’m intrigued.
WENDY GROUNDS: Today we’re setting sail on a remarkable journey with Grain de Sail. It’s a company that’s providing sustainable shipping founded by brothers, Jacques and his brother Olivier. And their vision was blending renewable energy with delicious craftsmanship, transporting coffee and chocolate across the Atlantic Ocean using wind-powered cargo ships.
But let me tell you a little bit more about Jacques first. He worked for nearly 10 years in marine renewable energies where he was in charge of important projects in a maritime context. He became involved in the Grain de Sail company in 2015. As a specialist in project development, organization, and financing, he is the co-founder and CEO of Grain de Sail, and he manages the company on a daily basis and ensures the financial management of the group.
BILL YATES: One of the things that Jacques really relies on are experts, specialists. And I know for me in my project management career; I had to build strong relationships with those key experts on my team. And Jacques gives us a lot of insight as to how to do that, how to trust others.
WENDY GROUNDS: Yeah, we’ve done sustainability projects before. We do like to bring you new novel inventive ideas. And just looking back, we can go right back to Episode 86. If you haven’t listened to that one, it was by Doc Watson, and he’s using technology to save rhinos in Africa.
BILL YATES: Yes.
WENDY GROUNDS: That was one of my favorite projects that we talked about.
BILL YATES: Oh, yeah. And then locally, closer to home here in Athens, Georgia, Episode 165 was about recycling, and that was Katherine Shayne and her organization. And I think it was an app called CIRT, Can I Recycle This? You can use that to see if there’s a recycle center near you for the object you’re trying to figure out.
WENDY GROUNDS: It’s always exciting to hear about amazing projects. And I’m sure you’ve heard us quote before from one of our favorite podcasts, which was the Ocean Cleanup with Henk van Dalen. That was Episode 106. They’re cleaning up the ocean. And today we’re talking about some gentlemen and their team that are sending products across the ocean and keeping it clean, as well. So, grab your favorite cup of coffee, a piece of chocolate, or a glass of wine, and join us for the conversation. It’s all about innovation, the future of sustainable shipping, and adventure on the open seas.
Hi, Jacques. Welcome to Manage This. Thank you so much for talking to us today.
JACQUES BARREAU: Thank you. Nice to talk to you.
The Launch of Grain de Sail
WENDY GROUNDS: We are so interested in this project. I think it was one of our instructors sent us an email and told us a little bit about what he had discovered, what you are doing. So, can you start at the beginning? Tell us what inspired you and your brother to launch Grain de Sail.
JACQUES BARREAU: Well, actually, me and my brother Olivier – twin brother, I have to say. So, we were working together in the offshore wind for approximately 10 years. And in 2010 Olivier had this weird idea to think about the way to reduce the carbon footprint of the maritime shipping. And, well, even today, when you want to do it, there is no better solution than a mast and a sail to push a boat without any fuel. So that was the basic idea at the beginning. How could we build a kind of a cargo sailing ship that would be efficient enough to almost kill the carbon footprint of the maritime shipping? That was the fundamental idea of the company.
BILL YATES: So, you guys had both – you have a science engineering background. You’ve been doing all this wind-generated offshore wind, and you’re looking at it going, “Hey, wait a minute. We could have an impact on the cargo industry, as well, and shipping.”
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
BILL YATES: So that’s impressive.
JACQUES BARREAU: And with the wind on both activities, I mean offshore wind, we produce energy with the wind; and using a cargo sailing ship, we also use the wind to push.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, that’s the link.
Starting with Coffee and Chocolate
The BILL YATES: Right. So can you walk us through, I know you’ve evolved, you started with almost like a prototype and then built a larger ship and then a larger vessel.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
BILL YATES: But kind of walk us back to the beginning of how did you come up with this idea of, okay, this is the route we’re going to do, and this is the kind of the layout of the ship that we want to build first.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, because in 2010, when we thought about the way we could build this kind of vessel, the next question is always the same. How are we going to finance…
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: …such a vessel? I mean, the first prototype. And actually, we discovered that it could be interesting to link these maritime shipping activities with food and process activities, just in order to load internally a big part of the vessel. Because when it comes to finance a vessel, the question is always how can we efficiently load the vessel? And by creating an activity around the coffee and the chocolate, we were then able to bring back our raw materials, from Latin America mainly, in order to load the vessel ourselves. So that was a way to be more reliable on the financial aspect of the project.
So, we didn’t make the mistake to start with a vessel. We thought that it was much more interesting to start by mastering the products. So, we started in 2013 with coffee roasting activities because it was the easiest product to handle, actually. I have to say that at this time we didn’t have any knowledge on how to make coffee and how to make chocolate. Frankly, that was totally crazy at this time. So, we had to hire some specialists.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: And our main question at the beginning, okay, can you learn us how to make excellent coffee? And then can you learn us how to make excellent chocolate? So, we started, as I said, in 2013 with the coffee, followed in 2016 with the chocolate factory. I have to mention that the chocolate is a product much more complex compared to the coffee.
BILL YATES: Yes, very.
JACQUES BARREAU: But thanks to many helps, we succeed to produce the right quality, as it was, of course, important for us, with a full organic product, of course. All was organic, the coffee and the chocolate.
Understanding the Scope
BILL YATES: Jacques, so as you’re pointing out, eventually you want to have a sailing vessel that takes advantage of this wind-powered generation. But the first thing you had to think about was the scope. And I think for so many of our project managers it’s the same thing of like, I know where we want to go. But first I’ve got to figure out exactly, you know, what does that product look like? What makes financial sense? What will consumers purchase? That kind of thing. It’s so interesting to me that you guys went back to – you landed on coffee and chocolate. And then eventually, okay, now we have something, we have a business that we can now build the sustainable energy vessel.
JACQUES BARREAU: Exactly.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: It’s a step-by-step approach. And that was the only way to achieve the whole story. To obtain the vessel, we had to start with the coffee and the chocolate.
BILL YATES: Right.
JACQUES BARREAU: Probably if at this time we decided to be just a maritime shipping company, probably we would not succeed to do it. The only way was this kind of incredible link with the product and the vessel. And everything is under the same brand. I mean, the chocolate and the coffee are sold under the Grain de Sail brand. And the name of the vessels, first one was Grain de Sail, the second Grain de Sail II and so on. So, for the final customers, when he tastes chocolate or coffee, he’s tasting more than the product.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: He’s also tasting the maritime adventure, all our environmental values, social equity and so on. This combination, we discovered it generates a very, very powerful brand, this kind of specific business model. It’s working.
WENDY GROUNDS: It’s just coffee and chocolates?
JACQUES BARREAU: So far, yes, but we are also thinking about the rums. We think about olive oil. And I mean, all these kind of product that give pleasures, yeah. It’s the way we want to develop the company, indeed.
Planning the Routes
WENDY GROUNDS: I’m sure there’s a lot of planning. There’s a lot of forethought that’s gone into exactly where you go and the routes you take. So, can you just describe a bit about that?
JACQUES BARREAU: So, our ocean is the Atlantic, definitely. We wanted at the beginning to play on the Atlantic because this ocean is very, very compatible with sailing. I mean, all the weather forecast, all the routing teams are used to play in the Atlantic. Of course, when you are living in France; and especially in Brittany, it’s the west part of France. And when you look at the sea on the west, somewhere you see the Liberty statue. You see New York.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: So, we said, yeah, it could be interesting to export some typical French product from France to New York. It would be a good idea, and especially good French wines and French product, I mean, in general. And by doing this export, we would then be able to get down to Caribbean Sea just to load our primary materials for coffee and chocolate, such as grain coffee and coconuts, and bring back this primary material in Brittany to transform in coffee and chocolate. So, as you can see, it’s a kind of loop.
But this loop is most of the time in opposition with the wind. Usually when you want to go from France to New York, you go south, and then you use the wind coming from the east, and then you go then back to America. But it takes time. It’s a long way. On our side, we didn’t want to spend that much time, so we decided to go almost straight. But you are upwind. I mean, it’s very strong conditions for navigations. But that was the only way to cross the Atlantic efficiently between France and New York.
And with the right partners and the routing, you know what is a routing? A routing team is, they are inland, and they are guiding the vessel through the Atlantic, integrating all the data from the satellite, all the weather forecast, in order to find the best way to cross the Atlantic by avoiding too much wind or, at the opposite weather reason, no wind at all, of course.
So, it’s a kind of mixed – it gave a lot of efficiency on the average crossing speed. Thanks to the satellite, we have to imagine that one century ago, when all the cargo sailing ship were in operation, there was no satellite, no weather forecast, nothing. And at this time, the only way to cross the Atlantic was to use a wet finger. You see?
BILL YATES: Which way are the winds blowing.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, exactly. That was bold to do it like that. But, yeah, today we have many more solutions to be much more efficient compared to this time. So, it’s again, today, when you want to use a cargo sailing ship, it’s much more efficient to do it today compared to one century ago. Thanks to the technology, I mean, the sails, the ropes, everything, electronic systems, and of course the routing teams that guide the vessel, I mean, 24 hours a day. It’s incredible.
Old Techniques with Modern Technology
WENDY GROUNDS: Yeah, because even though it is a sailboat using an old technique of sailing, you’ve still got all that technology in the modern day helps that, gets you across, yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Exactly.
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm, yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, we have the satellite communications. We have all the radars, IS to see all the other ships. I mean, yeah, it’s very convenient to sail today compared to a few decades ago.
Timing of the Trip
BILL YATES: So, Jacques, in terms of timing, when the ship leaves France and arrives in New York, how does that compare? Is it, like, twice as long as a typical cargo ship, or maybe less than that? How long of a trip are we talking?
JACQUES BARREAU: Not really. Actually, sometimes it’s faster.
BILL YATES: Oh, really?
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. It depends, of course, on the weather forecast and classical weather we have during the crossing. But our record is 14 days to make the crossing. And most of the time it’s something like 16, 18 days and sometimes 21. But it’s usually between 16 and 18. And that’s about the same duration compared to a classical vessel.
BILL YATES: Wow.
JACQUES BARREAU: So, it’s – that’s really a question of time. It’s just the way we transport, thanks to the efficiency of today’s technology once again.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
Crew and Capacity
WENDY GROUNDS: Yeah. What size crew do you have? I’m sure there’s also a lot of competition. People want to say, “Hey, can I come?”
BILL YATES: I want to be on it.
WENDY GROUNDS: Can I join?
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. Actually, we have two crews because when the boat is in operation, you have one crew that is resting inland and the other one is on the vessel. And the size of the crew, it’s eight seafarers, which means that we have 16 seafarers for Grain de Sail II that is operating across the Atlantic. And for the first vessel, Grain de Sail I, it was, at this time when this vessel was crossing the Atlantic, it was four seafarers.
Grain de Sail I vs. II
BILL YATES: Okay. And describe for our listeners the capacity of one versus two, because I know you’ve really grown that.
JACQUES BARREAU: So, as I mentioned, when we thought about building this company, we wanted to build a first vessel, but with a reasonable size in order to limit the financial risk.
BILL YATES: Sure.
JACQUES BARREAU: Mainly. And also, in order to learn how to operate this kind of vessel, to learn how to handle the merchandise, to bring all the goods in good shape to the other side. And we decided to build this first schooner-type vessel with 24 meters long, 72 feet long, and with a loading capacity of 50 tons, which means approximately 30 pallets on the hull. Fortunately, we did this first version because we learned so much details.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: And in the maritime activity, a detail is not a detail, actually.
BILL YATES: It’s huge.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. That’s always very tricky sometimes to discover that such a system is not working as expected. Yeah, so this first vessel cost 2 million euro and was enough for us at the beginning. And then we decided a few years later to build Grain de Sail II. Grain de Sail II, it’s a 52 meters long schooner-type vessel again, with a much higher loading capacity because we switched from 50 tons for the first vessel to 350 tons…
BILL YATES: Wow.
JACQUES BARREAU: …for the second version. It’s much longer. It’s twice longer. But when a vessel is twice longer, it’s always twice wider and twice higher. So, it’s in three dimensions, which means that the hull capacity is, of course, much bigger compared to the previous version. And then we started to operate Grain de Sail II in the middle of March 2024. It’s one year ago exactly. As the vessel is longer, the average cruising speed is higher, which means that you have more capacity. You can go faster. It’s more reliable. It’s more comfortable. I mean, everything is better. And the cost of transportation is lower. And that is the classical financial equation in all the maritime activities is to have the bigger vessel possible to reduce the transportation cost.
BILL YATES: Right.
JACQUES BARREAU: Except that when you want to almost kill the carbon footprint, you have to be reasonable on the size of the vessel. Imagine that if we decided to build a very, very big vessel like a container ship, let’s say 300 meters, 400 meters, it would be totally impossible to put some very high mast and huge sails on this kind of vessel, which means that the capacity to reduce the carbon footprint would not be efficient.
BILL YATES: Yeah, [crosstalk].
Grain de Sail III
JACQUES BARREAU: So, we have to be reasonable on the size. And That’s why we decided to create Grain de Sail II. It’s 52 meters long and no more because at this time the technology was not ready to do a bigger version. And that’s why we discovered something like one year ago that it was possible to use a new technique. It’s a solid sail technology. It’s a technology that uses rigid panels instead of flexible sails.
BILL YATES: Ah. Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: It’s not a tissu, it’s really like a plate.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: And this kind of rigging allows us to design much bigger surfaces of sails. That’s why we decided to create Grain de Sail III, to design it. And this version is again twice longer. So, it’s 110 meters this time, more than 300 feet. And the surface of sails on this third version is 43,000 feet squares. So, it’s absolutely huge. And we have three masts this time. And it’s a container ship this time. We are not loading pallets; we are loading containers directly.
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm. Yeah, that’s a big change.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. And it’s a big difference.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: Which means that for us, Grain de Sail III will be a vessel much closer from the habits of our logistic customers, will be again cheaper on the cost of transportation. It will go faster again, even compared to Grain de Sail II, will be more comfortable and so on. I mean, it’s, yeah, a big improvement. Just step by step.
BILL YATES: Oh, yeah, the progression.
JACQUES BARREAU: You see Grain de Sail I and Grain de Sail II, and one day Grain de Sail III and so on. It’s a step-by-step approach as it costs a lot of money, of course.
BILL YATES: Of course.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
BILL YATES: Grain de Sail III, what is the anticipated launch date for that?
JACQUES BARREAU: We expect to operate this vessel by the end of 2027.
BILL YATES: Yeah, yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Just the time to set up the detailed design and to build it, of course.
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm.
Managing Complexity
WENDY GROUNDS: And there’s clearly a demand for the products. If you keep getting bigger and bigger, people are definitely into buying the products, which is really good, yeah. What are some of the biggest challenges that you faced?
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, our value chain is much more complex than any conventional company, and especially for a small size company like us. So, at the beginning we had to be very careful on the way we digest the complexity, which means that we had to start with a step-by-step approach again. We started with a coffee that was definitely the easiest product to handle. I mean, we had to learn how to master the quality, 2013.
Then in 2016 the chocolate, even if the chocolate is a much more complex product that we imagine. It’s very hard actually to understand exactly the way we can build the right recipes. The way we use what we call the crystallization of the chocolate is something very, very important for the final quality. But, well, we made it. And only at the end we decided to build the first vessel.
So, the management is, we have to be very cautious on the way we drive the company and the way we integrate the complexity year after year. And it takes time. And, yeah, we succeed just by being patient. Yeah.
BILL YATES: And it sounds like you have an attitude of, “Let’s try things, and we’ll adjust our plans if they’re not working.”
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
BILL YATES: I think of the complexity of, “Okay, we’re going to manufacture coffee, and we’re going to transport coffee beans. Now let’s step it up and do chocolate.” You know, you pointed out the process of actually creating that final chocolate product is very complex, a lot more complex than coffee.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
Decision-Making and The Chocolate Specialist
BILL YATES: So how did you decide, “Okay, at what point do we stop the process and move it closer to our home base so that we can have more control of it?” I think a lot of project managers think through the same thing of, “Okay, there’s a complex part of this process that I either am going to trust the offsite capabilities of the team to do it there, or I want to have it closer to our headquarters or home base.” How did you guys go back and forth on that decision?
JACQUES BARREAU: We decided at the beginning to find the right specialist, just to be sure that we would be able to understand exactly how the process had to be executed, even what kind of machine we have to buy to produce the right coffee and the right chocolate. But also, we had to hire, I mean, our chocolate specialist. We had to hire the whole team. And we made a lot of tests at the beginning without selling anything, just testing.
BILL YATES: Yup.
JACQUES BARREAU: And I remember some days where we were something like six people from the Grain de Sail team around a table just testing chocolate tabs.
BILL YATES: Sign me up for that.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, I mean, it was the fun part of the job.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: But we had to do it like that. I mean, we didn’t want at this time to externalize the testing. We wanted to handle this important part of the recipe selection by ourselves. So, we were six around the table, and we used to test the one recipe at one time, of course, let’s say a dark chocolate with a tea inside, or any other peanuts, or some stuff like that. And with several percentage of integration. And we just ate; and the result was, what is the recipe that you prefer without any more description? Where do you find the best? What kind of equilibrium you have the more pleasure? And all our recipe has been chosen like that. And even after many years, we didn’t make any mistake. And, I mean, today the recipes are exactly the same compared to seven years ago.
BILL YATES: Wow. That’s terrific.
JACQUES BARREAU: But because we were six, I was not the guy, not like the boss. I’m testing. I’m [crosstalk] no, no way.
BILL YATES: This is my choice.
JACQUES BARREAU: We’re always six or even seven people.
BILL YATES: Uh-huh. That’s good.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. That’s the best way to avoid all the mistakes.
BILL YATES: Right. Right. And there’s buy-in with those six because you all had a hand in it.
JACQUES BARREAU: Exactly. So, our management is kind of distributed management. I mean, I don’t like the pyramidal management. Do you understand?
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Kind of a top-down approach.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. It’s not working, actually. We have to find the right specialist once again. It’s very important to find the right people. And when I hire somebody, I always, I’m giving the responsibility of his job, and I’m giving the keys. And that’s important to work like that, especially when you have many jobs to handle at the same time. I mean, I manage the maritime shipping, the chocolate, the coffee. I mean, it’s complex. So, I have to give the responsibility to my team.
BILL YATES: Absolutely.
JACQUES BARREAU: In order to be more lucid. I mean, to understand exactly what’s going on without too much complexity on my head.
BILL YATES: Yes.
WENDY GROUNDS: It’s very much managing a project. It’s what a project manager does.
JACQUES BARREAU: Exactly. We were lucky, me and my brother, to have enough experience before building Grain de Sail, actually. Probably that, if we decided to build Grain de Sail, let’s say 20 years ago, probably that the result would have been…
BILL YATES: Painful? Expensive?
JACQUES BARREAU: Less, yeah, more painful, more expensive. And, yeah.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
WENDY GROUNDS: With age comes wisdom.
BILL YATES: That’s right.
Jacques’ Career
WENDY GROUNDS: What were you doing before? What was your career?
JACQUES BARREAU: I mean, before Grain de Sail, the offshore wind. And before the offshore wind I was working in IT, technology, electronics development. So, it was mostly some engineering developments for digital TV, all the telecom networks and everything. But I learned at this time how to develop a project step by step. So somewhere I said that I’m the specialist to go from a PowerPoint slide to the real product.
WENDY GROUNDS: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Because most of the time we see some incredible slides. But I mean, the hardest part is to transform the idea in reality.
BILL YATES: That’s where the project managers come in, to get things done, yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Exactly.
BILL YATES: Become reality.
The Cost of Facing Resistance
WENDY GROUNDS: So, have you faced resistance, like from the traditional shipping or logistic industries? You know, have other people kind of looked at your project?
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. We have a resistance, not on the project itself. I mean, all our customers say, wow, your vessels are incredible. The way you are transporting goods, it’s just perfect. I mean, the service is 100% perfect. And thanks a lot. And it’s a great adventure. But there is an issue. Most of our customers don’t want to pay more compared to the classical maritime shipping.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: And frankly, it’s very hard to compete against the efficiency of the petrol.
BILL YATES: Sure.
JACQUES BARREAU: Because the way we are usually transporting, I mean, using big container ships and so on, we don’t pay the pollution, we don’t pay the underwater noises, and we don’t pay the climate change. So, it’s almost free to transport goods today. On our side, when it comes to design and build a cargo sailing boat, you pay the rigging, you pay a reinforced hull because the hull has to take all the effort from the rigging, you pay the keel, I mean, you pay for much more items compared to a classical vessel.
And just to give you an example, Grain de Sail II, it’s 52 meters long, cost approximately 10 million euros. The same vessel with the same capacity using only an engine would cost 5 million.
So, yeah, it’s more expensive to be compatible with the environment. But some customers don’t want to pay more. It’s a kind of financial habit. I mean, they used to pay almost nothing for the case. So, when it comes to pay more, sometimes kind of tricky. But we work very hard, I mean, to convince them that the normal price is on our side. So, we just take time to explain, and usually at the end it’s working. But it’s a tough job. It’s a tough job. Yeah.
BILL YATES: Yeah, I’d say. And of course, we’re going to put a link to this in the notes and the transcript. But the website does a great job of communicating all points, you know, from beginning to end until the coffee is in my coffee maker at my home or the chocolate is in my mouth. But it lets the customer and even your business partners see the vision behind the company and the reasons where these trade-offs are made and the vision that’s really driving this.
So, you’ve done a great job in that. That’s something that project managers have to do is communicate the why behind what this effort is they’re doing. I think you’ve done a great job with that.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. I used to work with what we call the planetary limits. I don’t know if you know the Doughnut Theory. It’s a specific diagram that is describing all the planetary limits we have to deal with. And there is nine limits, actually. And there is only one limit amongst the nine limits that is dealing with climate change, which means that we have eight other limits that we have to take into account, such as biodiversity, such as the land use change, the freshwater uses and so on. The Grain de Sail strategy is directly linked to these nine limits.
So, it’s not only the carbon footprint. It’s much wider than that. And it helps us to set up the right strategy and just by being compatible with what the environment is able to handle from eight billion people on the Earth.
BILL YATES: Right.
JACQUES BARREAU: I mean, we are producing pollutions. We are producing so many bad news for the environment that it’s time to be careful, definitely.
BILL YATES: Yeah, that’s true.
Hiring the Right People
WENDY GROUNDS: So, talking about structuring your project, you are coordinating food production, shipping operations. It’s very complex. How do you manage just that complexity in your day to day?
JACQUES BARREAU: On the maritime shipping activities, it’s mostly a question of hiring the right seafarers, hiring the right captain and so on. These guys know exactly how to handle a vessel like that. And especially we have some specialists of the sailing management. So, it’s something like seafarers that would be usually dedicated to the engine, and this guy is dedicated to piloting the wind engines, the rigging. And this kind of rigging is much better, is much bigger compared to a classical engine; but it’s a very tricky and very high knowledge that is absolutely mandatory in this kind of vessel. So yeah, for the maritime activity, the complexity is managed by hiring the right seafarers. That’s the only way to succeed.
WENDY GROUNDS: That’s the importance of having the right people on your team.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. And fortunately, the Grain de Sail communication helps us. We don’t have that much issue to hire the right people. But we have to be careful. Sometimes you have some seafarers that say, “Yeah, yeah, okay. I’m totally able to use your vessel.” And at the end, it’s not the case. So, yeah.
WENDY GROUNDS: It’s a risk.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, yeah, it’s a risk.
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm.
JACQUES BARREAU: So, we have to be very careful. We have to check the curriculum vitae just to see if everything is all right. But yeah, we have some very high-level, very high-skilled seafarers.
BILL YATES: Yeah. And as you pointed out on the food production side, the same is true. You know, you hire experts.
JACQUES BARREAU: Exactly.
To Master the Whole Value Chain
BILL YATES: That’s the interesting part to me, too. You know, one of your roles is to be that integrator, that communicator with the food production team and the transportation team, and make sure that “Here’s our estimate for how much, you know, how many tons of, let’s say, coffee beans we’re going to have on this date at this location. And as we get closer and the ship’s getting closer, let’s keep revising that, revising that, getting as accurate as possible.” Because that impacts how they’re going to load. And that’ll impact their ability to get things turned around. So, I imagine it puts a lot of emphasis on communication for you.
JACQUES BARREAU: We have to master the whole value chain.
BILL YATES: Yup.
JACQUES BARREAU: From, I mean, the loading, to the maritime transportation, to the chocolate transformation and coffee transformation. It’s, yeah, it’s a long chain, and we have to be synchronized on all these elements. And yeah, it’s kind of tricky. But, I mean, year after year we learn.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: And, I mean, today it’s working. Especially this year, it’s sometimes very hard to find the right primary materials because of the cost of the green coffee and the cost of the cocoa is very, very high due to the climate change. It’s a direct link with the climate change. And sometimes it’s very difficult to find the right quantity.
I remember even sometimes we’re not able to load the quantity we would need in the vessel just because there is not enough green coffee or not enough cocoa, cocoa mass. So, it’s tricky. I believe it’s temporary, even if the climate change will last again, probably one century again. I mean, it’s definitely an issue for us. But we have to adapt. We try to adapt our logistic strategy all the time to be able to produce enough. And especially our growth is kind of high. It’s something like 20% every year. So, it’s tricky.
BILL YATES: Must be challenging. Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Challenging, yes.
BILL YATES: That’s a good, a good problem to have, yeah.
Buy-In from Stakeholders
WENDY GROUNDS: You have stakeholders in New York and in Latin America. How did you get the buy-in from these places? How did you secure that contact and to be able to convince them like, this is what we want to do. You want to come onboard. How did you win over your stakeholders?
JACQUES BARREAU: At the beginning, we went directly in New York. Yeah, for the wines, especially for the French wines at the beginning, we had a lot of appointments on the restaurant just to discuss, to try to feel what was a market in New York. And it takes time. It takes something like three years to understand the market and to find the right wines to sell in New York coming from France.
Then we have done the same thing at the beginning to understand what kind of green coffee, what kind of cocoa we would need to produce the chocolates. So we went in Dominican Republic, we went in Peru, Mexique, and so on just to, yeah, to learn and to understand. And it cost a lot of money at the beginning to do it. But it was absolutely mandatory for us to learn and to understand the whole value chain and to find the right primary materials. I mean, the quality of the coffee and the quality of the chocolate is directly coming at the beginning from the primary material quality.
BILL YATES: Yes, mm-hmm.
JACQUES BARREAU: And especially when it’s organic. There is less choice when it’s organic. And hopefully, I mean, now we have a guy that is working with us full time. It’s Javier. This guy is working in Ecuador, and he helped us to find the right products. And yeah, he’s full time for Grain de Sail. He’s speaking Spanish and so on. He knows the coffee and chocolate. He’s the right specialist for us.
Keeping True to the Mission
BILL YATES: That’s good. As you expand, again, you have this balance of trying to be as eco-friendly and efficient as possible, but also wanting to have a sustainable business. And then, you know, 20% growth year over year. That’s difficult. That’s a good problem, as I mentioned, but it’s still difficult.
JACQUES BARREAU: It is. It is.
BILL YATES: So how do you continue to keep this balance and stay true to your mission of sustainability?
JACQUES BARREAU: Actually, the size of Grain de Sail II has been designed in order to be able to bring all our goods until 2030. So, we have the time to feed this vessel completely. And we know that, by the end of ‘27, we will have Grain de Sail III, so it’s not going to be an issue.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: But yes, the size of Grain de Sail II was indeed – we had to design it just to be sure that we would be able to bring 100% of our primary materials using this vessel only, with only one, one Grain de Sail II.
BILL YATES: Right. Oh, wow.
JACQUES BARREAU: 350 tons. I mean, the navigation is five loops per year, which means that the import capacity of Grain de Sail II is five times 350 tons. So it’s huge, actually. And it’s far enough for us. So, yeah.
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm. That’s good. Yeah, that’s some high-level math and forecasting. That’s fantastic.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
Other Products to Transport
WENDY GROUNDS: So, you have wine on the ships. You have chocolate and coffee. Is there anything else that you transport?
JACQUES BARREAU: So, we used to, yeah, to bring wine, excellent French wines from Burgundy, Bordeaux, and so on. It’s very, very high quality. We also used to bring some luxury product, perfumes and bags for women, and clothes sometimes, pharmaceutical product sometimes, chocolate from Grain de Sail, of course. And I mean, it’s somewhere on what France is able to do. I mean, the best products from France are transported with Grain de Sail II. And I used to say we want to transport goods that deserved to be transported.
BILL YATES: Ah.
JACQUES BARREAU: And it’s a new way of thinking the maritime shipping. When we see the absolutely huge container ship, most of the goods that are transported by these vessels are a poor-quality product, very cheap product, made in very poor social conditions. Do we really need this kind of transport? No.
And the only way to reduce the carbon footprint of the maritime shipping is, of course, to produce some specific vessel like the vessels from Grain de Sail. But we also need to reduce the amount of goods transported across the road. If we don’t do it, there is no chance to achieve the final goal of the International Maritime Organization that says that by 2050 we will have to be at zero net emissions.
BILL YATES: Wow.
JACQUES BARREAU: Zero net. It’s not 50%. It’s a zero.
BILL YATES: Zero.
JACQUES BARREAU: So yeah, we have to work on the vessel itself using sails, I mean, all the low carbon solutions. But we also have to reduce the amount of merchandise. And to do it, the first solution is to relocalize all the product that can be relocalized. It’s very important, the first step.
The second one is to transport less, transport better, as I said, and especially for the maritime shipping. The third important step is to produce a better quality. The quality of the product is important. A product, an object that will last much longer, an object that can be repaired, and a project that can be recycled at the end.
BILL YATES: Right.
JACQUES BARREAU: And for the food, it’s using also the organic product. And the fourth step, it’s for all of us, I mean, the consumer. We have to shift from an economy based on the quantity to an economy based on the quality. Because when you are buying a high-quality product, you will buy less product. Instead of, just an example, instead of buying 10 T-shirts made in poor social conditions, and in a very poor quality that will be almost destroyed after two or three washes, for 50 euros you can buy two T-shirts, high-quality T-shirts for 50 euros also. But this T-shirt will last much longer and will generate less pressure on the environment. So, it’s a shift between the economy based on the quantity, we have to shift to the quality.
BILL YATES: Yeah, that makes sense.
JACQUES BARREAU: And that’s about it. It’s simple, but it’s very tricky because we’re all used to buy more and more.
BILL YATES: Right.
JACQUES BARREAU: I mean, thanks to the marketing and so on. So, it’s a total change of habits.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: And the way we are consuming. And it’s going to take a very, very long time before, I mean, everybody will shift to this new way of buying. It’s a mind shift, indeed.
Financial, Environment and Social Equity
BILL YATES: That’s a good way to describe it. So, what qualities have been most critical in managing this really complex and pioneering business that you and your brother created?
JACQUES BARREAU: The quality was probably the most important value at the beginning. Because, I mean, the quality has to be everywhere. It’s the quality of the product; it’s the quality of our transportation, maritime transportation; the quality of our specialists and so on. So that’s the first important strategy we wanted to include in the Grain de Sail company. And the next one is to develop a company that is in the right equilibrium between the three pillars.
BILL YATES: Yup.
JACQUES BARREAU: The first one is the financial sustainability of the company. It’s important to make profits. If you don’t make profits, the company won’t be sustainable. So definitely the first pillar, the most important is to have a profitable company. But those profits have to be addressed to the environment and the social equity first. And maybe at the end, to me and my brother and, I mean, all the other financial partners. But the equilibrium of the three pillars is definitely the key. And I believe that the company of this new century, the 21st Century, will definitely have to be compatible with this equilibrium. Because so far, for decades, all the company has been built only…
BILL YATES: The financial.
JACQUES BARREAU: …on the financial value.
BILL YATES: Mm-hmm, yup.
JACQUES BARREAU: And this incredibly high growth of the financial value generates so many issues on the environment and even on the social equity. It’s not sustainable. That’s it.
The Rewards
WENDY GROUNDS: Looking at the project yourself, what has been the most rewarding thing for you?
JACQUES BARREAU: To see our products on the shops, to see people testing products and say, “Yeah, it’s great. Oh, congratulations.” And, yeah. I was not coming from the food and process activity. So, the first time I discovered my chocolate tabs on the shop, it was incredible. And, yeah. Oh, great. These are my products.
BILL YATES: Yeah. That had to be a breakthrough.
JACQUES BARREAU: And frankly, the second surprise when I see the first vessel, Grain Sail I sailing.
BILL YATES: That had to be, yeah, that had to be amazing.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah, totally amazing. I mean, the real beginning of the adventure. And it was in 2020 when this vessel had done the first crossing between Saint-Malo in France – because our main harbor is Saint-Malo. Saint-Malo is an incredible harbor with a lot of history. And I remember this day, it was a very sunny day, very cool, but very sunny day. The ship left the Saint-Malo harbor with New York as a destination. And the seafarers arrived in New York. Three weeks later, it was minus five degrees with snow. And it was during the COVID.
BILL YATES: Yes, right, 2020, yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: There was nobody on the streets.
BILL YATES: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: But, you know, that was the adventure. And we have some video, some footage of this crossing. It’s, yeah, it was the real beginning of the adventure at this time.
BILL YATES: That’s amazing.
WENDY GROUNDS: Yeah, gosh. Have you taken the voyage yourself? Have you been on a few trips?
JACQUES BARREAU: No, not yet. I mean, I made a few trips from Saint-Nazaire in the south of Brittany. But I don’t have the time to cross the Atlantic. It’s a shame. I will do it one day for sure. But I have to pilot the company during this time. The seafarers are piloting the vessel on this.
BILL YATES: Yes.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah.
WENDY GROUNDS: Yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: One day I promise I will go in the U.S. in a low-carbon way. And especially with the satellite, I mean, I can work.
BILL YATES: You can stay connected, yeah.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. I can’t be connected in the vessel.
Find Out More
WENDY GROUNDS: So finally, can you direct our audience where they can find out more, if they want to find out more about your company?
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. If they want to have all the information on Grain de Sail, we have a website. It’s https://graindesail.com/en/– graindesail is one word – with a French and English version. They will learn everything about the adventure.
WENDY GROUNDS: Can they buy your products online?
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. We also have a website, it’s graindesail-overseas.com, that allows the American people to buy all the chocolate tabs from Grain de Sail.
BILL YATES: This has been such an inspiring conversation. When I look at what you and your brother and your team have done…
JACQUES BARREAU: Thank you.
BILL YATES: …it’s just remarkable. We’ve had a lot of fun with this podcast talking through other sustainability initiatives. And this one is right there at the top. It’s like thinking about how to transform the shipping and cargo industry and take advantage of wind power. This is so inspiring. Thank you. And thanks for sharing some of the challenges and some of the thoughts that went into this as you guys learned as you went, because that’s what you’ve really done. That’s amazing. Well done.
JACQUES BARREAU: Yeah. The future can be positive. We have many issues to face; but with the right ideas, it’s possible to do much better compared to what we’re doing today. So, yeah.
Closing
WENDY GROUNDS: That’s it for us here on Manage This. Thank you for hanging out with us today. It’s always a pleasure to have you along for the ride. Don’t forget, you can visit us anytime at Velociteach.com to subscribe, catch up on past episodes, or read the full transcript of today’s show.
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Photo credits: LoysLeclerq L20naval
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