My first introduction to Granny's Finest was with founder Niek van Hengel, an inspired young man.
"He makes knitting grannies hip"
Niek told how, when he was a student, he had asked his grandmother to knit a warm shawl for him. Later, when Niek struck up a conversation with another elderly lady who was knitting at his grandmother's care home, he noticed her loneliness. The lady was knitting for knitting's sake. Every time she finished, she would pull the knitting apart and start again.
'Unfortunately, I have no one to knit for,' said the elderly lady. That hit Niek.
Together with his friend Jip Pulles, the idea of a 'social enterprise' was born. They won many prizes and awards and their story captures the imagination of many. Meanwhile, Granny's Finest counts 17 'knitting clubs' in our country's major cities. Niek told me how he uses Google and Salesforce for the organisation. He uses Salesforce.org with its favourable schemes for non-profit organisations.
Meanwhile, g-company has adopted Granny's Finest.
We help Granny's Finest with its goals of being a healthy business where the well-being of the elderly is paramount. We use Salesforce and Social Collaboration Technologies like Chatter to stimulate the social wellbeing of the elderly. Grannies choose for themselves, for example through an iPad present at the knitting club, from the knit kits to be knitted on the website www.grannysfinest.com stand.
The knit-kit is linked to the granny to facilitate later communication with the buyer and the granny.
The attendance of the grannies at the knitting clubs is tracked and so in the absence of a loyal visitor, this is signalled immediately. The coordinator of the knitting club will inquire about her and in case of illness, for example, a card is written or a visit is made.
This granny tries Google Glass out. For now, this application is still future music although the ladies thought it was quite a cool gadget!
