Wallach Gets Nod For IRTA
Hall-Of-Fame Award
(Introduction by Krista
Vardabash)
The International Reciprocal Trade Association?s Hall-Of-Fame is
the highest honor IRTA bestows. The honor recognizes individuals
whom the Hall Of Fame Inductees feel are regarded as an
?indisputable leader in the barter industry.?
What makes an indisputable leader? Someone who has been in the
barter industry for at least 10 continuous years, and has made
universally recognized and specific contributions to the barter
industry as a whole. Above all, inductees must be regarded in the
industry as highly professional and ethical.
I think many of you will agree that this description is just not
big enough to adequately describe the person who we induct tonight
to the IRTA Hall of Fame. David Wallach began his career in the
Barter Industry in 1976, when he became associated with barter
pioneer George Maddox of the United Trade Club.
In 1979 Dave founded his own exchange, the American Trade
Association. In that year he joined IRTA and attended the first
general meeting in San Jose, California. He has been a continuous
member of IRTA ever since.
By 1986 American Trade Association had grown to be one of the top
ten exchanges in the United States. David was an early innovator and
visionary. He was the first to introduce seller paid service fees,
maintain member reserve accounts, and integrate media ratio trading
into the retail barter environment.
In 1988, Dave received his first IRTA Distinguished Service Award
when he worked to defeat legislation that, if enacted, would have
had dire consequences not only in California but throughout the
entire industry.
Dave began a program of consolidation in 1995 when he purchased
five local trade exchanges and renamed his company ValueCard. By
2000, ValueCard was the largest independent trade exchange on the
West Coast with almost 4,000 clients, and the third largest exchange
in the nation. Dave sold ValueCard to Intagio, a dot-com company, in
2001.
Over the years, David has worked tirelessly to unite the
industry. He has chaired the Ethics, Media, Government Affairs, and
Awards committees. He was vice president of the IRTA North American
Board, and to this day serves on the IRTA Global Board.
Dave continues to have a vision for the worldwide trade industry.
He feels that the trade currency system could benefit the world
economy, especially in developing economy?s that are short on cash
and long on excess capacity. He believes that our commercial
currency could raise the world?s standard of living, and provide a
substantial increase in nutrition, education and healthcare. He has
attended conferences focused on developing alternative currencies,
and as result is studying viable synergies between commercial barter
and community currency systems.
In his local community David is well known for his charitable and
humanitarian work. The Leukemia Society of Northern California
recognized David naming him the 1992 Man of Year. He has also been a
fifteen-year active board member of an organization in San Francisco
that teaches homeless people how to feed themselves.
His three-decade long career continues to be a glowing example of
industry service, sharing of expertise, innovation, ethics,
leadership and vision. Not to mention that he is just a great guy.
For all of these reasons, and for many more that I am certain to
have missed, I am deeply honored to present IRTA?s 2006 Hall of Fame
inductee, David Wallach.
Hall Of Fame Acceptance Speech
By David Wallach
It is a great pleasure for me to be here with you tonight.
As many of you know, because of some very serious health issues I
was unable to attend last year?s convention. In July of 2005 my
doctors gave me between four and seven months to live. They were
mistaken.
I want to give my thanks for the overwhelming and prayerful
support I have received from my friends in the industry, my family
and loved ones. I am absolutely sure that this wonderful outpouring
is the reason I am here tonight.
I was deeply moved, and totally blown away, when I was informed
by Krista and the IRTA Global Board of Directors that I was to be
inducted in to the Barter Hall of Fame.
It will be a great honor to have my name listed and along side
barter industry greats, legends, leaders and visionaries. Hall of
famers that are present please stand up as I call your names...Bob
Meyer, Paul Suplizio, and Steve Webster.
These remarkable people represent an industry that has
collectively conceived, designed, shaped, defined, and brought to
the market place a system of currency that expresses the ultimate in
business efficiency and ecology.
This is my 30th year in this fantastic industry: and what a wild
and wonderful ride it has been and continues to be. Because of
opportune timing, I have had the privilege to witness and
participate in some of the most historic events that have formed our
business.
IRTA was our first governing body, and from its inception has
provided the organization, the wisdom, and a dedicated cadre of
leaders that seem to have always been there at exactly the right
time.
The people of IRTA have negotiated industry legal status with the
federal governments, provided a code of ethics, put into place
financial standards, organized corporate operators, and has members
and affiliates world wide.
From Paul Suplizio to Krista Vardabash, we have been and still
are, in great hands. As we bring our burgeoning industry into the
twenty-first century, we can be confident that a strong foundation
and framework for future growth, has been put into place.
At this point, the Alternative Business Currency Industry has an
estimated global business client base of 400,000. This number,
though impressive, represents a relatively small share...less than
one-half of one-percent of the estimated total of 65 to 100 million
businesses worldwide.
By achieving a 20% market penetration, we would welcome 13 to 20
million new business users into our currency systems. Obviously we
need to apply some serious resources to the task of impacting this
huge market with our positive message. Before organizing this huge
undertaking, we need to be assured that the information and message
imparted truly represents what we do.
During early development, our product concept was defined as
administrating the process of ?bartering, trading and exchanging.?
At some point in our learning curve we have discovered that we do
not engage in any of those activities. Much of the confusion about
our product can be directly traced to our use of the words trade,
barter and exchange...these words wrongly describe what we do.
We do not trade, barter or exchange. Each of those processes
implies a direct exchange of a product or service between two or
more parties usually at the time of the transaction. Besides these
descriptions and terms conjure up images of an ancient market place,
where merchants hawk their wares...bargaining, bickering and taking
advantage of one other.
We operate an ultra-modern currency system that allows businesses
to mutually access and utilize their excess capacities of products,
services, labor, space or time to their profit. And the whole
world?s economies benefit.
Our business currency systems use the latest computers, software,
web related communication, and credit card technologies in a
cooperative climate that facilitates millions of client buy and sell
transactions.
We need to clarify and re-brand our product conception in order
to more correctly describe and identify what our industry is about.
In short we do not need to change what we do but how we define what
we do.
By clarifying our definition we will be even more successful in
demonstrating to the business and financial community how to use our
currency to access and profit from what is unsold and wasted.
Our currency of the unsold, transforms inventories that are
neglected and wasted into useful resources that capitalize
businesses, create employment, and stimulate the world?s economy.
For the most part, those resources that go unsold for cash are
forever lost and totally wasted. Worldwide, this totals in the
trillions of euros in lost business and tax revenues. Lost and
forgotten revenues that could provide for fuller employment,
education, healthcare and nutrition, for millions of struggling
people worldwide.
As business ecologists it is our mission to provide a viable and
dynamic system of currency that facilitates the profitable use of
what goes unsold, unused and forgotten. Now is the time for our
industry to unite, and then go forward to fulfill its destiny.
We need to tell our story in a clear and understandable way, to a
world that is ready and waiting for solutions to problems our
product can and will answer.
Please be assured that I am with you until the very end.
(For further coverage
of the 2006 IRTA Awards Banquet Presentation
click here.)
Around The World. . .
-
Trade through barter encouraged...Mehmet
Burkay, Bursa branch chairman of the Association of independent
industrialists and businessmen (MUSIAD), said that a Foreign
Trade Ministry should be founded in order for Turkey to increase
its exports.
He suggested that trade through barter be encouraged with
neighboring countries such as Iran and Russia, which are in need
of foreign exchange.
For the list of five barter companies located in Turkey see:
http://www.barternews.com/mappage/worldwide.htm.
-
Barter in Iran...Nearly 500 foreign
and domestic companies have applied for a newly established
Iranian Barter Market. It?s predicted that the market will be
capable of handling up to 20% of the nation?s business affairs.
Barter deals are expected to be carried out through bank drafts
for safety and convenience.
-
Powerful megatrend to continue...The
International Monetary Fund (IMF) says that China is the world?s
leading economic powerhouse, pushing global growth to its
highest pace since the early 1970s. It is anticipated that China
will grow a whopping 10% this year, as well as another 10% next
year. A growth that?s three times faster than the U.S., and far
faster than any of the leading industrial nations in the world,
including Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Canada.
Hotel
General Managers
Here?s
The Easiest $100,000 You?ll Ever
Bring To The Bottomline!
Collect
cash, as usual, from the guest accounts staying at your
facility that require the use of professional AV services.
And rather than shouldering your ongoing employee costs, or
your current vendor?s cash agreement for AV services,
here?s a much better alternative:
Work
with a proven national vendor (a sterling 25-year track
record) who will provide all of the AV services for your
hotel on a 100% TRADE BASIS! (Payment to be in the form of
hotel rooms and/or trade dollars.)
Your hotel?s annual AV billings must be a minimum of $200,000, and this
offer is available only in the continental United States.
For a
confidential introduction contact Bob Meyer via e-mail:
bmeyer@barternews.com.
(Please type in AV Services On Trade in the subject
line of your e-mail.)
Attention Trade Exchange Owners:
If your
member hotel(s) have a minimum of 10,000 sq. feet of meeting
space and annual billings of at least $200,000 for AV
services this is a great opportunity to earn substantial
cash service fees on the hundreds of thousands of trade
dollars your hotel member will be paying the vendor. Contact
Bob Meyer at the above e-mail. |
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