Organic Trade Association Creating Team Culture Event in Chicago

The Organic Trade Association brought 19 leaders together at SPINS in Chicago for a Creating a Team Culture team culture event in Chicago, Illinois. The goal was to find the right balance between meaningful learning and genuine fun, and the group delivered on both counts. Participants worked through the session with real openness. What could have stayed polite actually moved the needle. The afternoon closed with a round of Minute to Win It challenges that landed exactly the right way.

The Organic Trade Association is the leading trade association for the organic industry in North America. The organization serves businesses across the organic supply chain, from producers and processors to retailers and importers. They advocate for policies that support organic growth and consumer confidence. OTA members represent a significant portion of the $60 billion U.S. organic market.

Organic Trade Association Finds the Sweet Spot Between Learning and Fun at Team Culture Event in Chicago

The group arrived at SPINS with a mix of leaders across different roles. The Creating a Team Culture session gave them a framework for understanding how the people around them actually operate. The work was reflective but never felt heavy. Participants leaned into the material with genuine curiosity, and conversations that might have stayed surface-level in another setting went somewhere real.

What emerged over the course of the session was a clearer picture of both familiar and unfamiliar truths about their colleagues. The kind of shared understanding that comes from this format is hard to manufacture any other way. By the time they had worked through the core content, the group had already built something useful. They had tools to take back to their day-to-day work.

Then came the Minute to Win It challenges, and the energy in the room shifted into a completely different gear. After a session built on reflection and honest conversation, the competition brought out the competitive side of the group. They had been holding it in all morning. The challenges were the right kind of ridiculous. The laughter they produced was a natural release for a group that had spent the morning doing real thinking together.

The afternoon ended in a two-way tie for first place. That felt like the most fitting outcome possible for a group that balanced thoughtfulness and play so well all day.

We’d like to thank the Organic Trade Association for carving out time for this kind of experience. They brought a group that got out of it exactly what they put in.