Dear friends of the MREA, 

If you live in Wisconsin and care about our energy future, you likely know Cal Couillard. You may also know his inspiring family and the great people who have led the Couillard Solar Foundation. Beyond just knowing these good folks, many of us have directly benefited from their work. I’ll leave it to others to detail the hundreds of solar projects on schools, churches, food banks, and community serving institutions made possible by the foundation. You can see their transformational accomplishments on their website. 

I’m writing today to tell you a few things that you likely haven’t heard and that you won’t find through an internet search. I’ll first say that Cal and the foundation have done more for us at the MREA, and for the many people we work with, than I have space to write in this short letter. Instead of an exhaustive list, I’d like to share two quick stories that give some added color to their work. 

In 2018, a few disreputable solar companies were causing trouble in Wisconsin and surrounding states. Through our Grow Solar group buy programs, the MREA was caught off guard by a company that stranded sixteen customers in a program we ran in the Eau Claire area.

These purchasers had paid down payments with nothing to show for it and were collectively out over $100,000. The company had stolen millions of dollars from people in Wisconsin and Minnesota, declared bankruptcy, and was under investigation by the Minnesota attorney general. Despite our best efforts, the customers that purchased through our program had no good options. 

I explained the situation to Cal during one of our many conversations about the potential of the solar market in Wisconsin. The next day, Cal donated a shipping container full of solar modules to the MREA, allowing us to sell them to raise funds or provide modules directly to affected customers so they could complete their projects with a different installation company. 

On another occasion, Cal had met the mayor of a small town in Puerto Rico that had suffered from a hurricane that decimated the island and its electrical infrastructure. I had talked with Cal about the conversation and let him know that the MREA had staff with experience in Puerto Rico and were fluent in Spanish, had instructors that could teach solar and energy storage courses, and that we might be able to help.

Once again on the very next day, Cal told me to get a plan together for assistance, and he would fund it if it looked promising. For the next two years, Cal and his wife Laurie not only funded multiple training courses and installations in the community, but traveled to meet the people being served by the effort. I had the opportunity to travel with them. During the trip, I learned that they are quite simply people you want to be friends and neighbors with. 

Cal and Laurie Couillard with their MREA Avenue of Advocates tree awarded in 2022.

Over the years I have learned a bit more: They are people that motivate others to do more and to be more.

I share these stories to show how the Couillard Solar Foundation has gone above and beyond to advance their mission (and how they have done much more than we may ever know). Shortly after I first met Cal Couillard, I called him a unicorn. He was nonplussed. I used the term because, though we are blessed to know a few at MREA, it is rare to find someone that gives so generously and strategically for a cause without regard to self-promotion. In typical Cal fashion, his response was to say, “We’ll need to breed a heard of unicorns!”

This is the part of the story where you come in. 

Cal and his family have done most of what they set out to do: Give the money they could in support of causes that lead to a better world for their grandkids and ours. This method of giving is straightforward and sincere. It is also a recipe for a prosperous future.  

Today, thousands of families in Wisconsin have more to give than the Couillards ever had. It is not money to donate that makes Cal and his family unicorns; it is a recognition that real wealth comes in the form of shared progress. They don’t have magic horns or rainbow powers. They have a willingness to act and a trust in good people. They hold the same message that Charles Dickens gave us in A Christmas Carol — that people are worth your investment, and the good life is a life shared with those around us. 

If you’ve made it to the end of this letter, I have a request for you. Don’t wait to be scared out of your slumber by the ghost of Christmas future. Take inspiration from the Couillard family and join their growing herd of unicorns. You and the place you call home will be better for it. We need you now more than ever. 

So, three cheers to the Couillards and to all of the fledgling unicorns out there! 

With much gratitude and respect, 

Nick Hylla

MREA Executive Director