The titular serviceberry serves as an all-encompassing metaphor for the importance of gift economies, embodying Kimmerer’s thematic focus on the natural world as inspiration for economic reform. The book itself opens with a florid description of the process of harvesting the fruit of the serviceberry, a process that Kimmerer uses to introduce her readers to more complex models of economic systems and human interactions. The plant itself is a product of a natural exchange of resources, while the harvesting of the fruit provides a framework for a sustainable economic model that, Kimmerer believes, will allow human society to thrive. Kimmerer predicates her book on the analogy of the serviceberry, encouraging readers to draw inspiration from its example just as she has, and uses it as a launching point for her broader advocacy for environmental causes and her critiques of capitalist systems. Just as her friends Paulie and Ed opened up their farm to the public, hoping that people would try the berries one time and return to the farm in the future, Kimmerer hopes that the serviceberry will motivate readers to implement the lesson of the text in their lives and communities, catalyzing grassroots reform.