When I interviewed Cinnamon Cooper of Poise Bags I have to admit I was a bit taken aback when she told me that one of the primary reasons she started her business was to extend her ability to support the charities and causes most close to her heart. Her reasoning was basically that on her income at the time there was a limit to how much she could donate, but that if her business was able to bring in more money then some of the proceeds of her endeavour could be directed to charities. Businesses donating a portion of their profits to charity is really nothing new, but it is really pretty exciting when you get to be the one at the helm of a business and deciding where you’re business donations will go.
A few of the women we interviewed in our book make charitable giving a regular part of their business plan, and recently our good pals over at Lunapads started a partnership with a very cool organization called Good 4 Girls to donate their washable menstrual products to schoolgirls in Africa. One of the really exciting things about this project that makes it a bit different from some other business donation programs is that Lunapads has also empowered their customers to get involved directly by making special kits available on their site (at a “no-profit” price) so that customers can purchase products to be donated directly on their behalf. If you want to read more about this program and what Lunapads is doing, check out their blog post about it here. If you’d like to donate to Good 4 Girls they have two kits available: the Lunapads Kit and the Lunapanties Kit, both of which you can purchase at their website and they will arrange the shipping to get them to Good 4 Girls.
So what about you? If you have/dream of having your own business what kinds of organizations and charities might you support with a portion of your profits?
4 responses so far ↓
1 Tiara // Apr 8, 2008 at 8:43 pm
I’d like to support places that support young people and their dreams. Organizations that give confidence to young people that their dreams are valid, that they have every right to pursue their passions no matter how unorthodox they are, and to give them support to help them on their way.
(btw: question about the book - is there a way to obtain a copy while paying through paypal? I’d like to buy one, but I’m in Australia and would rather not use a CC.)
2 Emira // Apr 9, 2008 at 11:15 am
Tiara, that’s a great cause to support. If you find yourself involved in that kind of work, please update us and let us know!
As for the book. We may be making a few copies available for sale through this site in May, so check back. We would be doing so through PayPal, so that would definitely be a possibility. We’d just need to figure out shipping to Australia from Canada.
3 Tiara // Apr 9, 2008 at 7:19 pm
Well I do that sort of work, in a way; my EducateDeviate blog has plenty of resources to support young’s people wishes no matter their educational goal or style. There’s also Pursue the Passion (http://pursuethepassion.com) which involves students interviewing people from different career paths to find out what their passion is (RoadTrip Nation does much of the same).
4 Kim // Apr 14, 2008 at 11:01 am
Through my business I support a woman in Rwanda through http://womenforwomen.org. It’s a wonderful organization that helps women in war-torn countries to learn basic business skills and a trade so that they can start their own within a year.
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