The post Holiday Gift Guide: Gifts that Give Back! appeared first on All That's Fair..
]]>Chances are, you’ve been seeing quite a few holiday gift guides pop up on your favorite Web sites and blogs recently. How about one more? I’m sure I’m not the only one who doesn’t have my Christmas shopping done (right? Help me out here!)
This gift guide is a little bit different—it highlights some of our favorite ethical, fair trade, and charitable organizations. What’s better than giving a gift that gives twice, especially at Christmastime?
For Him:
1. Apolis. Apolis means “global citizen.” This socially motivated lifestyle brand empowers communities worldwide. With everything from ties to hats to beautiful Alpaca travel kits and chambray swim trunks, this brand guarantees a great high-quality gift for your guy!
2. LSTN headphones. Not only are these headphones stunning, but for every pair sold, LSTN helps restore hearing to a person in need through the Starkey Hearing Foundation. Starkey helps kids and adults in countries around the world, from India to Rwanda to the U.S. Bonus: you can buy these at Nordstrom!
For Her:
1. Rose & Fitzgerald. Based in Kampala, Uganda, Rose & Fitzgerald collaborates with local artisans to create a line of high-quality accessories. Beautiful handmade products with a contemporary design provide local local economic development in Kampala, Uganda. Stunning serving trays, jewelry and more make up the collection.
2. Della. If she loves fashion and accessories, this one’s for her! Their products are hand-crafted in Ghana, West Africa, and sold in Los Angeles. Through jobs, education and job training, the women who make these lovely pieces are given an opportunity for a better life. Check out this gorgeous iPad case!
For Littles:
1. Help Ink. This company describes their product as “inspirational art that gives to those in need” and their beautiful prints are perfect for a nursery or child’s room. They donate proceeds to a variety of worthy charities, including The Children’s Hunger Fund and Thirst Relief International.
For Families:
I think this is a fun category! If you know a family that you’d like to buy a “together” present for, for example, a family with several small children, how about something the whole group can love instead of individual gifts?
1. Love With Food. This unique company is a monthly subscription box for organic, all-natural snacks. For every box sent, they donate a meal to a food bank in America. What a great concept! And it’s a gift that keeps on giving—you can choose the number of boxes you want sent to the recipient, and they can always renew when their subscription runs out.
Stocking Stuffers:
1. Bombas Socks. These soft, comfortable socks come in fun, bright patterns and are high quality through and through. The company follows the one for one model—for each pair purchased, one pair is donated to a person in need.
2. Greenola Style. This company’s empowerment model is implemented holistically, providing the artisans with access to quality healthcare, design education, business training, and community building. They offer jewelry, gloves, hats and headbands, and more—at very affordable prices!
Have you heard of any of these companies before? If you have any others you’d like to share, I’d love for you to link them up in the comments! And don’t forget—free shipping on our site through Dec 19! Just enter the code FREESHIP14 at checkout!
XO,
Casey
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]]>The post Nula Kids {Friends With a Mission} appeared first on All That's Fair..
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It’s been a while since we’ve done a Friends With a Mission post! If you’ll recall, this is where we like to introduce you to some great companies we’ve come across who share a mission similar to ours. We all know that money is a powerful resource, one we can use to empower others. It’s fun to discover companies who find creative ways of doing just that—such as California-based Nula Kids! Nula is a sustainable children’s clothing company that came up with a fun concept: the clothes adjust to fit your ever-growing kids, so they can wear them for longer. Fun, right?
From the Nula Kids Website:
We started Nula to create a sustainable alternative to throw-away kids clothes by designing styles that grow with kids and obsessing over durable construction.
Inspired by a growing movement toward sustainable fashion and driven by a lack of options for kids, we teamed up to start Nula in 2012. After learning about the harmful effects of the global apparel industry we set out to solve the problems with sustainable kidswear – its high cost and short lifecycle.
We work with manufacturers in Los Angeles to make quality clothes that fit for three years. We visit them often. And we sell directly to our customers online to keep our prices as low as possible.
We started the kind of company we want to buy from – one that makes lasting goods in the US and provides affordable options for conscious consumers – founded on the belief that we shouldn’t have to accept products with mysterious origins, or settle for throw-away goods that fill up our homes and landfills and keep us coming back for more.
I love this concept. We all know how quickly kids grow, and buying new items only adds to the 25 billion pounds of textiles Americans throw out a year. So if you have little ones at home, I encourage you to give Nula Kids a try!
XO,
Casey
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Well friends,
February is somewhat of a drab month. I don’t think anyone’s denying that at this point. Why not spice it up a bit with a night in with friends? If you’re trying to incorporate more ethically produced goods and products into your everyday life, including fun evenings at home, today is your lucky day. 
It just so happens I’ve rounded up a few big-hearted buds to help us out with a festive winter soiree! It’s been a while since we featured some Friends With a Mission, so here we go!
What elements make up a fab foodie party? Well, the dinner is an obvious place to start. We’re serious about our food around here! And the hostess with the mostess, you can leave all the hard work to Global Grub and concentrate on enjoying your own party!
Here’s how it works, from their Web Site:
- Choose a cooking kit, stocked with high quality non-perishable ingredients that are pre-measured for you, and step-by-step instructions
- Pick up a few fresh/basic items from the included shopping list
- Begin your cooking adventure
- Enjoy your homemade dish with loved ones!
Pretty easy, right? And the best part: for every food kit sold, they donate the cost of a meal (based on the Feeding America Formula) to someone in need through their local food bank. Eat good, do good!
And what dinner party is complete without a little wine? I’m glad you brought that up:
OneHope Wine makes an impact with every bottle sold by donating HALF of the profits to
charitable partner causes. (And it’s good wine, people … it does come from California, after all!)
From their Web site:
ONEHOPE’s motivation began as a personal mission to help a
friend with her fight against cancer and evolved into a thriving business that
always remains focused on a very basic, but compelling principle: giving back is
good business. Eight founders came together in 2007 and created,
ONEHOPE Wine, with the goal of selling a quality wine that
would enable them to donate to worthy causes all year round.
So your dinner party is off to a great start! The key missing ingredient here, it seems, would be fair trade products to serve your delicious meal and wine in … and Seven Hopes United can definitely take it from here! Serve your yummy global grub on these Asanta reclaimed serving platters, pour the wine into these earthy red clay wine cups, and set the scene with this cheery paisley table runner.
Enjoy your “do good” dinner party, and don’t forget the fair trade chocolate and coffee for dessert!
XO,
Casey
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In keeping with our new “Friends With a Mission” series, today I bring you Krochet Kids—one of the most inspiring and fun organizations I’ve ever encountered! This clothing and accessories line comes from Northern Uganda and Peru, and each item has a note inside from the woman who created it.
You may recall that I attended the Fourth Estate Summit a while back, and had the pleasure of meeting the Krochet Kids folks at the Common Good Exchange. The heart of their story, from their Website, is this:
{MISSION
To empower people to rise above poverty.
VISION
To create sustainable economic development programs that support holistic growth of individuals and communities within developing nations.
To inspire the knowledge of a generation about their ability to bring change to a world that is in need.
VALUES
People: We desire holistic freedom for our people to grow and enrich their lives physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
Our Product: We believe in quality, handmade products that not only bring comfort and style but serve as a vehicle for social change.
Love: We believe actions rooted in love bring lasting and powerful change. Our model for love is that of the ultimate servant: Jesus.}
Krochet Kids is transforming Northern Uganda, as they put it, through “hook and yarn.” The founders, who were avid snowboarding enthusiasts, decided to make their own cozy headwear for the mountains and soon friends dubbed them the “krochet kids.” As these three high school boys began volunteering across the world, they began to realize they could empower communities through simply teaching the the craft they had grown to love.
Their story today is an inspiration to many:
“Today, over 150 people in Uganda and Peru are working, receiving education, and being mentored toward a brighter future in creating gifts that give back. The products created abroad have been well received here at home and the collaboration of our staff and beneficiaries around the globe has created a sustainable cycle of employment and empowerment.”
Krochet Kids’ line of soft, cozy clothing and accessories is perfect for any time of year. I had been eyeing this cute pocket hoodie for a while and today I decided to order it for my upcoming Fall camping trips and evenings spent around a bonfire!
Perfect, right?
We know you, our amazing socially minded readers, will enjoy the Krochet Kids cause and story (and beautiful products!) as much as we do. Enjoy!
XO,
Casey
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]]>The post Hope for Uganda appeared first on All That's Fair..
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Hello hello!
Sometimes, when you’re surfing the Internets and clicking on your usual blogs and favorite shopping sites (ahem, Seven Hopes), you come across something out of the ordinary. Something that ignites a spark of passion inside that you just want to share with the world.
So we thought it would be fun to begin a new series on this blog. A series that highlights organizations dedicated to improving the lives of our brothers and sisters across the globe. These companies will align with our mission of making the world a better place for all people.
A couple of months ago, while I was scrolling through my endless Twitter feed, I stumbled on a tweet from a company called Sole Hope. Sole Hope is dedicated to putting closed-toe shoes on African children, one pair at a time. The organization was born out of an American family’s desire to help improve the lives of children and adults in Uganda. Now based in Uganda, Sole Hope is transforming the face of hope on African soil.
Here in the US, it’s easy to take shoes for granted. And even if we go barefoot, we have little to concern us besides maybe some stray broken glass or a hot sidewalk. But for children in Uganda, going barefoot can lead to devastating consequences from an enormous problem known as jiggers.
The word “jiggers” may sound like the word “chiggers,” but the two are entirely different. Jiggers are small sand fleas that enter the feet and burrow deep inside. If left untreated, they can lead to infections, crippling pain and even amputations.
Here’s how Sole Hope helps (from their website):
Core Purpose
To effectively put in place preventive methods to combat diseases that enter through the feet and to create a positive physical and spiritual difference in the lives of individuals in impoverished communities.
Sole Hope not only removes jiggers and provides medical care for those affected; they sew close-toed shoes and distribute them to combat future problems caused by going barefoot. They also teach men and women in the region how to make the shoes, which generates jobs and provides lasting change in the fight against foot-related diseases.
There are a variety of ways we can help too, including hosting shoe-cutting parties (did someone say party?!), donating money, and becoming ambassadors. You can even travel to Uganda with Sole Hope! Read more about how to get involved, and watch the YouTube video that inspired the mission and vision of Sole Hope, at www.solehope.com.
Check back on the blog often to learn about more amazing organizations like Sole Hope! Next time, we’ll include information on how to travel with some of these groups—to transform and be transformed.
XO,
Casey
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