Add a little social good to your home during the holidays with a few new items. Below are some simple ways to introduce your home to social good and ethical products. Think of small ways you can start social gooding each room in your home. Little items can sometimes have great impact and these products prove that.
Coffee
734 Coffee is the social enterprise arm of Humanity Helping Sudan Project(HHSP), a nonprofit dedicated to providing Sudanese refugees the tools and knowledge they need to achieve self-sufficiency. Manyang Reath Kher, founder of HHSP, began the organization with hope in his heart after having lived in several refugee camps along the Sudanese and Ethiopian border.
Offering vocational programs, access to clean water, and farming tools, HHSP has helped hundreds of Sudanese refugees start a new, prosperous life. At 734 Coffee, 80% of products go to scholarships and the education programs for refugees of Sudan. This means every bag of coffee purchased provides one more day of school for 4 refugees. Check out their awesome coffee here.
Hammock
Hammocks are an awesome mobile and lightweight way to get comfortable anywhere in your home. Summer time outdoor hammocks are pretty sweet, but during the holidays you can also use it indoors in a living room, bedroom or basement.
Check out Yellow Leaf Hammocks. They are breaking the cycle of extreme poverty through sustainable job creation. They use amazing and talented artisan weavers who were historically trapped in extreme poverty. Now they are empowered to earn a stable, healthy income through dignified work. This is the basis for a brighter future and community, built on a hand up, not a handout. Check out their great collection here.
Razor
We all shave, whether its our face, legs, or whatever else, the blade is our friend. Instead of using lower quality, overpriced regular razors try out Harry’s. They provide amazing shaving products including razors, creams and lotions. Also they give 1% of Harry’s sales to City Year’s New York chapter. That means 1% of every purchase of Harry’s product, online or wholesale, goes to the organization. There is no cap to the amount of money they give to City Year. Check out their product line here.
Food/Snack/Breakfast
For a quick breakfast or a quick snack try a granola bar from This Bar Saves Lives. Every year, severe acute malnutrition claims the lives of 2.6 million children. That’s one child every 12 seconds. But here’s the thing…it’s preventable. Children suffering from severe acute malnutrition have a low weight-for-height ratio and suffer from wasting (extreme thinness) or edema (swelling)—often resulting from illness and a lack of nutritious foods in their diet. The bars are all-natural, non-GMO, gluten free, kosher, and just plain awesome. For every bar you buy, a packet of life-saving food is given to a child in need. Check out their nutritious life saving bars here.
Teeth
Bogobrush aims to not only produce a 100% biodegradable toothbrush but to help someone in need with their plan to give a Bogobrush away to someone who needs one with every one that is purchased. Bogobrush believes the world deserves a toothbrush worth caring about. They believe that it starts with knowing where it came from, and how it was made. They believe it grows from an attention to aesthetics that will make you smile, and deepens with the beauty of giving back to someone in need. Check out their brushes here.
Furniture
Anew Nature is a St. Louis based furniture restoration and design house They have partnered with MIssion: St. Louis, a local non profit to teach Vocational skills to marginalized inner city men . They use their work to teach a not for profit vocational training class to unemployed, at risk men. Many of these men have a slim chance for finding gainful employment due their felony convictions. The company was born out of the need to create jobs and lasting change in the lives and neighborhoods of their early interns. They also manufacture, refinish and re-design pieces to fund the teaching of a new vocational training class. Check out their amazing furniture.
Kitchen
Rose & Fitzgerald is based in Kampala, Uganda, they collaborate with local artisans to create a line of high-quality accessories. Its focus is on handmade products, contemporary design, natural materials and local economic development. Each product they design is handmade from start to finish in a workshop in Uganda—giving the pieces a heart, soul, and story. They aim to forge the future by looking toward the forgotten places—shedding light on over-looked talent, designing and creating rare goods from far away places—all with the intention of surrounding ourselves with beauty that makes us feel more alive. Check out their products here.
Bathroom
Hand in Hand Soap was conceived in 2011 by two social entrepreneurs who believe that business can do so much more than just make money. Understanding the difficulty that most non-profits face trying to obtain funding, married couple Courtney and Bill set out to start a business based on sustainable giving. By directly tying charitable donations to the sale of an everyday product, Hand in Hand is able to give soap and clean water to those in need and save lives without depending on a single donation.
For every product purchased, Hand in Hand donates a bar of soap and provides a month of clean water to children in need. For this particular collection Hand in Hand provides essential small business loans to entrepreneurs in Haiti to create jobs & strengthen communities. Espere is the Haitian Creole word for “hope.” Check out the Espere collection here.
