Black and White and Pink All Over

I admit it! I love women's magazines, and love to look at the latest fashions and read tips on how to live my my best life. So I pick up the latest O Magazine around Sept 20th, with Oprah in her hot pink outfit on the cover and I leaf through this issue fairly rapidly. Guess there wasn't that much that caught my interest. But after I finished, I had a strange image of the entire magazine as one big pink blur from cover to cover. Going back through the magazine my impression was verified with the images of pink clothing and lipstick interspersed with pages and pages of  pink ads promoting breast cancer awareness and research. So okay, October is coming up, which is National Breast Cancer Month and this was the October issue of  "O", but the odd thing was that for all the pink advertising there was not a single mention of  the specially dedicated month in any of the editorial pages.

Here are the companies and their ads in support of helping prevent and cure breast cancer.

Hanes Company and their support for the Susan B Komen's Pink For The Cure
Warrior in Pink, by Ford Motor company
Breast Cancer Research Foundation sponsored by Kmart
 "Shop Till You Stop Breast Cancer" page about products that contribute a portion of sales to support research, detection and treatment.
Ralph Lauren, Pink Pony
Vera Bradley with a note about their 10 million dollar contribution to breast cancer research

And to  "O" Magazine's credit, they ran a story about the latest advances on breast cancer research with a cover page of hundreds of female figurines standing  in a pink colored shape of a ribbon.
 
That's quite a lot of pink advertising-maybe not enough to provide the necessary resources to knock out a real killer of a disease. But as a consumer the effect of all this pink advertising interspersed with a lot of pink color on the fashion  pages, destroyed any impact that any one ad could have had on me. After my first skim through the magazine, not one company nor one non-profit stood out in my memory.

I applaud these companies like Ralph Lauren and others, doing whatever they can to help fight breast cancer, and I believe that "O" Magazine's intentions were to help promote this cause by having a such a pink colored issue. I would have preferred a little more thought to what the effects of creating this pink blur might have and a little more information about how to help beat breast cancer.

For more information on how you or your business can help support this cause in October, check out the site for the National Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Change the World and Look Good Doing It-GeboMana

Giving gifts the GeboMana way - fashionable organic T-shirts

With GeboMana, changing the world is as simple as changing your T-shirt.
GeboMana ships limited-edition, organic T-shirts; highly fashionable and handcrafted in Bali, Indonesia.

Each T-shirt comes hand-numbered as part of a limited edition range.

But what happens next is what has already caught the attention of people across the world, many weeks before the official launch of Gebomana.com. Every time 5 T-shirts are shipped an underprivileged child can start an education.

“It’s great receiving things from others but it feels so much better to be the one giving. So, here’s to 2010 the year for JOY to give!!! Watch my GeboMana giving tree grow!!! ;)” Joy P, London, UK

For the inaugural series of GeboMana T-shirts, “Bali Art goes to New York”, designers were briefed to incorporate traditional Eastern culture fused with fashion-forward, modern designs. Each design is screen printed by hand, then embellished and decorated by experts in Bali. The most elaborate GeboMana designs take a full eight hours to decorate!

Each T-shirt is handcrafted using certified organic Indian cotton, knitted to a superior cotton jersey for GeboMana. It’s shipped in an exclusive gift-box, direct to consumers in over 65 countries.

So wherever you are, it’s easy to start changing the world.

“Overall, great job guys! The T-shirts are lovely (very unique designs) and the packaging simple but very effective!" Marian F, Red Deer, Canada

The brainchild of Mike Boorn, of Sydney, Australia, GeboMana has been in constant development for the past four years. As such, the organisation has been launched as a strong collaboration that stretches across North America, Europe, Australia and Asia; with contributions from graphics artists, fashion designers and
craftspeople on different continents.

But that’s just where the giving starts. When you give the gift of GeboMana, you’re giving the gift of on-the ground education to underprivileged children in developing countries. You’re giving them the chance to lift themselves out of poverty and into prosperity.

All it takes is 5 T-shirts to give a child that gift of education in sustainable practices for a full year.

GeboMana makes it easy and convenient to give great fashion gifts and change lives at the same time. All you have to do is visit the site, www.GeboMana.com and click “New to GeboMana”. Within minutes you’ll be on your way to turning gift-giving into education!

"…just wanted to say a big thank you for my T-shirt.. It’s by far my favourite... Love your work, I'm a big fan."
Frank C, Sydney, Australia

For further details, please contact Mike Boorn, Founder, on mike@gebomana.com

Submitted by Mike Boorn. 

Thank you Mike!

7 Ways Small Business Can Embrace Social Responsibility

Small businesses may think that social responsibility does not apply to them because of the "C' word , the corporate, that stands in front of the "SR".  If one considers the fact that small businesses account for 70% of the work force, it is easy to see how small businesses have great potential for impact on social responsibility and philanthropy in their communities. Just as one example, consider the magnitude of the environmental impact alone of 70% of the people in the workplace.

By taking out the "C"  word out of Social Responsibility, small and mid-sized businesses can embrace social responsibility with the assurance that their contribution to society will have impact and will add value to their communities and to their business.

Here are seven ways that any sized business can embrace Social Responsibility.

1. Recycle
One just needs to go behind any business or business area to see  dumpsters full of  waste. Businesses generate all kinds of waste: electronic, paper, plastic,cardboard, food waste, printer ink cartridges, batteries, and office equipment that can all be recycled and saved from the landfill. Handing out recyclable bags to customers for their purchases and giving customers incentives for bringing in their bags can help businesses and communities stay green.

2. Reduce Your Energy Consumption
Turn off unnecessary lights in your business overnight. Replace light bulbs with energy efficient ones. Power down your computers when not in use. If you own your own building, install solar energy panels. Your energy reduction will also result in long term savings.

3. Volunteer Locally
While small businesses may not have the large employee volunteer pools of big business, small businesses have closer connections with their employees and are likely to engage a greater percentage of them in volunteering. Small businesses are also closer to their local community needs and are better able to match volunteers to the right causes. Small business can support the community by volunteering for fundraisers, for environmental causes like cleanup days, or pitch in to help build homes or in soup kitchens. 

4.Establish Your Own Grant Program
Although small businesses account for the majority of the workforce, they cannot match big companies in revenues. Large companies are able to endow foundations that can make huge donations to support nonprofits or social enterprises. Small businesses may not have the kind of funding that large businesses have, but they can set up an application process for small local non-profits that helps charities in their fundraising process as well as helps the business control the deluge of requests for donations. 

5.Collaborate With Other Businesses
Small businesses can more easily find inventive ways of collaborating with other small businesses, either through their Chamber of Commerce, local branches of associations, networking groups, or just in their local business community. Helping each other to develop a healthy local economy and sustainable business practices is the kind of community involvement that can help the entire community grow.

6. Help Global Causes
Should global causes be more interesting to small business owners, they can invest modestly in micro-lending enterprises such as Kiva. Some small businesses have started their own social enterprises directly supporting local or global causes, with part or all of their profits, (see postings about In Her Shoes and Mission Street Food) going to both local and/or global causes.
There are also opportunities to support the many 501c3 organizations located in local communities that support global causes such as building schools in Africa, or sending supplies to underprivileged communities.

7. Start Your Own Cause Marketing Campaign
Businesses have great resources to involve their customers with well thought out campaigns that can help raise funds and increase community involvement in their favorite causes. Cause marketing for small businesses can be as simple as posting a flier in your window, collection spare change, giving discounts to customers who support a charity, or mentioning your favorite charity on your website.


Increasingly customers are expecting large corporations to be more philanthropic and socially responsible.  That level of expectation will soon trickle down towards smaller businesses. Maybe it’s time for small businesses to realize that collectively their impact can be as important as that of big business, that there customers will appreciate their commitment ,and their responsibility may be even greater.