I read an interesting opinion of these "buy a pair of shoes and we'll donate a pair to someone in need" ie TOMS shoes. I'll include the opinion below. I'm just curious what your opinion is on this type of business/organization model?
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Here is the opinion piece (I tend to agree with it): "Further, though, the TOMS campaign â like the million shirts â misses the fundamental point that not having a pair of shoes (or a shirt, christmas toy, etc.) is not a problem about not having shoes. Itâs a problem of poverty. Shoelessness, such as it is, is a symptom of a much bigger and more complex problem. And while donating a pair of shoes helps shoelessness, it does not help poverty. Things like jobs help poverty. Jobs making things like shoes, for example. But TOMS doesnât make its shoes in Africa, it makes them in China where itâs presumably cheaper to make two pairs of shoes and give one away than it is to get people in a needier community to make one pair of shoes. The result of this setup, as Zizek explains most succinctly, is that on a big-picture level, TOMS (and other buy-my-product-and-donate companies) are busy building the exploitative global structure that produces economic inequality, while on the other hand pretending that supporting them actually does something to fix it. It doesnât. It just gives people shoes."
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Answer:
My preference is to donate to international nonprofits focused on building the local economy rather than simply donating products to poor regions. As noted in this article, http://www.fastcoexist.com/1679628/the-broken-buy-one-give-one-model-three-ways-to-save-toms-shoes, "charitable gifts from abroad can distort developing markets and undermine local businesses by creating an entirely unsustainable aid-based economy." Also, as a private company, TOMS Shoes does not need to adhere to nonprofit disclosure guidelines. As a result, there's no way to tell how much it costs for them to deliver a pair of shoes under their One for One model. Lacking such disclosure, it's not possible for a purchaser of TOMS Shoes to know how much of what they paid for their TOMS is going towards the One for One program. With such limited information available, my dollars will be going towards funding transparent, high-impact nonprofits rather than buy one / give one programs that feel much more like marketing to me.
Kent Chao at Quora Visit the source
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