Listen to this articleOpen Eyes Open Heart offers high quality jewelry to consumers and gives 50% of their profits to charities. They plan to expand their product and nonprofit partner lists. Their goal is to continue to change lives and make the world a better place, one pendant, one bracelet, and one necklace at a time. Below is our interview with Sadie Emmons (image below) and Tina Stafford from Open Eyes Open Heart:
Q: What’s Open Eyes Open Heart’s story? – How did the idea for the site come about, and when did you launch?
A: The idea came from personal need. As managers of a CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocate) Program and a Children’s Advocacy Center, we were both raising money to provide services to children in our community. Together, we created an annual “Hearts and Heroes Event” to bring awareness to child abuse, recruit new advocates, and raise money. Although our first event was successful, we didn’t reach our fundraising goal. After all, every charity in town has an event and we’re all asking the community to support our cause. So it was clear that we needed to do something that would set us apart. A gift of heart shaped pendants from a local business turned out to be that “something.”
Three weeks before our next fundraiser we emailed our volunteers and supporters a photo of our “Hearts and Heroes Pendant” and they bought over half of them within days. An article about our event in the local newspaper featured the pendant and we had so many calls from people in the community that we had to get more pendants. The pendants became a conversation piece, our supporters loved wearing something that represented a cause they cared deeply about and people who weren’t aware of our programs became supporters. It was amazing how one piece of jewelry raised awareness, increased volunteerism, and made fundraising easy. With over 25 years of combined nonprofit fundraising we quickly realized we need to share this concept on a larger scale … and c online jewelry store was born!
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Q: What makes OEOH a good choice?
A: We do exactly what we say we do! We offer high quality products to consumers and we give 50% of our profits to charities. When we say 50% – it means 50% of the gross – not the net. The consumer knows exactly what their donation is when they purchase through Open Eyes Open Heart. Half of every purchase is a donation to their cause. No exceptions – no caveats – and no fine print!
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Q: What’s the best thing about Open Eyes Open Heart that people might not know about?
A: Our prices are very competitive. We don’t mark-up our prices in order to give 50% to charities. Open Eyes Open Heart is a private company, so there are no shareholders expecting a return on their investment, and no pressure to increase the “bottom line.” We’re not the traditional business model, it’s just the two of us, which means we can stay true to our philanthropreneur’s mission of giving back to organizations who make a difference in the lives of people in their communities and beyond.
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Q: What can we expect in the next 6 months? What are our plans?
A: You’ll see new products and more nonprofit partners. As we continue to grow there will be even more diversity in the types of service organizations we support and more opportunities to give.
Our plan? It’s simple… we’re going to continue to change lives and make the world a better place, one pendant, one bracelet, and one necklace at a time!
