Earlier this month, TOMS launched TOMS Marketplace, a platform bringing together social entrepreneurs and change to world issues. The marketplace offers a variety of items from necklaces and bicycles to earbuds. It also offers exclusive gear from TOMS such as the Stone + Cloth’s Benson Backpack which supports children’s education in Tanzania.
Each item provides information about the brand, its cause, and how and where it helps. Categorized by item, cause, region, and brand, users are able to tailor their purchases to a cause close to their hearts.
In this time of giving, the marketplace is a great way to shop and give two-fold for the holiday season. Here are six social brands that keep on giving:
1. Harper Belle
Cause: Children
Harper Belle Website
Harper Belle is a jewelry company partnering with Vitamin Angels to provide vitamins for children for the first five years of their life. Named after the founder’s daughter, Harper Belle’s mission is to prevent impairments limiting a child’s future. By providing vitamins, the company helps to reduce the risk of mortality by 24 percent and provide above-average paying jobs in Indonesia.
Items to check out: The Citrine Balboa Necklace, Turquoise Seascape Necklace
2. JOYN
Cause: Education and Job Creation
JOYN provides education, medical care and jobs by producing block-printed textiles, handbags and accessories in Uganda. After volunteering at a Ugandan orphanage, founder Melody Murray decided to create JOYN to create a future for the town of Rajpur where only 40 percent of the population has steady work.
Items to check out: Red Ornament Stocking, Mint Jetsons Coasters
3. LSTN
Cause: Health
Using wood from furniture makers and flooring manufactures, LSTN Headphones (pronounced ‘listen’) creates specialty headphones to restore hearing around the world with the Starkey Hearing Foundation.
Items to check out: Cherry Wood Fillmore Headphones, Beech Wood Bowery Earbuds
Cause: Job Creation
After moving to Uganda with her co-founder, Courtney Rose delved into design and craft with local, small businesses to develop beautiful, handmade furniture. From working with local artisans to a local timber company, Rose & Fitzgerald constructs natural and native products to build economic development.
Items to check out: Bell Jar Lamp, Paint Dipped Mugavu Wood Wine Holder (Exclusive)
5. Half United
Cause: Nutrition
Half United has an interesting take on bullets; they fight hunger through jewelry. Changing the perception of bullets, Half United supports children by giving half of the profits to fight global hunger and support education in Cambodia, Fiji, Liberia and the United States.
Items to check out: Honeybee Bracelet, TOMS Exclusive Fighting Hunger Necklace
Cause: Water
A hundred percent is a bold idea to live up to, but charity: water lives up to it by using 100 percent of public donations to help provide clean water. The funds help bring clean water to communities while partnerships, like TOMS Marketplace, allow the company to continue operating to fight disease from unsafe water and encourage opportunities in Africa, Asia, Central and South America.
Items to check out: Pure Fix Bike
Make sure to check out the TOMS Marketplace to learn about other organizations and how they are helping to improve the world.
What’s your favorite brand from TOMS Marketplace? Tell me what you’re loving in the comments.
Allyn Woodward
{Images via TOMS Marketplace}
