Category: Campaigns & Projects

Walk In Their Shoes

Outrage and despair – the reaction I get from my kids during a 10 minute car ride when they ask for a drink and we tell them that we forgot to bring their water bottles… A 10 minute car drive without a drink… How ever will they survive? If you are a parent, this may sound familiar.

Last weekend, my family and I joined about 40 other people from the Open Doors team, plus about 70 other teams from around the country, to ‘Walk To Water’.

opendoors-walktowater

On our way to the event, we were explaining to our kids why we were doing this… the concept of not having instant access to clean drinking water to a kid living in Sydney is almost unfathomable (note above!). Of course, kids are not the only ones ignorant or oblivious to this – we all take access to clean water for granted, it’s hard not to. Continue reading “Walk In Their Shoes” →

Advertisement

Thankfulness

“If you were to wake up tomorrow, with only the things you thanked God for today, what would you have?”

What an awesome question. Thankfulness in general will transform your perspective indeed. But, thankfulness to God, will completely change your life, like it did for Helen… what an amazing story.

Thanks for a great video Open Doors Australia.

‘Love Wins’ (Literally)

Positive Posters announced their 2013 winner at their ‘Thirty’ Exhibition this week. Gotta love the irony of ‘Love Wins’, literally winning the comp!

PP13 Winner
2013 Winner – ‘Love Wins’ by Calvin Hui.

Aside from the irony, I’m a big fan of the winning poster – I love the ‘naughts & crosses’ concept of love vs money… very clever and effective way of conveying a very true, but easily forgotten truth. It’s a big challenge for everyday life, as we too often spend our life pursuing money… yet it is love we were created by, and for. It is in fact the very purpose of life.

In the end… love always wins.

Well said, and well done to Calvin Hui.

#NOCHILDFORSALE

Here’s a great video to give us sneak peak into the sad reality of child slavery. So many shocking facts that should move us to create change – an we can.

So get on board with World Vision and tell the world No Child Should Ever Be For Sale. #nochildforsale

Head to http://worldvision.ca to start making a difference in a child’s life today.

#colesandwoolworths campaign by Thankyou (*Water)

I’ve always loved the work of Thankyou Water, and now they’ve really taken it to the next level. Some mixed reactions out there in the social media world, so it will be interesting to see how it goes!

As for me – get on board #colesandwoolworths!

Check out the vid and more on the campaign here: http://www.thankyou.co/coles-and-woolworths

Just Another Human Being?

This guy is amazing. A true humanitarian who has seen a need and changed his life to do something very practical about it.

I love his simple philosophy – “I’m just another human being, we are all the same… the ultimate purpose of life is to give.”

If you aren’t a little challenged by this guy, I think you need to have a good think about your outlook on life.

The Joy of Giving

How often have you given money to some cause or organisation and wondered if the funds will ever make it to the project or person it was intended? I am generally fairly trusting, and assume it goes where it’s supposed to… though on one recent occasion, we chose to use some of our credit card points to donate funds to the Fred Hollows Foundation – we never even saw any sort of receipt or even acknowledgement that the money went there… in this case I was a little skeptical I must admit! It kinda robs you of any satisfaction in giving, wondering if the funds met their purpose… but the opposite is also true when you see the outcome of your generosity…

Recently I got an email from my mate, Dan, who some time ago collected some funds in our small group for a project in Cambodia. I had forgotten about it completely, making receiving the email below even more encouraging to see the impact that our small notion of generosity made…

// DAN:

Hi Guys!

Hope you’re all doing well. Remember when we collected money for the Mother and her daughter in Cambodia last year, so that they could buy some land and have somewhere to live and make a living? Well, I didn’t just pocket the cash… that money went to Cambodia and has transformed the prospects of this family, so thanks guys! Emma was very excited to send us the following info and photos: Continue reading “The Joy of Giving” →

Print with Purpose

I recently had the opportunity to involve some great non profit organisations in a project for work.

Rather than wasting hundreds of meters of print as is often the case at print industry trade shows, I organised to offer printing to non profits. We were privileged to partner with World Vision, Oxfam and SurfAid to print hundreds of posters, banners and collateral for their upcoming campaigns.

Here’s a few pics of the prints coming off the fancy new Roland wide format printer. Thanks to Roland and also Shil and Avery media suppliers.

Glad we could help to make an impact for these great organisations!

20130523-210008.jpg

20130523-210034.jpg

20130523-210159.jpg

Behind the Brands

Check out this great campaign by Oxfam highlighting some of the big brands and how they perform with regard to their supply chain, their impact on the global food system, and in particular how this flows onto the poor and marginalised at the bottom of their supply chains.

Oxfam’s Behind the Brands campaign aims to provide people who buy and enjoy these products with the information they need to hold the Big 10 to account for what happens in their supply chains.

Oxfam has done some great research and has developed this interesting Company Scorecard to see how your favourite brand stacks up. It’s a bit of a worry that the best brand is only at 54% and even more worrying that major brands like Kellogs, which I know we personally buy frequently, are performing so poorly!

Behind the Brands

It’s particularly interesting at this point in time, Easter, when we in the west consume ridiclous amounts of chocolate – $185.7mill* on chocolate this Easter in Australia in fact. The Cocoa trade is somewhat notorious for exploitation over the years, and Oxfam has highlighted the expoitation of women in particular:

Mars, Mondelez, and Nestlé buy more than 30% of the cocoa grown worldwide. But throughout their supply chains women are getting a raw deal.

So as you enjoy that delicious chocolate this Easter, I’d encourage you to head to the Behind the Brands website – learn more and sign the petition to “make noise, make change” as Oxfam puts it, and get the big brands to “Look, Listen & Act”.

(* IBISWorld Study)

The Impact of LBL 2012

A great little vid to show the impact of Live Below the Line 2012… some awesome work to help get these kids out of the cycle of poverty! Check out my LBL post from last year and think about how you can get involved this year!

www.livebelowtheline.com.au