Charity Bit.

In our office, we have a club dedicated in championing all charitable causes and events. It is known as the Ukhwah Club. Ukhwah in English means fraternity. We do all sort of things to build networking, friendships, establishes good rapport and relationships with all external parties and also internally.

Every end of the year, our normal and default event is to choose a charity home that is not supported by any welfare department and send them our contributions - in terms of money, clothes, electrical appliances or whatever that we managed to get for them. But usually we give money and spend time cleaning their home and help them with what ever that they need for a day. The sequence of meetups trailing up to the event would usually take weeks, if not months in order to properly choose the right charity home (we have had experienced dealing with a fraud - establishing an orphanage but siphoned money off them - but that is another story for another post), brainstorming on what we can do and what we want to achieve.

I always support the club's sentiment, but I never agree on the one-off contribution to charity home. The reason I don't agree with a one-off  contribution is because I always believe that we could establish a sustainable relationship with the management of the charity home.

So this year, I suggested something that is out of the ordinary. We choose a charity home and stick with them for one year. We can choose to help and pay for their electricity or water bills but we have to have commitment in order to make it work. Rather than having to do it in a grandeur manner, setting up events for donation drive - which uses money to gain money - I suggest we do a small pop-up events every now and then. The ones that don't actually take up so much of our time but the effort is consistent. To prove my theory, I went and set up a booth selling good old new stuff (clothes, accessories, bags, shoes that my colleagues and I collected , that were never used and was bought strictly on impulse - yes we have many of those) during a Safety and Health Week in our office building with a help of a few of my colleagues  and all of the proceed we gained was given to Ukhwah Club.

We've made close to RM500 in just few hours. I also sold some of the paintings and accessories from my own business during that time and I contributed 20% of it.

The idea is that you don't have to go big.. small booths and small-scaled events would produce the same impact and the best part is it requires less time and effort. I know many of my office colleagues have some sort of business on the side and if we manage to convince every one that they can get a free promotion and at the same time do good deeds, am sure everyone will be more than happy to join.

After the pop-up sales during the Safety Week, many a times I have been asked when are we going to have another round of the pop-up sales. They said it was fun and quick. I think this is mostly because when people know that they are doing good by purchasing stuff - cheap good stuff - they are motivated to contribute more. Which is what I'm aiming for - the rippling effect. And the fact that the pop-up has an element of surprise in it, people are always intrigued of when and where it is going to happen again. :)

My next plan is a bake sale - collaboration with a baker friend of mine. We are going to order 100 of her delicious red velvet and chocolate cupcakes and open a booth for one hour - after that we will close shop and disappear.

We come and go but we do it constantly. All of us can take turns in manning the pop-up booths.