BusyShirts - Thoughts on World Poverty

Brio Magazine Notices BusyShirts

2008-07-16 23:22:26 -0500

Brio Magazine contacted Meg about her involvement with Busy Shirts. They interviewed her and plan on putting her story in Brio early next year! That kind of exposure could mean a lot of money raised for ministries. Way to go Meg!

Little Girl Saved From Drowning

2008-05-29 16:53:31 -0500

While visiting partners in India, I met Pratima and she told me her story. She was only six years old when her parents died in North India. An aunt took her in but soon realized she could not afford to care for her. In desperation, and based on her Hindu beliefs, she made plans to send Pratima on to the next life by drowning her in the Ganges River. Fortunately, the organization I was visiting was able to intervene and take Pratima to their orphanage. She had just finished high school when I met her and was trying to find a way to pay for nursing school. As you can see from her photo, she is a happy and beautiful young woman. The reason she lived past the age of 6 is because of people like you in the US who give so orphanages can have the resources needed for housing, food, staff, and schools. That’s why we started BusyShirts—to give people an opportunity to save lives.

For $7 you can change the world

2008-05-29 11:05:47 -0500

According to numbers from Wikipedia, about 180 million adults in the United States call themselves Christians. Christians have very strong commands from the Bible to help the poor. Proverbs 28:27 says that if we close our eyes to the poor we will be cursed. Who wants to be cursed??? If everyone in the US who considers themselves a Christian would give just $7 more per month we could feed millions of starving people, educate and provide basic health care for millions of children who have none, help millions of women start businesses to feed their families, provide safe drinking water for millions who are dying without it, and provide loving homes for millions of orphans. Honestly, who couldn’t find a way to increase their giving by $7 a month. We could eat out less, take shorter hot showers, accelerate more slowly from stop lights, turn our thermostat one degree warmer in the summer and one degree lower in the winter. There are probably hundreds of ways to find $7 in the monthly budget. Send your ideas about coming up with an extra $7 a month to me at busyshirts@gmail.com.

Spending $100 million to make $18?!

2008-03-10 19:31:41 -0500

I read today that the Gap has spent $100 million dollars advertising its RED campaign, but has only donated $18 million to Aids research. Why didn’t they just donate the $100 million? (http://digg.com/business_finance/Product_RED_100_Million_Spent_18_Million_Raised) And there appears to be a lot of secrecy concerning what percent of the profit is given away and how much they plan to donate in the future. Why not tell us?

BusyShirts gives 100% of the profit from every shirt to organizations who educate and train people in the poorest parts of the world. So far we have not spent a dime advertising and have raised $3,800 as of April 13. And we are just getting started!

Buying a BusyShirt means you are sending money to build an orphanage in Mexico, to help women in India start businesses, and to provide education and food for children in India. When those projects are fully funded, we’ll move on to new ones! (We only fund organizations that we have carefully investigated and personally visited.)

If everyone who comes to this site buys a BusyShirt and sends a link to all their friends, and they buy a shirt and send links to their friends, and so on, we could sell two million shirts and raise $20 million dollars while spending zero on advertising. Let’s make it happen!

Great Idea

2008-01-10 20:08:00 -0600

A student at Charleston High School wanted to make a bigger impact than just buying a shirt. She has sold 7 shirts to friends and they have declared (unilaterally) that the 15th day of each month is “World Poverty Day.” They are all going to wear their shirts to school to raise awareness and sell more shirts. Wouldn’t it be great to see hundreds of students on a high school campus rally around such a good cause?! Email us your great idea! E-mail Us!

Update: The World Poverty Awareness Day has really taken off. For more info and a printable flyer see here. Meg has spoken to various groups, including WCIA television in Champaign.

As of March 14, she’s raised $2000 for women and children in India and for the orphanage in Mexico. She wants everyone to email a picture of themselves wearing their shirts on the 15th. We’ll post it here on the website. Her email is fightingworldpoverty@gmail.com.