September 12, 2017
From July 31st through August 25th 2017, Mindsight hosted a shoe drive within our office. Employees along with their friends and families were invited to donate new or gently worn shoes for the non-profit organization Share Your Soles. In addition to this drive, Mindsight also spent a Saturday volunteering at their distribution center directly helping to ensure these shoes reach their destinations. Now that the drive is over, we can reflect on the contribution we’ve made and the lessons we’ve learned.
Who Are Share Your Soles?
Share Your Soles is a 501c3 charity organization that collects shoe donations and delivers them to areas around the world in need. Though they began distributing shoes in Central America, the charity has expanded their reach far beyond this region. From our own domestic Native American reservations to South America, the Caribbean, and Africa. Currently, the charity is focused on providing shoes to Haiti.
Mona Purdy traveled throughout Central America in 1999 and was shocked by the lack of shoes of the local population. Children were painting tar on their feet, so they could run a local race. Furthermore, an American Orthopedic surgeon informed her than the lack of shoes directly lead to amputations of infected limbs. After becoming aware of this crisis, Purdy founded Share Your Soles, and over the past 17 years has delivered over 2 million pairs of shoes to individuals in need around the world.
The Mindsight Contribution
In total, we were able to gather approximately 250 pairs of shoes for the charity. They were delivered in twelve large bags on our volunteering day, August 26th. Mindsight employees visited the Share Your Soles Warehouse in the historic Pullman District. Our team spent the morning inspecting and sorting the massive collection of donations the organization was working to process. Each shoe must be inspected by hand to ensure it does not have any holes and the soles are not too worn down to be donated. Share Your Soles takes great care in ensuring that recipients get good quality, lasting pairs of shoes.
Donate to Share Your Soles Today
Share Your Soles has drop boxes located all around the city. If you have any new or gently worn shoes you would like to donate to this cause, you can find your nearest drop box on the Share Your Soles Website.
Your Money Goes a Long Way, Literally
Alternatively, the charity also accepts direct monetary donations. Those monetary donations are crucial to ensure the shoes reach their intended destinations. There are a number of logistical factors that must be accounted for, and each of these factors comes at a significant expense. The shoe donations need to be packaged and shipped, often overseas, to foreign countries. From there, Share Your Soles needs to locate and hire couriers to deliver the shoes to the beneficiaries. Even then, there are more expenses to be paid including gas for the delivery truck. Each dollar donated goes a long way to covering these expenses.
Donations can be made on the Share Your Soles Website as well.
To learn more about Mona Purdy, the Share Your Soles charity, and more, view the video below.
Next Up, Hunger Games
Now that the Share Your Soles Shoe Drive is passed, we can turn our attention to our next giving back initiative. We are once again going to be hosting our Annual Hunger Games competition where we focus on donations, volunteering, and raising awareness to combat food insecurity in our surrounding communities. In the past, we’ve donated hundreds of pounds of food and our time at local soup kitchens and food banks, and we look forward to giving back once more this holiday season.
We want to thank Share Your Soles for all the good work they do and the opportunity to make a difference.
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About Mindsight
Mindsight, a Chicago IT services provider, is an extension of your team. Our culture is built on transparency and trust, and our team is made up of extraordinary people – the kinds of people you would hire. We have one of the largest expert-level engineering teams delivering the full spectrum of IT services and solutions, from cloud to infrastructure, collaboration to contact center. Our highly-certified engineers and process-oriented excellence have certainly been key to our success. But what really sets us apart is our straightforward and honest approach to every conversation, whether it is for an emerging business or global enterprise. Our customers rely on our thought leadership, responsiveness, and dedication to solving their toughest technology challenges.
Contact us at GoMindsight.com.
For Further Reading:
Mindsight Fights Food Insecurity with 3rd Annual Hunger Games