What is the I=Change campaign? A Q&A with Rebel Muse owner and advocate Alicia Xyraski
What if you were donating to charity by continuing your usual shopping habits?
I=Change, is a charity that works with participating brands by adding one simple step to the online checkout process.
Clothing store, Rebel Muse, had teamed up with I=Change by giving one dollar for every sale they make.
Lilly Tomlinson sat down with Alicia, the owner of Rebel Muse and asked her more about this platform and how we can get on board.
Q: How long has Rebel Muse been apart of this marketing platform?
We’ve been working with I=change for about 8 months now.
Q: How did this idea come about?
Our business is built on the idea of conscious consumerism and being aware of the impact our shopping habits can have on the global community and environment. This is the broader goal of Rebel Muse, we’re not just about pushing clothes in and out of our doors. I was already playing with the idea of donating a $1 of sales to charity and was working out how we would facilitate this. It’s actually a lot trickier than you would think. For small business owners, the workload and bills and payments are endless! How can we do something like this without increasing our workload, interrupting our cash flow and ensuring the donations we make are going to an ethical and transparent charity and actually making an impact on women’s lives.
It wasn’t until I attended an online retail seminar where Jeremy Meltzer, the founder of I=change gave a talk and introduced us to I=change. Prior to that, I had never heard of I=change as it was still very new. I knew straight away that I wanted Rebel Muse to work with I=change. It streamlined all the issues we would have if we were to manage the donation process our self. I=change has put in the groundwork to make sure the charities and projects they work with are the best in their field, transparent in their processes and impactful in their work. They meet with their charity partners and understand how they work, operate and have visited many of their projects in the field. Because unfortunately a lot of the time the money you donate to certain charities actually has little to no impact on the community you’re trying to help. Working with I=change was a no-brainer for me
Q: How can customers of yours donate?
$1 from every sale made on our online store is donated through I=change. So basically just by shopping online as they always do, they are donating. The 100% of the $1 donation goes to the charity. We pay I=change an extra 30c per sale for the platform. A the end of the checkout process, customers are also given an option to give a donation of their own to the charity to any dollar value they wish. Customers can also pop onto the I-change website and subscribe to keep up to date with all the businesses using the platform and any other ways they can donate and support the program.
Q: What opportunities do you give the people you donate too?
We work with three charities 1) Send Hope Not Flowers – Send hope provide safe birthing to women in developing countries. Every 2 minutes a woman dies from complications in childbirth. Safe birthing is definitely something we take for granted in Australia. A little bit of money goes a very long way in developing countries. Donations made to Send Hope buys a baby bundle which contain basic supplies such as a baby bath, sanitary items, cloth nappies etc. Baby bundles incentivize mothers to go to a health clinic to give birth, instead of having an unsupervised birth in their village where no medical supplies or professionals are on hand. The baby bundle project is directly responsible for a 78% decrease in the maternal death rate in the region.2) UN Women – Breaking the silence and putting an end to domestic violence in Papua New Guinea. In the highlands of PNG up to 100% of women experience violence regularly. Un Women support local services to meet the needs of women, train male community leader to understand and communicate that violence against women is a crime and provide training so women can ear and income and support their families. Every dollar UN Women receives helps Papua New Guinean women rebuild their life free of violence. 3) Asylum Seekers Resource Centre – Families who have fled violence, war and persecution are often stripped of their basic rights when they get to Australia while waiting for an outcome to their legal status. They could live in this limbo for years. During this time, without the right to work, people become destitute. Women and children are especially vulnerable during this time. Asylum Seeker Resource Centre helps provide a warm bed, food, education, employment support and much more. Giving asylum seekers the hope for a safe and brighter future. $15 gives a person seeking asylum in Australia a night of safe housing.
How much of the proceeds get donated? We donate $1 from every sale made to one of the three charities we work with. 100% of that $1 is donated to the charity. We pay I=change and extra 30c per sale for their services.
Q: Can customers track where their donation goes, how can they track it if so?
Yes, they definitely can. They can track it all through the i=change website www.iequalchange.com
Q: What would you like to achieve out of this campaign?
I’d hope campaigns like this help shoppers be more aware of how their shopping habits can have positive and negative impacts on the global community and the environment. All brands and retails that work with I=change are brands that don’t exploit their factory workers.
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