Blog

It's an exciting time to be alive in a day and age where Freedom Businesses are on the rise. What are Freedom Businesses? Freedom Businesses are social entrepreneurs creating impactful businesses, changing communities and restoring lives. Freedom Businesses not only focus on making a profit, but an overall goal of impacting the community they live in, the environment, the people they work with, and an overall answer to social issues. Most of these businesses hire people who are marginalized by society and offer them skills, a fresh start in life and a job with dignity. Instead of handouts, these businesses...

This idea - orphan prevention through job creation - is something I came across when I read a blog post about Papillion Enterprise (http://papillon-enterprise.com/). I love this idea and have been deeply challenged by it. When we create jobs, and support businesses that create jobs, our influence isn't only felt by that employee. Our influence is felt by that entire family and all the relatives that are supported through that wage. Your purchases have power.

"Poverty is not just a lack of cash, medicine, or technology. It is also about the confidence, skills, and belief that people can use what they have for the community's good. Surely poverty is as much about identity, meaning, and belonging as material goods." From Making Poverty Personal by Ash Barker Too often we reduce poverty to being a lack of material things. Of course this is an important part of poverty, but we can't overlook the other side which has a lot to do with identity. The lack of confidence is a message that is reinforced through handouts "you can't do...

"And it goes without saying that they are often treated as subhuman and have lost their dignity." This quote is from Kevin Bales book Disposable People and is in reference to slaves in India. The reality is that although legal slavery was abolished in the nineteenth century we must fight today to end illegal slavery. The fact that there are people, many people, in this world that are treated as subhuman and stripped of their dignity is an evil that we must face. It is not a reality that we can afford to hide our faces from.

*That there are some amazing businesses in the world doing good and they are worth supporting. Here is what we, Kairos Traders, learned in 2016: *That Freedom Businesses (those engaged in the issue of human trafficking) are a small percentage of social enterprises. *That scarves sell. *That there are consumers who want their purchase to support a good cause and that they don't know where to start in making that purchase. *To weigh down your display if you are outdoors and its windy :) *That earrings sell. *That you never know what event, or connection, will make the difference for...