25 Businesses that give back in extraordinary ways

There’s an immense number of community involvement ideas for businesses and being not profitable enough to give back is simply not an excuse. As you can see from the list below, there are many examples of businesses giving back to the community that don’t involve money.

Support people undergoing cancer treatments

As a former foster child and then homeless young adult, it is extremely important to me to give back to the community that has supported my success. Our cancer cleanings are now also extremely close to my heart since my daughter was diagnosed with Leukemia last year, and I’ve been able to see firsthand how critical cleaning is to oncology families.

Laura, Founder of All Star Cleaning Services

Organise a virtual TED-Talk-style fundraiser

Organizing a virtual ted-talk-style fundraiser where the audience comes to learn and gets to leave motivated and inspired is a valuable and creative way to give back. Having the virtual attendees donate money to an organization of choice or even have business owners that have been poorly affected by the pandemic join in to hear other business owners and experts advise on how to survive through these tough times. Putting on such an event would take minimum investment, would allow everyone to stay safe, and would have the potential to help so many people.

Brandon Monaghan, Co-Founder of Miracle Brand

Make others pay in donations to pick your brain

I think this idea is a win for everyone involved; I get to share my knowledge, donators learn useful information that they can apply directly to their business and their money goes to the people needing it the most right now.

Jon Zacharias, CEO and Founder of The Search Guy

Encourage employees to volunteer and pay them for it

A philanthropy initiative that we offer at Boundery to all of our employees is encouraging each individual to spend 3 workdays out of the quarter to volunteer at a charity or organization of their choice whilst being fully compensated. This initiative allows employees to choose where they would like to allocate their volunteer hours and spreads awareness of new charities and organizations within our offices. 

Separately from Boundery, my wife and I work closely with the organization Casa de Amparo, which has a mission to help kids affected or at risk of child abuse and neglect. With the current state of our country due to the pandemic, we have been very active by connecting colleagues and business owners that might have extra resources to donate to the charity. We are reaching out to all of our connections because the kids desperately require all basic supplies. Connecting people and utilizing your network might seem like a small action to take but sometimes is most impactful.

Jason Akatiff, Co-Founder of Boundery

Kindness is a language everyone understands

This quick-turn-around high-level emergency work had the taskforce translating a range of documents including:

• Airport guidelines for quarantine and for people arriving to NYC
• Anti-eviction informational newsletters to various communities who might have landlords looking to take advantage of the COVID-19 situation
• Directions for how to use various work-from-home technology and apps
• Alerts for various apps that deliver push-notification news
• Community news alerts for various minorities living in New York who might not speak Spanish, English, Mandarin, or Russian

Languages included: Arabic, Bengali, Tibetan, Greek, Spanish, Dari, Farsi, French, Hebrew, Hindi, Haitian Creole, Indonesian, Igbo, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Nepali, Punjabi (India), Punjabi (Pakistan), Polish, Portuguese (Brazil and Portugal), Pashto, Russian, Tagalog, Urdu, Vietnamese, Yiddish, Yoruba, Chinese (China), Chinese (Hong Kong), Chinese (Taiwan).

Phil Shawe, President & CEO of TransPerfect

Reward the community heroes

The first project was a smaller scale, paying $200 to a locally owned coffee shop to cover five dollars of 40 orders for that day. We created a small business card-sized positive message saying we are all in this together and to enjoy their gift from the granite and marble depot.

The next project we did was asking the community to nominate a local teacher who was going above and beyond while working remotely and teaching their students virtually. We got tons of nominations from the community and decided on one winner. The owner of granite and marble depot and myself met with the teacher at a locally owned food establishment, where they covered the cost of the entire dinner for the teacher’s family.

The final and most exciting project was donating five granite countertops to local heroes regardless of their position. We were in a two-month campaign asking the community to nominate local heroes from grocery store workers to first responders. We selected five winners and are just in the works of selections and installing the completely cost covered granite countertops.

Kylie Knur, Project Manager at JJR Marketing

Weekly donations to the most caring organisations

We’ve now reached our 120th consecutive week of donations!

Monica Eaton-Cardone, Co-Founder and COO of Chargebacks911

Donate one mask for each purchase

Here are the organizations we’ve donated masks to so far:

– Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center, San Pedro

– Lompoc Valley Medical Center

– Boys & Girls Clubs of Central Orange Coast

– The Bridge Fund of New York Inc.

– Baltimore Donation Hub

– Gold In Fight

– REACH Air Medical Services

– Chinatown Service Center

Brandon Chopp, Digital Manager at iHeartRaves

Support minority-owned businesses

We also host networking events, Melanin Village Market Places, and our annual awards ceremony celebrating small businesses in the area. When Black Panther was being released, I bought out the theatre for Black-Owned Businesses and their families to experience what Black excellence looks like.

Alexis L. Williams, Owner of Aloha Glamour

Financially support low-income entrepreneurs

We do community outreach as a part of our annual Thrive Camp – an event where we bring in our employees from around the world to our Texas headquarters to do local volunteer work. We have also partnered with Kiva, a non-profit organization aiming to help low-income entrepreneurs in more than 80 countries. We give monetary help to those striving entrepreneurs to maximize their potential, including farmers or women in Africa selling goods. 

I believe that when you are at a point where you’ve gotten so much, it’s that chance you have to give back to people – to get them to the same place as you are.

Matt Bowman, President at Thrive Agency

Raise funds to make other people’s lives better

As part of Progreso Relief, an informal group of people who came together to help the community, we raised funds and fed over 1,200 families suffering from the loss of income in our city when COVID hit. We provided packages of food, sourced through local stores to keep more of the money in the community, and delivered them following strict safety protocols, supervised by a retired nurse, to needy families and individuals. Donations came from Mexico, the US and Canada.

When tropical storm Cristobal hit the area and flooded many homes, we again raised funds and worked with local restaurants to provide meals to over 400 people while they were staying in temporary shelters, and then used the remainder of the funds raised to provide gift certificates through a locally-owned hardware store to help people purchase materials and tools to repair the flood damage to their homes.

I was the first president of the Merida English Rotary Club, the first English-language Rotary Club in the state of Yucatan, Mexico, and spearheaded a project to put computers in the computer labs in Progreso, Yucatan, where they currently have no computers for the students to share. That’s right, zero computers in computer labs in 2020! Teachers currently bring their own laptops and teach the students via projector, which is really no way to learn computer skills effectively.

David B. Wright, President of W3 Group Marketing

Feed the hungry together with your employees

Gabe Abshire,  CEO of Utility Concierge

Make giving back part of your brand

We donate at least 3% of profits to advocate for better infrastructure support and maternal health programs.

– 1% global – to combat the global maternal health crisis

– 1% local – to provide local support and resources for new mothers (first-time and experienced) suffering from anxiety or depression related to a postpartum mood disorder

– 1% sustainable – to advocate for high quality paid family leave for all

Selah Rhodes, Founder/CEO of DARITY

Offer your skills for free to those in need

Especially due to the pandemic, a polished online presence is more essential than ever in business. That includes having a website that’s optimized to get positive results.

Yet, not all business owners are marketing experts so achieving that professional online presence is challenging.

To help business owners in that position, I’m offering value-packed website audits at no cost and with no obligation. These are done manually by me, a professional SEO copywriter and brand strategist.

The audit reports contain expert recommendations on everything from the quality of website copy to SEO to branding to overall UX. They pinpoint exactly what improvements need to be made so that business owners can either make the changes themselves or have an objective game plan if they choose to hire a professional to help.

Nia Gyant, Founder of http://niagyant.com

Fuel up health care workers with delicious pizza

Dave Parsons, Manager, PR & Communications at Donatos Pizza

Offer your products for free to those on the front lines

Additionally, CELSIUS is offering first responders and healthcare workers a case of product if they DM the CELSIUS Instagram page @celsiusofficial with proof of their ID. The brand has dropped off over 7k cases of product.

John Fieldly, CEO at Celsius Holdings Inc

As a BIPOC women-owned and certified B-Corp company, we have been using our business as a force for change and social good in our community for years. During the pandemic, we have been making our great sanitizing and cleaning products available to first responders, doctors, and nurses on COVID-19 frontlines, nonprofits, and to those in need both on a local and national level. 

All you have to do is reach out to us at team@drbrite.com if you are a frontline hero, a nonprofit, or someone in need, and we will be able to help you.

Dr. Paris Sabo, MD, COO at Dr. Brite

Give equal housing opportunities to the underprivileged

We do this because vacant properties become a habitat for criminal mischief and lower the property value of surrounding homes. We believe that homeownership has many positive impacts in our community relating to mental/physical health, our youth, and participation in civic duties such as voting.

We believe that it’s unfair to deny a family the opportunity to turn a house into a home based solely on their past financial hardship without making an attempt to fully understand their current financial position.

Paul Logsdon, Founder of Logsdon Home Buyers

Encourage attendees of fundraising events to open their wallets

We donate the bartender(s), alcohol, beer, wine and all the mixers so they can keep their costs down. We also assist in getting their Series 15 Special Event License for the event since it has to be submitted to the city and state for approval. Having alcohol served is always good for the auctions.

We have worked with some of the biggest charities in AZ and enjoy seeing them succeed.

Dave Forman, President at Pour Masters

Bring the community together to help turn business ideas into reality

Through my organization, I spearheaded the Salisbury-Rowan Black Business Pitch Contest. As an entrepreneur, I personally know the struggles of finding funding and resources to build and grow your business. Therefore, I reached out to local black business owners and asked them to sow monies into the pitch winner and to be pitch judges. Also, I asked other black businesses to provide business services to the pitch winner. 

Within 24 hours I received verbal commitments for both monetary and service packages for the pitch winner. The response was so overwhelming that my pitch committee was able to award service packages to 2nd and 3rd place winners as well. The pitch contest audience was also able to participate and vote for their favorite pitch! It was truly a collective effort and a great way to bring our community together and sow into a local black owned business.

Tonya Cross, Accessory Designer at Accented Glory

Collect donations for women’s shelters

For the public, I set up three different donation day/time slots they could drop off sites at the office. After two weeks, I collected all the donations and dropped them off at the shelter, along with a check from the company. We duplicated this with a food bank and a veteran center. All were contact-free, which made people feel safe and gave them a chance to contribute. 

Laura Fuentes, Operator of Infinity Dish

Set internet for underprivileged families

So, whenever we can, we set up underprivileged families with internet for free. It’s just our way to pay it forward and thank our community for supporting us. 

Sean Nguyen, Director of Internet Advisor

Instead of spending on advertising, donate

We support youth charities because we know not all young people get an equal chance in life, and our mission is to make hiring about skills and talent not about who you know or bank of mum and dad – we want our candidates to have an equal shot at working in the tech and media industries.

We partner with Work for Good to help facilitate our donations.

Lucy Smith, Founder & CEO of DigitalGrads

Show your love and support to the elders

The reason why we are volunteering is that we want to appreciate these elders who gave their best to build Singapore over 40 years ago. So by helping them save a meal or two weekly we help to ease their finances as well.

Cyrus Yung, Director of Ascelade

Years long dedication to help homeless people

Getting to experience his warmth and see how much he prioritizes his volunteer work has inspired me to continue serving dinners to the homeless and volunteering with the Sunday Streets mission without fail for many years now. No matter how successful I become, my family, my companies, and I will always give back to the most vulnerable in our community.

Nerissa Zhang, CEO at The Bright App

Conclusion

Looking at these businesses that give back is impossible not to feel inspired. Their selfless social responsibility proves that community involvement ideas for businesses are not limited to donating money.

The businesses giving back to the community are most often the smallest local businesses in our communities and not the large corporations. That’s because the businesses that give back have big hearts but not necessarily deep pockets.

You can be a one-man band, and still, help more than a company employing 1000 staff does.

18 myths of entrepreneurship that paint the wrong picture

Since it became impossible for the mere observer to tell myths of entrepreneurship from facts we took it upon ourselves to debunk the worst entrepreneurship myths and misconceptions and strip off all the lies that have built up during the years.

#1 Myth: Entrepreneurs are narcissistic people with no connection to the real world

Building your own business or creating a product or service requires hard work, long hours and sacrifice – but it doesn’t necessarily mean you have to sacrifice your life or relationships to be successful.

Many entrepreneurs have families at home who are counting on them. For some, this might even mean a spouse is taking on additional work while their partner builds the business. The majority of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs decide to take on major lifestyle changes, not because of their own self-interest or ambition, but because they believe their idea can change the world for the better. It’s a noble cause that is often misunderstood as narcissism.

David Wright, Executive Director of Practice Development at M&O Marketing

#2 Myth: You will live a care-free, autonomous lifestyle

Simply not true. Oftentimes, entrepreneurs leave behind a 40-hour workweek, only to find themselves putting in 80-hour work weeks for the first few years. As for the autonomy, entrepreneurs are very much still held accountable, even more so as they continue to build a team.

DeeAnn Sims-Knight, Founder of Dark Horse PR

#3 Myth: Successful entrepreneurs all start young

Kelly Bertog, Founder of YOURS Non-Alcoholic Drinks

#4 Myth: Only extroverts can succeed in entrepreneurship

For example, introverted entrepreneurs don’t mind working alone during those long hours in the early stages of their business. They are more likely to enjoy working and making decisions independently. Introverts are also more likely to prefer one-on-one meetings and listen carefully to the suggestions of others. They are also likely to be successful as entrepreneurs because they tend to be low key and deliberate in their decisions.

Kathryn Schwab, Head of Content at Bobbie

#5 Myth: You no longer have a boss

Laura Gariepy, Owner Before You Go Freelance

#6 Myth: You need a lot of money to start a business

I started with $1K to my name working from a cell phone and laptop of a dining room table and now run a $5M/yr business with 7 employees disrupting an industry. Anything is possible with enough determination and grit to solve the problems you’re presented with and make it happen.

Kyle Sharick, CEO of TracksNTeeth, Inc

While it’s true that you will need some sort of capital to fund the early stages of your business, growing it initially doesn’t always have to revolve around chunks of cash.

Entrepreneurs typically finance startups from their own pockets. And because not all entrepreneurs come from a wealthy background, capital isn’t always as accessible.

Take my startup story for example. We founded EarlyBird, a financial gifting platform, in 2019. We weren’t fully funded when we had just started. To make up for it, our small team developed strategic partnerships with investors who helped raise our capital, and marketers who increased awareness and online authority of our brand.

Different business operations like growth hacking and raising funds through investments are some of the tactics that worked for us. Our driven team members also played an important role to achieve our success.

Caleb Frankel, Co-founder and COO at EarlyBird

#7 Myth: You should hustle day and night

Why hustle and grind your way to success, and risk sacrificing your health and relationships along the way?

If you work smarter and better, you can enjoy the fruits of your labor in good mental and physical health together with the people you love. That, to me, is the very definition of success.

Thomas Sorheim, Founder of Leisurehiking.com

#8 Myth: You should heed all of the advice you’re given

There is no shortage of advice coming at you when you are starting a business. While some of it may be exceptional for the most part, I’ve always found it too general to be useful. It more often than not comes from someone well-meaning but usually comes from someone who really doesn’t understand your concept and idea. So, use your time wisely and only seek counsel from those you believe will move your business forward. Although this seems obvious, it is amazing how others can influence your thinking.

Geneva Long, founder​ and CEO of Bowlus

#9 Myth: You need to be an expert before starting

People learn best by taking action and making mistakes. Begin with trial and error then assess, adjust, and keep moving forward. Do not allow yourself to put off your entrepreneurial journey because you’re not yet an expert. If you wait until you are “ready” you will never start. People who are successful are not worried about the failures as they understand that failure breeds success.

Jake Irving, Owner of Willamette Life Insurance

#10 Myth: You need a completely new idea to be successful

Bringing a novel idea to market is hard, time-consuming, and has the highest chance of failure because it’s likely that it’s too early for it. When you improve on an existing idea, there’s an established market and you can quickly become profitable and expand the business.

Daniel Ndukwu, Co-Founder of UsefulPDF

#11 Myth: Entrepreneurs are only motivated by money

One entrepreneurship myth is that all entrepreneurs are only motivated by money. Businesses aren’t built overnight. Being an entrepreneur takes dedication and not everyone can do it. Those who can aren’t solely motivated by money. 

Many entrepreneurs, like myself, are motivated by the need for personal freedom and the ability to spend time doing the things we love to do. My favorite thing to do is to spend time with my family. Through starting a business I am able to do that.

Laura Rike, Founder of LauraRike.com

#12 Myth: Entrepreneurs must innovate or create new ways of doing things

Nicola Tesla and Thomas Edison are great examples. Tesla created bright innovations, but never found a paying customer. On the other hand, Edison created many useful innovations for the world and held over a thousand patents. He also found a way to commercialize his inventions. Someone can be an innovator and an entrepreneur, like Edison was, but not always.

Vivian Chan, Leadership & Team-building Expert at Sette

#13 Myth: You need to do everything yourself

Of course, you will be the sole decision-maker for the most important things, but you can also have others do smaller tasks to move things along. There are ways to outsource or hire freelancers to help you with the less-risky responsibilities so you can focus on building your brand. 

By doing this, you’ll end up still retaining creative control but have more time to focus on the bigger picture and growing your business. Letting others help you along the way is extremely crucial because it saves you a lot of time, energy, and, most importantly, sanity.

Chris Lieu, Founder & Editor at The Distillery Groove

#14 Myth: You can outsource everything and automate

One of the most significant myths about entrepreneurship I often hear is that you can just outsource everything and automate your whole business. Basically, just come up with an idea, hire experts, automate everything, and then just sit back and relax and watch the money rain.

As an entrepreneur, you need to manage and package everything that happens in your business. Definitely not going into the details, but always keep a finger on the pulse. The entrepreneur is the person with the vision, and it’s his/her job to transfer this vision to the rest of the team – to the extent that they see it just as clearly.

Johannes Larsson,CEO and Founder of Financer.com

#15 Myth: Being VC-funded gets you to the goal faster than bootstrapping

Erdin Beshimov, Founder of MIT Bootcamps

#16 Myth: Hard work equals success

If you keep working hard and hustling all day long focusing on the wrong things, success won’t come, because being busy and being productive are entirely different things. What it will get you is sleepless nights, overwhelm, burnout or worse! 

So what can you do? Get clear on what you want, prioritise properly, learn to say no, stop multitasking and most of all, prioritise a good night sleep.

Susanne Grant, Business Coach & Consultant at Grant Method

#17 Myth: Entrepreneurship is about venture capital and hip office space

Entrepreneurship is not a pipe dream, nor is it a get-rich-quick plan. A dedicated local service provider can build a huge business and secure a very comfortable life. Tech startups can be profitable, but take much more luck and money than your local junk removal truck requires!

Anders Helgeson, Co-Founder of Time Now Hauling & Junk Removal

#18 Myth: Entrepreneurship is incredibly risky

On the other hand, employees have almost no ability to control their destiny. Oftentimes, if the company is failing or the entire industry goes south, then employees can be let go through no fault of their own and their only recourse is to find another job (which can take months).

Omer Reiner, President of FL Cash Home Buyers