Press + News
Crowdsourcing Capital for Sustainable Supply Chains
Sustainable Life Media - Everyday the world gets a little more connected. With only a mobile phone and a Twitter account, citizens across the globe are publishing international news and breaking stories in a matter of seconds. Sustainable brands have the opportunity to take advantage of this new level of connectivity with producers and consumers to do what their profit-only competitors cannot: build passionate, engaged customers around real stories of impact.
In 2010, a group of entrepreneurs and leading sustainable brands came together to launch The Hoop Fund. The group’s mission is to connect consumers and producers, crowdfund microloans for ethical producers, and transform sustainable value-chains into powerful platforms for customer engagement and acquisition.
Greed Has Gone Good: Social Capital Markets 2011
Forbes - Patrick Donohue, Co-Founder & CEO of the Hoop Fund, an e-Bay meets Kiva crowd funding platform that allows individuals to purchase “ethically” products and to invest in the farmers and artisans behind them, is hoping for the same. “We are looking for partners and investors to help us take the Hoop to the next level,” says Donohue. They just kicked off a new seed round of $350k, of which they’ve raised $75k from Hub Ventures and First Light Ventures.” Donohue notes that both are “pioneers in the SOCAP community.”
Community caught my eye. It’s not a term you’d find flowing from Wall Street’s lips. Donohue believes that’s changing.
“When the market’s crashed in 2008, I think a lot of people realized just how much we need community. Not only did out of control money put us in a bad situation, but we realized that we can’t rely 100% on 401ks and the market to take care of us. Trying to make so much money so that you don’t need anyone is a ridiculous and lonely pursuit. So impact investing not only helps build the types of community infrastructure we need to thrive, but it also forces us to view our financial returns along side the society we’re building and what we’re doing to our ecosystems. It keeps us connected. That’s a very good thing.”
Looking to Turn a Profit - One Good Cause at a Time
Wall Street Journal - Niche sites require tons of legwork to grow. For one thing, entrepreneurs must develop a critical mass of fund raisers and potential donors to give the site value.
One way to do that is to tap into an existing network. Patrick Donohue, co-founder of Hoopfund.com, says the San Francisco-based site has grown to more than 4,000 members in less than a year. The strategy, he says, is to give donors another way to support people whose goods they already buy in stores.
Launched in August 2010, the site lets users make interest-free loans of $25 at a time to help suppliers in developing countries who produce everything from chocolate to vodka. Donors usually know the products from chains like Whole Foods or smaller markets. "Each brand we bring on board brings along their own social network," says Mr. Donohue. "Since these networks tend to have an affinity for one another, we're creating a large community out of all these smaller networks."
Hoop Fund Spearheads Innovative Crowd-Funding Platform for the Conscious Consumer-Investor
Triple Pundit - Many consumers these days are in search of a way to not only support, but become more personally connected to a sustainable supply chain which provides them with products that do good. The Hoop Fund, recent winner of Hub Bay Area’s Venture funding, was formed with this type of conscious consumer in mind.
Co-founded last August by former Coca-Cola VP of global brands Mark Mathieu, fair trade expert Deborah Hirsch, and entrepreneur Patrick Donohue, the Hoop Fund is a crowd-funding platform where people can invest in fair trade, sustainable farmers and artisans around the world whose products include rice, chocolate, tea, clothing, handicrafts and cotton, among others. Currently, the site has 510 funders contributing a total of $11,500 to ten projects that are improving nine international communities.
Group Buying For Social Enterprises: 5 Ways Deals Can Do Good
Reuters via Matter Network - Offer a sexy deal, drive massive amounts of new customers to your door, and you're golden, right?
There's been a lot of news these days about group deal platforms, and if you're a traditional business - with excess inventory to move, highly perishable goods, or a low cost of goods sold – then a deal platform might be just what you need.
But what if you're a hybrid business that's both for-profit and for-social impact: say a fair trade or sustainable brand that invests in the well being of your suppliers and the ecosystems they live in? Will the typical, discount-focused, deal aggregator work for you?
Not likely.
"Consumer Investing" Creates Opportunity for Cambodian Rice Farmers
Triple Pundit - There are people and families behind every product that we buy. As the local food movement grows in popularity and strength, so has the demand for a way to connect to the people and communities behind products that come from other parts of the world.
The Hoop Fund, a crowd-funding platform that enables people “to connect with and support small producers of great products,” is innovating a new way to connect consumers to where and whom our products come from.
Have Your Chocolate and Fund It Too: A New Vision for Microloans
Fast Company - The idea for The Hoop was first hatched by Deborah Hirsh, a fair trade expert who was struck by the success of online microlending platforms like Kiva. She partnered with entrepreneur Patrick Donohue, who had a track record of several successful enterprises in developing countries. "We thought, why can't this model be used for fair trade producers?" Donohue says.
The Hoop Fund: Applying the Kiva Model to Fair Trade
Chronicle of Philanthropy - The Hoop Fund is a new Web site that uses an approach popularized by Kiva to increase the market for fair-trade goods, such as chocolate and hand-woven clothing, and help the farmer and craft cooperatives in the developing world that make the products gain access to capital to improve their businesses.
Visitors to the Hoop site can buy Coral Jasmine Rice grown by the Surin Cooperative in Thailand, but they can also make a loan to help the cooperative buy a freezer to preserve seeds from 35 threatened native rice species.
