Blake Mycoskie, founder of Tom’s shoes in Venice, CA, and a former contestant on The Amazing Race, gives away a pair of shoes for every pair his company sells. He’s now donated over 115,000 pairs through a series of Shoe-Drop tours around the world.

Why?

To give children the opportunity to wear shoes through his One For One program of course, but also because an explosive trend in conscious consumerism is upon us. We want to know who we’re buying from, the size of their carbon footprint and yes, if the people who made it were paid a reasonable amount to do the work.

Giving product and money to causes is part of the new distribution of designer wealth and it’s what’s we want to see. Designers big and small see the benefits of this.

EDUN founders, Bono of U2 and Ali Hewson founded their company in 2005 featuring organic clothing, graphic tees and eco-clothing with a mission to drive sustainable employment in developing economies.

Other designers like Betsey Johnson, Iman, Tory Burch and Nicole Miller have done everything from support the environment to donate to AIDS awareness, breast cancer research and school nutrition programs.

Maybe they do it because they realize how good it feels to give.

Maybe they do it because the numbers add up better if they do it, but maybe, just maybe they do it so that when their kids ask them in ten years: “Mommy, what did you do to help the world?”

Mommy can then look them straight in the eye and say, “A lot.”

Image: Garry Knight

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