ThriftBooks Giving Back to Goodwill Industries this ThriftGiving Tuesday

1% of net revenue today will be donated to select Goodwill Industry Locations

Black Friday, Cyber Monday, GivingTuesday... It is so easy to get caught up in the holiday shopping lingo that we don't often stop to think of what it is all about. For many of us, these are days when we can expect great shopping deals to kick off our holiday season. And of course, they are! By the time you read this blog, I'm sure many of you will have purchased several gifts from your holiday shopping gift lists. Hopefully some of those items came from ThriftBooks^®!

But let's pause for a minute from the high-energy fun from the past weekend and center ourselves around what today is about. Today is GivingTuesday. It is a day about others and not ourselves. In case you were not aware (and I wasn't until I did some research for this blog), this year, 2022, is the 10th anniversary of GivingTuesday. What began at the 92nd Street Y in NYC in 2012 is today a global movement across 70 countries that inspires millions of people to give and celebrate generosity.

At ThriftBooks, we strive for every day to be a day of giving. Through our ThriftBooks Cares program we fulfill many requests for book donations for families, schools, and communities globally. Additionally, the past three years has seen the launch of our ThriftGiving™ Tuesday initiative where, on GivingTuesday, we highlight a key strategic partner we want to support in the year ahead. In 2020, we partnered with Barbershop Books and provided them a monetary donation to help fund an expansion of their program to get books into the hands of underprivileged boys. On ThriftGiving Tuesday in 2021, we highlighted a partnership we embarked on with Orion Jean, Time's 2021 Kid of the Year, and his Race to Kindness initiative where we donated a percent of our revenue on that day to one of Orion's non-profits, Book Drive for Kids.

These past programs have been extremely rewarding for all of us here at ThriftBooks and we are grateful for your involvement simply through your purchases on ThriftBooks.com on those select days.

For ThriftGiving Tuesday 2022, we are incredibly proud to support a non-profit organization we are all familiar with: Goodwill^® Industries International. Goodwill was founded in 1902 and despite its lengthy history, I personally only thought about them from a single perspective: donations. There are over 4,000 Goodwill locations and like many of us, I have dropped off household donations with them a few times in my life. Despite my very limited contact with Goodwill, I still considered myself to be somewhat familiar with all that Goodwill had to offer.

It turns out, however, that my knowledge of Goodwill hadn't even scratched the surface of all that they do.

Goodwill Industries International is more than a donation location. Goodwill is an organization all about changing lives. They put donated items to work in their retail stores, making them available to people in their local communities. In times of need or tight family budgets, customers can walk into a Goodwill and purchase a variety of items—clothes, shoes, housewares, or other necessities—at exceptionally low prices that simply cover operating costs because other people have donated them. That is what is at the core of our circular economy. Beyond selling items, those retail stores also change lives by providing gainful employment to thousands of people. But it doesn't stop there.

Goodwill Industries International supports a network of 155 nonprofit member organizations across North America. Each local Goodwill organization provides services that meet people where they are. From training, education, and job placement to transportation assistance, childcare and financial coaching, local Goodwill organizations help people prepare for, and join, their local workforce thereby strengthening their communities.

In fact, Goodwill is the leading nonprofit provider of job training and placement programs in North America. They have developed key programs to specifically address the skills gap in our country and are actively working to close this gap by providing training, education, certifications, and job placements.

At ThriftBooks, we believe access to books, and learning to be a strong reader, can change lives. But that is just a start. Having support later in life with access to job training and education also provides individuals with opportunities to reach their full potential.

Today's ThriftGiving Tuesday is about both. Today, 1% of our net revenue will be donated to selected Goodwill Industry locations who are in partnership with us. The best part is there is no additional action needed from you. In today's economy, where every dollar matters, we are not asking you for incremental donations. Simply shop ThriftBooks.com today as you normally would. This simple action will benefit Goodwill locations, and all the individuals assisted by their programs, throughout the country.

A popular song by Dave Matthews states: "If you give, you begin to live." Join us in making this ThriftGiving Tuesday a day of giving and the start of a new life for millions of people across the country.

Read more by Barbara Hagen