Innovation

With this question, Sophie started to explore new possibilities. She found that many non-profit organizations are lacking good resources. The organizations need good projects that not only provide financial support to the people they help, but also help them to grow as a person. on the other hand, Sophie found that there are retail businesses which are interested in making their brand more socially responsible. “Why not connect them together to synergize their resources and make bigger impact to more people?” Sophie wondered. “The impact is not just on those people who are in difficult situations and need help. We can also inspire those who are in good living conditions; we can help them to raise awareness, to have more empathy and compassion which in return will help them be happier and more satisfied in their lives.”

It is remarkable that WAL’s innovative collaborative platform service make the business sustainable while making the world a better place. The way WAL operates successfully meets the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 5 which is “Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls: End all forms of discrimination against all women and girls everywhere. Enhance the use of enabling technology, in particular information and communications technology, to promote the empowerment of women.”

Inspiration

“WAL is the bridge to connect all the parties involved, especially between non-profit organization and the customers, helping them to build emotional connections. So for those all involve they can generate more empathy from people”, Sophie said. With this clear position and strategy, Sophie narrowed down WAL’s focus on connecting “empowered women artisans in disadvantaged situations in under-developing countries/areas to conscious fashion consumers' preferred fashion brands. Although women communities have different needs for different countries/areas, however, these women are all backbones and all mothers of the world, Sophie believes, “Empower a woman, you will empower the whole family!” WAL has worked with 5 women communities in India, China, Uganda, and Peru. At the same time, “conscious fashion become more and more popular. “Every person ought to have the awareness that ‘purchasing is always a moral—and not simply an economic—act,” said Pope Francis in his 2015 New Year’s Day address. It resonates to Sophie’s heart. She is keen to work with those brands that see themselves as “conscious fashion consumers”, advocate eco-friendly or fair trade collections, and also serve with higher purpose. Each project in WAL is co-brand collaboration between the brand and the artisan women community. How to synergize these two parts and make even bigger impact to the whole society? The power of story! “Each customer will feel the product they bought is not just beautiful, but also they will appreciate the handmade craft once they know the heart-touching story of whom made their product.” Sophie says proudly.

One of the great examples of WAL’s project is collaboration with Aahan Tribal Development Foundation in India and Olga Dogs in Taiwan. Aahan foundation is an Indian non-profit organization, founded by Rashmi, a passionate Indian woman, aiming to prevent trafficking of tribal girls and empowerment of tribal women. Olga Dogs, is an online shop for dogs. The owner, Olga, a Taiwanese girl got inspired during the trip in India and start this shop back to Taiwan. “When people talk about charity, they focus too much on the miserable stories. But I want to focus on the positive side. And people needs positive inspiration. I want to through my products, and the story behind to make my customers feel empowered. Our products help people to connect to love, connect to courage, and connect to family.”

WAL connected these two parties together, and provided a project where Olga Dogs purchases dog bow ties designed and hand-made by girls from Aahan foundation with fair trade price. Then Olga sells those ties to customers in market price with stories behind. To manage the project, WAL’s team not only facilitate from concept development, product design, material sourcing, artisan production, but also they will facilitate the communication between both sides, for making an excellent supply chain management on the special collaboration. This project provides opportunity to those Indian girls for self-fulfilled& self-empowerment, at the same time it inspires Olga Dogs’ customers with the stories of these girls. “Courageous girls create the wonder of life” this slogan represents the spirit which has inspired many people. They become more aware and emotional engaged, buying with sense of meaning.

Overall impact

This project has brought the first amount of non-fundraise money to Aahan Foundation. It has helped 5,000 young girls in the disadvantage situation to collect their courage, learn technique skills, and develop their life on their own feet. And Olga Dogs’ facebook page already has 15,000 followers and the number is keep growing.

Business benefit

WAL’s mission is focusing on women empowerment from every corner of the world. With this mission, WAL has helped women all over the world. They provide fashion teachings, business trainings and micro-financing to the communities. They develop a methodology to encourage each community to become independent on their own. For example, WAL has worked with Uganda to introduce the tropical energetic design to the world, and provide women cooperative in Uganda a new opportunity of feeding their family and accessibility of education of their kids.

Social and environmental benefit

“Money is help to increase our impact!” Sophie emphasized. So when WAL manage projects, not only they help women to find their own strength within, but also help those fair-trade businesses grow; how to expand their business, how to help people the business is targeting. At the same time, during the process, WAL pays close attention to make sure products are more friendly to the environment and environment is more friendly to social-works.

Interview

Sophie Tsuei, CEO