VALENTINE’S DAY MARKS THE soft launch of a brave new charitable group based in Brooklyn Heights. Global Giving Circle (GGC) organizer SHANA DRESSLER plans to grab attention with some top tier chocolate.
The Feb. 14 Chocolate Tasting Extravaganza at Side Bar near Union Square will benefit Project Hope & Fairness, a not-for-profit that supports African cocoa farmers and their families. It is the first of five events Dressler plans to host this year before GGC’s official launch in December.
“I wanted our first event to be on Valentine’s Day because as much as it is a day of romance, it’s a day of love. Unfortunately many companies have capitalized on Valentine’s Day being another selling opportunity.
“In response to this, we decided we wanted to ‘bring it back to the people’ so to speak and focus on spreading love in the form of a benefit to help the cocoa farmers. Sadly, out of everyone working in the cocoa industry, they are the ones who earn the least amount of money.”
Dressler wants giving to be a community affair, which means making it fun and creative in a way to bring people together. For the tasting Dressler received an outpouring of generosity from chocolatiers and bakeries, many from New York and Brooklyn: Jacques Torres, The Chocolate Room, Baked, Theo, Vere, Sweet Riot, Fine & Raw, Divine Chocolate and others. For $25, cacao lovers can sample varieties of decadence from 3 to 5 p.m.
She credits Kamini Reddy, organizer of the NYC Chocolate Meetup (a group on Meetup.com), with boosting her confidence during event planning. Reddy’s more than 700 Meetup members were like a tailor-made invite list. Dressler hopes 100 people will attend on Saturday.
After leaving her job at Link TV two and a half years ago, while developing the mission and vision of what she wanted GGC to be, Dressler attended a dozen conferences about social entrepreneurship, philanthropy, wealth building and community activism. In 2008, she organized two initiatives—the first raised $5,000 to support VisionSpring in its work in India. Each $2 provided a pair of eyeglasses to a trade worker who otherwise would lose their job as soon as their vision deteriorated.
“VisionSpring has come up with such an ingeniously simple solution that drastically changes lives for the better,” says Dressler. “I see it as a preventative philanthropy model. Tailors, electricians, goldsmiths and mechanics don’t have to fall into poverty once their vision begins to fail. They can continue to be the main breadwinners for their families.”
She describes how it is much easier to keep someone from falling into poverty than to pull them back out of it.
“Once the working poor lose their livelihood, they often develop severe health and psychological problems. It’s amazing to me that one pair of glasses can make the difference that enables a worker to sustain an entire family.”
The second project, which came about through a connection she made at a Global Philanthropy Forum breakfast discussion table, was a donation of 10 water transportation systems (Q-Drums) to a Gone Rural boMake, a Swaziland artist collective. By cutting down on the time it takes the women to fetch water, they are able to focus more of their time on producing handicrafts, therefore making more money to support their families.
“We want to show people that they can make an enormous impact on peoples’ lives with small donations, as well as donations in groups. You don’t have to be wealthy or have a fancy title or position in society to be a change agent.”
Her team is a collective of professionals who come from varying backgrounds such as media, arts, medicine, health, real estate and education. Charles Best, CEO of DonorsChoose.org, was one of the Q-Drum project’s main donors.
“I’ve achieved a lot of milestones and accomplished a lot of things that I’m proud of. I’ve spent a lot of time focused on my career, my life, my needs, but underneath it all there was actually a hollow, empty feeling. So, I’ve rounded up a small infantry and we’re looking for others to join us in our quest to use our creativity, talents and resources to make significant differences in the lives of others.”
The web site, www.globalgivingcircle.org, will launch within the next two weeks, although you can visit now to sign up for the e-newsletter. Also a photographer, Dressler will have a show called “Discovering Ganesh” at BRIC’s Rotunda Gallery in the fall. Ganesh is the Hindu deity known as the Remover of Obstacles. More information about the exhibition can be seen at www.discoveringganesh.com.
To buy tickets to the Chocolate Extravaganza visit www.brownpapertickets.com/event/54935. More about Project Hope & Fairness available at www.projecthopeandfairness.org.
— Compiled by Caitlin McNamara
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© Brooklyn Daily Eagle 2009
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