Dear friends,

We are writing to share with you some sad news about the Hoop Fund.

After two years of working to crowdfund producer microloans and promote fair trade products, we have decided to close our doors.

There are a number of reasons for shutting down the company, the biggest being that despite some very passionate supporters, we were never able to reach the volume of projects and user traffic necessary to sustain the Hoop. Recently many of our brand partners confirmed that microloan projects + product deals are very difficult to market and there’s a high-level of education required for purchase. We’ve also found it very time consuming to set-up enough projects with enough product margin to cover our costs.

This is a really difficult decision to make, we’ve worked hard to keep the Hoop going and are proud of what we have all been able to do together. Over 800 people came together to support producers in 8 countries, as well as an amazing group of companies doing great work all over the world. We had so many passionate supporters, we just wish we could have done so much more.

For everyone that made a microloan through the Hoop, we will be contacting you via email to get your preference on how you would like to be repaid. We’re also working with our brand partners to figure out a plan for the loans that are still currently doing work in the field.

Finally, I’ve also been asked to share a number of our lessons learned, so that other social enterprises might benefit from our experiences. We’ll be posting those lessons here on our blog, so stay tuned if you want to learn more.

Thank you again for all your work to support the Hoop.  We will be forever grateful for your work, leadership, and commitment to supporting ethical producers.

Sincerely,
Patrick Donohue

CEO, Co-Founder
The Hoop Fund

For most people, it is not easy to find a gift with meaning. We value our relationships, but a heartfelt expression…seems so difficult!

In order to meet time restraints, we resort to best bets – brand name gift cards, trendy stocking stuffers, and Hallmark.  In order to fit within our budget, we want to find a good deal.

But it’s actually easier than ever to find gifts with meaning.

Conscious consumers across the globe shop based on their values.  They look for ownership type (family-owned, non-profit), production location (Made in the USA, locally-made), environmental standards (organic, Non-GMO), and labor practices (Fair Trade Certified) – to name a few.

To answer their call – green gift guides abound! From Green America and Fair Trade USA to the blogosphere and national news.  Everyone seems to be getting into the action.

Holiday shoppers are also opting for companies that give “One for One.” This is a newly popular option that combines consumption and philanthropy.  Popular brand leaders include Toms Shoes, FEED, and Better World Books.

With each purchase of shoes, Toms sends a pair of shoes to a child in need. With each purchase of FEED branded bags, the company funds nutritious school meals for malnourished children. For every book purchased on BetterWorldBooks, they send a book to someone in need.  The Hoop offers another example of this as consumers  fund a microloan with every purchase of ethical products.

More and more gift-givers are also opting to send donations instead of stuff and charities of all kinds make it easier to send a donation as a gift.  Universal Giving is a great resource for donation opportunities around the world and 100% of each donation goes directly to the cause. The organization screens donation and volunteer opportunities, so you don’t have to.

Global Exchange is another non-profit organization that’s practicing what they preach. Their Fair Trade stores provide shoppers with great ethical products and all sales revenue is re-invested in the non-profit.

What’s meaningful to you and your loved ones?

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, December 12, 2011

San Francisco, CA – This week, The Hoop Fund launches a unique gifting feature for the holidays, where every gift purchase funds a microloan (and every microloan can be gifted).

The latest twist on “One for One” buying meets philanthropy, the Hoop sends a microloan to the maker with every product purchase. Shoppers earn a deal on products in exchange for their investment in ethical supply chains and get their loan repaid.

Product offers come from fair trade and ethical brands such as Indigenous Designs, One Mango Tree, Global Goods Partners, Lotus Foods, Runa Tea, Prosperity Candle, and IndoSole.

Loans are all 0% interest and philanthropic in nature. Upon borrower repayment by the producer, the principal of the loan is returned to each lender.

Together, shoppers are building a seed bank for threatened species in Thailand and a day care center for hardworking Ugandan mothers. They’re sending Peruvian women weavers to vocational training and re-planting trees for Amazonian tea farmers.

For further information or interviews, contact:
Mary Rick
Tel: 415-425-6777
Email: mary(at)hoopfund.com
Hoop Press Page: http://hoopfund.com/press.webui

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About the Hoop
The Hoop is a one-year old start-up social enterprise that combines the power of group buying and crowdfunding to engage conscious consumers and send much needed financing to ethical farmers and artisans. Domestic lending will be coming soon. The company has been featured in Forbes, the Wall Street Journal and Fast Company and won the 2011 Hub Ventures Competition. Please visit HoopFund.com for more info. See campaign ads here:

Every day sustainable and ethical brands work to better align their values with their value chain. Every day they think about what’s best for the artisans, weavers, and farmers that produce the food we eat and the clothing we wear.

Every day these producers strive to grow, sew and make great products for us to enjoy.

Ethical brands including Indigenous Designs, Alter Eco, Lotus Foods, Runa Tea, Global Goods Partners, XS Project, Prosperity Candle, and One Mango Tree have all stepped up to bring Hoop customers great products, supporting great causes.

We thank you.

Learn about the microlending needs of these producers.

By Elizabeth M. Rojo and Kevin F. Adler

Kevin Adler is a passionate Hoop Funder and works as the Founder of BetterGrads, an organization built to empower public high school students to tap into the power of their school’s latent alumni network.

For most of 2011, Kevin lived, worked, studied, and served in Mexico as an Ambassador of Goodwill through a Rotary scholarship, which was awarded in recognition of his work as a social entrepreneur and for his commitment to global peace and understanding.

After being inspired by the Hoop’s mission to support producer communities around the world, Kevin and his friend Elizabeth Rojo of Fundación En Via composed this blog post for us to share with you.

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The Valley of Oaxaca is known for its many beautiful local crafts: colorful alebrijes in San Antonio Arrazola; barro negro (black mud) pottery in San Bartolo Coyotepec; beautiful tapetes (rugs) in Teotitlán del Valle. What is less known, and often overlooked, are the challenges that the talented artisans behind the crafts face in obtaining capital to expand their businesses and gain access to international and domestic markets.

The small Zapotec town of TeotitlánTeotitlán del Valle is renowned for its tapetes with intricate patterns and beautiful natural dyes. Falling in love with one of these traditional rugs is an easy task; understanding the process it took to produce one is a different story.

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This summer, Hoop Funder Daniel Torpey took a trip down to Peru to visit the plant garden that he and90 other chocolate lovers funded.  He was happy to report that the nursery and medicinal plant garden have continued their rapid growth, quite literally.  Thanks to Daniel, we can now share some more recent pictures of what your loans have made possible!

The nursery is now full of life in various stages of its own virtuous cycle, just as your loans are adding economic value through reforestation, traditional medicinals, and chocolate. Click here to see more pictures of the progress on facebook.

In a region of Peru known for its severe deforestation, the Acopagro Cooperativa Agraria Cacaotera is transforming the landscape, both environmentally and economically.  With the San Martin region’s ancient roots in traditional medicinal practices, Acopagro is not only producing the chocolate that we all love, but they are also contributing to the preservation and propagation of the native plants that were once prevalent in northern Peru.

We will keep you in the loop as we continue to follow the progress of your Hoop project.

Best wishes,
The Hoop Fund Team
(Maia, Patrick, Sylvia, Delise, and Rachel)

Since the Amazonian Reforestation project was fully funded – by a group of fantastic funders – the 35,000 seedlings that they helped to purchase are already sprouting…and promising even greater growth!

This month team Runa was able to deliver over two thousand Guayusa plants, sprouted from those seeds, to farmers in Misahualli and Alto Tena. After years of disappointment and lowered expectations from other similar projects, the farmers were thrilled to see that the Guayusa actually arrived as promised. By truck, wheelbarrow, and basket Runa is off to a great start, and the images show just some of the excitement and joy sprouting from seeds the Hoop community has funded!

Click here to see more photos from the delivery.

We will keep you in the loop as we continue to follow the progress of this awesome project.

Best wishes,
The Hoop Fund Team
(Maia, Patrick, Sylvia, Delise, and Rachel)

This article is featured on the Matter Network and Reuters.

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.

In our experience at the Hoop Fund, working with companies at the intersection of traditional commerce and philanthropy, at best the typical deal aggregator only shows off half of what you do, and at worst it might even undermine one of your core assets (your impact).

Here are 5 tops reasons why your typical deal aggregators won’t cut it for social enterprises, and what you can do about it.
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We’re really excited to announce our latest offering from the Hoop: crowd-funding for sustainable & fair trade products & producers. Check out the press release below for more, and please forward it on.

SF Based Hoop Fund unveils new crowd-funding Deals campaign combining fair-trade and personal investment

The “Fund Your Sweater, and Wear it Too” Campaign does exactly what it says, it gives consumers a way to do good while getting a deal. “Hoop Fund” deals combine sustainable and fair trade products with a personal investment in the people producing them.

Thanks to a partnership with Indigenous Designs, a $25 gift on hoopfund.com gets you a $35 credit towards any Indigenous product and a $10 micro-loan towards their women weavers, a vocational training project that enables women in Peru to learn new skills and earn a higher income. Visit this deal at hoopfund.com.

About the Hoop Fund:
The Hoop Fund is a unique crowd-funding platform that combines sustainable products with a direct, personal investment in the farmers or artisans who make them. The Hoop enables consumers to be investors in products that do good for the world. To know more about the current campaigns please visit http://hoopfund.com

About Indigenous Designs:
For over 17 years, Indigenous Designs has been a pioneer in fair trade, organic apparel, featuring handcrafted clothing made with beautiful fibers like organic cotton, alpaca, “wild silk” and merino wool. Indigenous Designs is committed to supporting and preserving fair trade wages and artisan cooperatives, investing in natural and organic fibers and environmentally-friendly dyes, and spreading the beauty of handmade, eco fashion. http://indigenousdesigns.com

Medicine hunter Chris Kilham talks about his experience visiting the guayusa growers of the Napo Province in Ecuador.

Guayusa is unusual. On the one hand, it contains caffeine, and so is useful in helping to maintain wakefulness. On the other hand, guayusa also contains an ample supply of L-theanine, an amino acid that imparts a feeling of pleasant tranquility. The combination of the two creates a light stimulation, but very smooth. Basically in guayusa you have a stimulant without ragged edges.

During the course of several days in Ecuador, I was able to see and participate in the planting of guayusa seedlings, harvesting guayusa leaves, and spending time with people from a project called Runa, who have organized guayusa growers and harvesters into a community. Using certified organic agriculture and fair wages, the Runa project is providing economic opportunity to native people who typically rely on performing day labor to get by. It’s a good model of agriculture performed in a safe, non-toxic way that can actually lead to a decent living for growers.

• Read Chris’s full story here.
• Give a microloan to support guayusa growers in Napo expand their guayusa production and reforestation efforts

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Chris Kilham is a medicine hunter, author and educator and appears on Fox News Health online in the U.S. and international television markets.