DRESSEMBER FOUNDER BLYTHE HILL IN 2016. |
THE ROMANTICS |
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Bea and Leah Koch
Cofounders of The Ripped Bodice PLATFORM: Kickstarter RAISED: $ 91,187
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THE FASHION PLATE Blythe Hill
CEO and founder of the Dressember Foundation PLATFORM: Classy RAISED: $ 1.5 million +
P O I N T S O F L IG H T
HONOREE NO. 5879
In 2009, Blythe Hill was an uninspired grad-school student with little time to pursue her side interest in fashion. So she created a style challenge: Wear a dress( not necessarily the same one) every day for a month. She thought it would be a silly, one-off thing— until friends and even strangers asked to join.“ By the third year, I started dreaming about what more it could be,” Hill says. Inspired by Movember, the
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mustache-growing challenge that supports men’ s health, she focused on human trafficking, a cause Hill is passionate about. The response was beyond positive. Dressember partners with anti-trafficking organizations International Justice Mission and the A21 Campaign to fund rescue operations and survivors’ recovery.“ I didn’ t [ take ] the conventional path to engage on this issue,” Hill says.“ What I created was a fun way to have a significant impact.”
SUCCESS SECRET Build partnerships with like-minded orgs to expand your impact. Hill partners with a company each year to create a Dressember dress collection, sewn by women in Nepal rescued from sex trafficking. They get fair wages, and donors get a new outfit for their challenge.
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POINTS OF LIGHT is a global nonprofit that engages 4 million volunteers in service projects every year and shares stories of Points of Light honorees to help inspire others to serve— including Mallory Brown( CrowdRise. com / Mallory) and Dressember Foundation founder Blythe Hill. Visit Cosmopolitan. com / Crowdfunding to see how you can join this year’ s Dressember challenge. |
Sisters Bea, 27, and Leah Koch, 24, love romance novels and were sure they wanted to start a business together. But in 2015, when they decided to open the nation’ s first romance-only bookstore, in Los Angeles, they had no idea how to get the $ 90,000 needed for inventory, equipment, furniture, licensing, and more. Then they hit on the
SISTERS AND COFOUNDERS LEAH( LEFT) AND BEA KOCH.
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1. SET REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS“ When people say they want to be the next Ice Bucket Challenge, I cringe,” says Rachel Lazarus, an account manager at Classy.“ It’ s not that easy to go viral.” Instead of hoping the Today show discovers you, start with your circle. |
2. BE SPECIFIC“ Raising money for something tangible is better than raising money for operational funds,” says Robert Wolfe, CEO of Crowd Rise. Consider what is more inspiring: raising $ 50,000 for a hospital’ s“ operational costs” or raising |
$ 50,000 for a new hospital wing?
3. ASK FOR WHAT YOU REALLY NEED A lot of companies set a low goal amount just to have a successful campaign, reveals Grant Crider, a consultant at Startups. co. But if you raise $ 5,000 and you
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actually need $ 25,000, your company goes nowhere, he warns.
4. SET A DEADLINE“ It seems counterintuitive, but urgency creates results,” Wolfe adds.“ If you have to participate within 24 hours, you’ re not going to wait.”
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5. COST OUT EVERY NUT AND BOLT Physical products are by far the most successful ones on Indiegogo, notes CEO David Mandelbrot. But“ to actually manufacture and ship a product is not an easy task,” he says. First, create a“ bill of materials,” breaking |