Do you ever drive past a soup kitchen and think, one day I will volunteer? Or throw change in a homeless persons cup thinking I could do more?
Here is an organisation that can help you on that quest. Cafe smart is a one day annual event that unites coffee makers and drinkers around Australia to help people that are homeless. So how it works is every coffee purchased in a participating cafe, $1 is donated to cafe smart. As a roaster we donate 1kg of coffee to each participating cafe to use on the day of cafe smart (7th August).
Last year 415 cafes across Australia united to raise over $120,000 for projects helping people who are homeless or at risk.
Where does all the money go? Well you'll be helping smaller organisations that really struggle to fundraise. Last year Cafe smart funded the Council to homeless persons, peer education support program to create a number of videos such as this one below to help with their education and advocacy work. Street Smart (the organisation that runs cafesmart) has also supported FareShare since 2004 when it was just starting out. Since then Street Smart has been a constant funder as the organisation has grown to now supply close to a million meals a year. Watch the video below to see how FareShare has become a huge non for profit organisation to rescue food and fight hunger.
If you're a cafe owner and would like to sign up or find out more, check out the cafesmart website.