Live on Good Day LA!
The wonderful (and extremely talented) Koko McAboy (@koko.mcaboy) and Good Day LA spent five hours with me and this morning, first in our loft, then out on the street, delivering the bags. We appreciate all the attention and publicity… and, yes, I could use your donations!
Most of the people I meet on the street are just like you and me, but had no safety net when trouble befell them. They need your help. A recurring pledge of just $40 a month would change the life of a person every month and keep them alive for up to five days.
BAG will be LIVE on “Good Day LA” tomorrow! Monday March 18th
Bags and Grace will be featured 4 times, every hour, tomorrow morning, Monday March 18th, on Channel 11’s hit morning show, Good Day LA!
At 7:15 and 8:15, the show will broadcast live from the loft, showing how we create the bags for distribution. Then, at 9:15 and 10:15, they will broadcast live with our founder, Tom Provost, live from the street as he hands out bags. If you live in LA, please watch!
(We’d love any photos from the broadcast if you catch us on!)
Thanks for a terrific afternoon of filling bags!
Many thanks to all the people who came out to see our new loft space… and help us fill bags! This was by far the most bags we’ve filled in a day ever, which will help so many of the unhoused in LA!
Christmas Morning Delivery
Our annual Christmas morning BAG delivery: my good friends Nate and Jack woke up at 4:30 AM (God bless them!) to help deliver 2 truck loads of bags of food, water, socks and sundries to people living on the street. We do it before sunrise so people get a little "Santa Claus" Christmas morning when they wake up. If you need a year-end tax deduction, please consider a donation: www.bagsandgrace.com The need is great... and MERRY CHRISTMAS!
This is Quinn
I met Quinn Saturday, handing out bags downtown. His glasses were broken and I was able to get him a new pair so he could see. It is amazing how hopeful and upbeat so many of the people I meet and encounter remain, even given very difficult circumstances. Quinn is such a man, smart, funny and engaging. So many people are in need. Please consider a donation (monthly would be an amazing help) so we can continue to provide bags… and more!… to the unhoused on our streets.
Our New Location!
We are thrilled to expand into a much larger location! Located in the Arts District of downtown Los Angeles, this new space opens a world of opportunity for us. Because of the added space, not only is it easier and faster to make the bags, we now have a lot of extra room to receive corporate donorships of our products! Take a look at the space… and all the room!
BTW - if you have any experience getting donations, we sure could use the help! Please contact us: tom@bagsandgrace.com.
BAGS in action
I recently handed out a lot of bags early one more, including to this lovely gentleman. Our partner, Street Medicine LA, ran into him a week later… he’d broken his arm and was using the bag as his sling! Street Medicine was able to help him but they sent us a photo and his thank you.
Our “folks”
Here are photos of just a few of the people we give our bags. I’m continually amazed by the positivity and optimism many people on the street have, even in the hardest of circumstances, and the grace and knowledge I receive back from them.
A heartfelt response
We received this email from Alfredo, a man we handed some bags to early one morning:
Hello and good day to you and yours !
I just wanted to thank you for the gift of gifts on a bag, I am one of the homeless persons that you and I believe your son passed a couple of Bags of Grave to one day before this past Christmas, it has to be one of the best packed care packages that I'd ever received this past 5+ years that I've been experiencing this "homeless"situation of my later life here on Earth, and I felt the need to let you and your crew know to that we seriously appreciate your love and care especially the time it must take to individually fill these bags and then actually go through the trouble of hitting these mean crazy streets to pas them out, not including the cost of each item and other sacrifices it takes to show this love and care to complete strangers whom you don't even know ......I know a lot of these individuals would share the same words of thanks and appreciation if they could, yet I know their addictions and at times lack of having the simplest means to communicate such as a phone or even WiFi , doesn't allow them the opportunity to do so. But I want say your heart is that of an angel 😇, because I know of what it takes to show such concerns, love and care for an "oppressed soul "of our society, God Bless you and yours, and may HE show HIS REWARDS TO THOSE SUCH AS YOURSELF, IN TIMES OF NEED AS WELL AS TIMES OF ANY DOUBT THAT HE IS WITH YOU .....ALWAYS
Our new partner: Mango, the unofficial Mayor of downtown LA
Last night, handing out bags in downtown LA, I met the most amazing fellow. Mango. He was a joy to speak with… smart, sharp, funny, with an attitude about life that would put any of us to shame. He has agreed to help us distribute bags to those who really need them, as well as get the word out. Check out the ABC news video about him (click the link) as well a photo. Clearly we were having a good time.
New Products for the bag!
I’m so excited about the new product we are adding to the bags for the winter. Hand warmers, toe warmers, a rain poncho and a mylar blanket for warmth. Please consider donating so we can provide more bags to the people on the street!
Events for Christmas Week
This is always a big week for us at bagsandgrace.com… This morning, we delivered 100 bags to one of our partners, The Laundry Truck LA, who will give a bag with every free load of laundry they do for the unhoused - they are an amazing charity. Then, another partner, Nickey Kehoe, the wonderful design store on Beverly, is featuring our bags so we will give them a lot of bags as well. And on Christmas morning, we’ll do a big delivery before dawn, leaving bags in front of tents around town so people can have a little Christmas.
Please considering checking out the website and donating, we’ll need more product for bags after this week. You can even do a recurring donation... just 35 dollars a month will help someone survive on the street for up to 5 days. Many thanks!
Bags in the Xterra
Bags of clothes to be washed by Laundry Truck
Debra of The Laundry Truck LA
Display at Nickey Kehoe (nickeykehoe.com)
Another new partnership… and fundraiser
This Saturday, Nickey Kehoe, an incredible design and furnishing store in Los Angeles, is donating 20% of their marketplace sales (household items) to Bags And Grace! This is an incredibly giving event Nickey Kehoe is throwing for us and will help many of the unhoused. The store is incredible... if you live in LA and have a chance to drop by and, you know, buy... please do! (7266 Beverly Blvd, just west of La Brea,) Or visit them online on Saturday! It's an opportunity to get a cool gift... or something special for yourself... and help out at the same time.
The wonderful staff at the store is excited about partnering with Bags And Grace and is going to sell bags to people who would be willing to also hand them out, which will broaden out reach across the city.
“Safe Sleep Village” is a new partnership
Our Bags And Grace partnership with Laundry Truck LA has been going great. This week we were able to distribute 80 bags to "Safe Sleep Village", a tent village in a parking lot designed to give the homeless more safety. Laundry Truck LA is washing their clothes for free and we can help with our bags: each bag provides enough food, liquid and sundries for someone to survive on the street for 3-5 days.
We are always in need of donations for the product for our bags. A pledge of only 35 dollars a month would be one bag a month and help so much. Just think about it... then click on over to our website! It's easy to set up a recurring donation.
CBS News “Shout-out”!
The LA CBS station did a wonderful news report on one of our partners, Street Medicine and its founder, the amazing Brett Feldman, along with the equally amazing Joseph Becerra. Street Medicine provides medical attention to people on the street. Like us, they go directly to the people in need. Their service to the community is inspiring and we’re thrilled they can give each person they treat one of our bags.
Click below for the news report… where our bags are so prominently displayed, we’ve received emails and donations because of the story. So feel free to share the news report! Any attention we get helps us raise money, which helps us make more bags!
Check out our new bags!
I worked in marketing for a dozen or so years and understand the importance of branding. At its base, branding involves a great logo. I believe we have a great logo. But over this first year of Bags And Grace being official (5/5 is our anniversary!) and handing out many, many bags, I realized how important it was to get this logo onto the bag itself. One main reason was for ease… I can’t tell you how many times I’m asked ‘Who are you with?’ or ‘Where do these come from?’ The logo on the bag makes the question easy to answer.
But for any charity, particularly a start-up, fundraising is so important. Branding aids fundraising enormously. So I wanted to get the logo onto the bag so that the name and website would become more and more evident, particularly as we distribute more and more bags. This is furthered by our choice to fill reusable bags that people can hold onto long after the products in the bags are gone. Properly branded, the name of the charity and the website will stay in the memory for anyone using the bag or who encounters the bag.
My good friend Tiffiny Federico, a teacher and librarian in the Los Angeles School District, connected me with a wonderful woman, Ana Sanchez, who runs a business called Mean Stitching, Inc. Ana was gracious enough to agree to put the logos on the bags at cost. Combined with our partner Organic Cotton Mart, who sell us the bags at a very reduced rate, we now have these awesome branded bags!
Many thanks to Ana and her gracious gift. I daresay I foresee t-shirts in our future as well! (Any donors out there want to contribute for that??)
And, btw, as long as we are talking branding and logos, a good friend recently pointed out to me the arrow in the Fed Ex logo, which is brilliant. I’d never noticed it. Have you?
Organic Cotton Mart - a wonderful new partner
When the charity is called Bags And Grace, the bag itself is pretty important. I tried over a dozen bags when I first started giving out bags a few years ago. I felt like Goldilocks… too big, too small, too flimsy, too everything. Nothing was just right. Until I tried Organic Cotton Mart’s “Reusable Cotton Muslin Bag.” Made from all natural ingredients and biodegradable, this bag was strong! Not only would it hold our ever growing list of items, it could be used again and again by the person receiving the bag. I’ve been using these wonderful bags ever since.
The bag is our costliest item. But I needed a sturdy, reusable bag. So I kept ordering them from Amazon, larger and larger amounts with each order. After a particularly large order, the people from Organic Cotton Mart emailed to find out if we could work an easier way to ship the bags. They also were curious why I was ordering so many bags. When they found out what the bags were for, they offered me a huge discount! I’m getting the bags essentially at cost.
Thank you and God bless Organic Cotton Mart! This is a huge savings and benefit for our charity, enabling us to create many more bags.
Please check out their awesome website. They have a lot of other wonderful, high quality products, including awesome cotton throws along with a lot of different bags, totes, make up removers, cheesecloths and swaddles. They even have a gorgeous yoga mat. I love all their merchandise!
Again, please check out the website for this terrific company …. they are currently having a terrific sale.
https://www.organiccottonmart.com
And many continued thanks to the wonderful team at Organic Cotton Mart!
Organic Cotton Mart’s Cotton Muslin Produce Bag - we use the XL.
Alcala! Our first sponsorhip
A product we feature in the bag is a body wipe, enabling a person to get clean without a shower. Because I want each item in the bag to be good quality, I tried a lot of different wipes in order to find the best one. Hands down, no question, the best wipe I tried was the Alcala Deodorizing Body Wipe:
Made from bamboo and biodegradable, this is a large wipe (big plus) that is extremely soft yet very durable. It smells amazing and gets the job done better than all the other wipes I tried.
So I bought an initial 500 wipes from Amazon.
I then received a query through Amazon from Steven Arjonilla, who started the company with his partner Robert. Steven was curious why we ordered so many wipes. I replied, telling him about Bags And Grace and how we were putting two wipes into each bag. Steven then wrote back … and donated another 500 wipes!
Particularly for a start-up charity, a donation such as this meant a great deal and is helping us to create more bags as the homeless population in Los Angeles is exploding due to the pandemic and lockdown. Alcala is also a growing company with not only a terrific product but a company created and run by two very good men who are striving to put their community first.
If you ever have use for a body wipe, I encourage you to use Alcala. They are awesome!
And thank you Steven and Robert!
Christmas Morning Delivery
Thank you to everyone who donated in December! Along with giving about 100 bags to Laundry Truck LA, I went out before dawn on Christmas morning and put almost 100 bags in front of tents or next to those sleeping in doorways so people might have a little Santa. It was dark and I hate invading people’s privacy so I didn’t take any pictures but I know your gifts and donations made a big difference in the lives of those who received the bags. Onward into 2021, we’ll see how many bags we can continue to create!
Blessings to all of you as we come to the end of this crazy year.
An Exciting New Partnership!
As some of you know, one of the ways we distribute bags to people in need is through Street Medicine LA, a wonderful team of doctors and staff who bring medical care directly to tent cities and sidewalks. The team is able to give one of our bags to each person they help.
We are now also partnering with The Laundry Truck LA, an amazing service created by Jodie Dolan and managed by Angelica Naccarati. The Laundry Truck provides free mobile laundry to the homeless. Check out their website:
https://www.thelaundrytruckla.com
This is such a cool service to the homeless! We’ll be bringing them bags as often as possible (we need your donations!) so they can also give bags to those they help.
Click over to donate at PayPal or use Venmo (our preferred… no fees!) where you can find us: bagsandgrace.
Thanks for your support!
