2023 has seen the launch of a new charity fundraising initiative from my Cheltenham greeting card business, Jess A Little Creative. Charity Card Of The Month launched in May, and pretty much does what it says on the tin - I like to keep things straight forward! Every month, I design and release a new greeting card design which raises money for a different charity. I am really excited to be able to share more with you today about what the scheme is, how it works, why I chose to set it up in the first place, and list some of the charities who are already benefiting from it (as well as sharing some images of the beautiful charity cards already available to buy!).
Bee cardWhat is Charity Card Of The Month?
Charity Card Of The Month is a brand new charity fundraising initiative from my Cheltenham greeting card business, Jess A Little Creative. I wanted to find a way that I could use my business for good, and help raise money for amazing charities. Every month, I design and release a new greeting card, raising money for a different charity. I am hoping to use this scheme to build up a large collection of charity cards, meaning that Jess A Little Creative is regularly donating to a wide range of incredible charities; locally, nationally, and internationally.
Why charity fundraising?
I have always been incredibly passionate about helping others, and trying to make a positive impact in the world. The whole mission behind my greeting card business, Jess A Little Creative, is to spread kindness. But the idea of incorporating charity fundraising into my business came about during the outbreak of the war in Ukraine in 2022. I felt helpless watching all the suffering and not knowing how to make a difference.
Shortly after the outbreak of the war, I discovered that Ukraine’s national flower was a sunflower, and I had had an idea for a sunflower greeting card for a long time. I decided to finally design and release this card, with all the proceeds being donated to help those suffering in Ukraine. I dropped everything and spent the rest of that week designing the sunflower greeting card, getting it printed, and shouting about it on social media to help spread the word about my fundraising and raise as much money as possible for those in need.
The response was fantastic (particularly over on Instagram), and the sunflower card ended up raising over £100 for The British Red Cross Ukraine Appeal. I was incredibly honoured to be named as one of Work For Good’s 2022 Charity Champions for this fundraising work, and it was one of my biggest business achievements in 2022. You can read more about my fundraising for Ukraine here.
I felt a bigger sense of love, community, and kindness during the launch of the sunflower card than I had at any other time while running my business. I knew that charity fundraising had to become a bigger part of the Jess A Little Creative mission, I just didn’t quite know how yet. But a few months later, the idea came to me to create a scheme where I regularly released new charity card designs, and so Charity Card Of The Month was born.
Sunflower card, raising money for The British Red Cross
How does Charity Card Of The Month work?
I ummed and ahhed over the exact logistics of the scheme, but in the end I decided on a way that meant I got to support lots of different charities, while creating greeting cards whose designs linked to the charity being supported.
It works like this:
- Each month, I design and release a new greeting card design, supporting a different charity.
- During its launch month, while it is ‘Charity Card Of The Month’, 25% of every sale of that greeting card will be donated to the charity via Work For Good.
- Once the month is over, and the card is no longer ‘Charity Card Of The Month’, it will remain as a charity card, but the charity donation will reduce from 25% to 10% of every sale being donated to the chosen charity via Work For Good.
Yes You Can card, raising money for Mind
Charities already being supported
The scheme is already well under way with some incredible charities being supported.
- The original Sunflower card which started this whole idea rolling is still raising money for The British Red Cross.
- In May, I designed and released a Bee card to raise money for the Bumblebee Conservation Trust.
- June saw the release of a special Yes You Can card, raising money for mental health charity, Mind. This is the first in what I’m hoping will become a whole range of cards designed to help support individuals struggling with their mental health.
- Most recently, I designed a Butterfly card, to raise money for Butterfly Conservation.
But this is just the beginning! I run Jess A Little Creative single-handedly, so have limited time and resources, but I will continue to release a new charity card design every month (or as often as I can!) to help support various local, national and international charities. I am incredibly excited to build my collection of charity cards, and raise as much money as possible for these incredible causes.
Butterfly card, raising money for Butterfly Conservation
So there you have it, that was a very quick whistle-stop tour of Charity Card Of The Month for you. I am very proud of the scheme, and hope it will continue to grow and support many more charities over the coming months and years. All the charity cards currently available can be viewed and purchased here.
If you like the sound of Charity Card Of The Month, please sign up to my mailing list where you will receive my emails, including information about the release of each new charity card.
If you work for a charity and would like to see your charity supported through this charity card scheme, please drop me an email at jessalittlecreative@gmail.com. Please note that the charity will need to be registered with Work For Good, as I do all my charity donations through them.
Thank you to everyone who has supported Charity Card Of The Month so far! Jess x
