Gumball Greetings: Thank You for Your Support
Dear Friend,
Here is our first newsletter! We're delighted in your continued interest and support of Gumball Capital and we wanted to update you on our current activities and endeavors. Hopefully this letter, and the ones follow should keep you up to speed on our progress and inform you of the impact we're making in student entrepreneurship and microfinance.
Cheers,
Belinda Chiang
Director of Marketing
Our Mission
Gumball Capital engages students with micropreneurship for social good through experience, education and investment. We created a one-week microfinance-benefit competition called the Gumball Challenge, where students form teams and create value using $27 and 27 gumballs. They return any revenue they generate to the Gumball Fund, which supports the working poor in developing nations through Kiva.org.
Campus Updates!
Fall was a very busy quarter for us as we simultaneously developed materials for and ran the Gumball Challenge for the first time at five schools nationwide: St. Olaf College, Stanford, Yale, UC Berkeley, and Sewanee.
We've held the first rounds of the Gumball Challenge at St. Olaf College and Stanford University, collecting a total of $3650 to lend out to the working poor.
We were able to work very closely with the Stanford teams to make sure the Gumball Challenge ran smoothly. Stanford recruited 8 teams that collectively raised $1250. One team took the gumball metaphor to heart spreading awareness about microfinance by selling gumball-inspired jewelry and crafts. We awarded them Best Microfinance Advocate and a lunch-date with Jessica Flannery (co-founder of Kiva). Another team raised an 11 foot-tower of $450 in quarters, winning Most Money Raised and got a chance to meet with Silicon Valley VC Sean Foote of Labrador Ventures.
St. Olaf followed a different route, hosting a 7-day event called "theWeek: microfinance for macroimpact." They raised $2400 through an series of speaker-conferences, benefit concerts, and charity auctions.
What's next? UC Berkeley, University of the South, and Yale University have all run the Gumball Challenge at their schools and we are waiting to hear out the results. When we hear back from them, we will then deliberate on national awards for the Gumball Challenge.
Grants and Awards
We've won a few awards along our journey that we are quite proud of. In late September, we were awarded a $500 grant from Gamestop and DoSomething.org, and in early December we won a grant from MTVu and Youth Venture (part of Ashoka, an organization we love!). We are working hard to make a positive impact in our community and in the world and it is awesome that other people are recognizing and supporting our efforts!
Microfinance
What is microfinance exactly, and how does Gumball Capital support it? Microfinance is an umbrella term for financial services to the poor. We focus specifically on the practice of making small loans, or microcredits, to the working poor to start or expand their businesses. This allows them to sustainably accumulate wealth and reduce the risks and uncertainty they face each day.
Teams that compete in the Gumball Challenge give any revenue they generate to the Gumball Fund. The Fund then uses the system developed by Kiva to provide individual loans to the working poor, who then have one year to repay it. Upon receipt of the loan, Gumball re-lends the money to another low-income individual, with no interest charged.
Why Gumballs?
We see gumballs as a metaphor for change: By placing a small amount of money in a gumball machine you allow a gumball to roll out. That one released gumball shifts all the remaining gumballs, moving them one step closer to the exit tunnel.
In a similar way, each developing-world entrepreneur lifted out of poverty through microfinance helps other members of his or her community by providing jobs, goods, and services. The entrepreneurs' increased income also goes to better health services and education for their families, which helps break the intergenerational cycle of poverty.
Extra! Extra!
We've recently been featured in a couple news-pieces. Check it out:
Stanford Competition Benefits Microfinance, The Paly Voice
Gumballs for Good, The Stanford Daily
Links
Gumball Capital, our website
Gumballs Making Change on YouTube
Profile on Do Something
Case Study on Social Edge
Microfinance!
Alleviating poverty
by providing
financial services
to the poor.
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