Who We Are & What We Do
Generosity Street provides a welcoming environment online to offer your skills and services to your neighbors within the San Francisco Bay Area. By providing our Connect forum, we’re encouraging our urban communities to grow and strengthening our common bonds.
To be clear, Generosity Street is not a time bank, an exchange service or anything that implies payment. We strive to encourage the actions of paying-it-forward, to rouse a society where people give for the sake of giving. There is no expected return, no money exchange, nothing banked for a later date. It’s pure kindness.
The intentions with our website is for neighbors to share their services with their neighbors in hopes to build bonds, create friendships, learn new skills and improve the communities they live in – with generosity. This bond isn't always so easy to create in urban environments where inhabitants ebb and flow throughout the years. The hope is we’ll provide a comfortable place to find those like-minded souls for you to connect with and begin growing.
But Generosity Street is becoming so much more! We hosted our first Skill Share Event in June in Oakland, CA and it was an incredible success! We invited 12 professionals from our community to give 15 minute presentations. Presentations ranging from DIY Plumbing Skills to Yoga to Food Preservation/Canning to Belly Dancing! We provided free snacks, sweets and beverages to all those who attended and hosted an Everything Swap Table with another local organization, Swap It Oakland. In addition to all this, we had a Free Raffle, with amazing prizes from generous donors like The Crucible, The Natural Grocery Company, Niroga Yoga and Amoeba Music. We were pleased to have dozens from our communities visit us throughout the event. If you would like a sneak peek, please see the Gallery above for photos from our first event.
Why is this so important? Because it was a beautiful event full of sharing, kindness, learning and fun! Because it is an event that we have been repeatedly asked to host again. Because it is an event that we would love to make a regular part of Generosity Street's efforts to unite our communities with kindness and service!
We are a 100% volunteer organization!
What We Need & What You Get
We have a very modest budget and pride ourselves in keeping expenses low. Our current/on-going expenses are Web Hosting. Keeping our forum live so our neighbors can serve their communities is our #1 priority!
Our dreams for hosting future Skill Share Events would involve the following expenses:
- Event Site Rental Fee (Area venues for such events are available for about $100.)
- Outreach and Promotional Expenses (Fliers, etc - roughly $10 per event.)
- Snacks and Beverages ($30-$40 per event)
- If we don't meet our entire goal of $600 (which we expect would fund 4 to 5 events) we will use the funds received towards as many community Skill Share events we can host as possible.
- If we EXCEED our goal, we will begin hosting Skill Share events outside of Oakland/East Bay and into the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area.
What do you get for your kindness and generosity?
Besides the good vibes of the universe for being such an integral part of an ever important movement, you can come join us at our next Skill Share Event! Maybe you even have a skill of your own that you'd like to share? But we also have some fabulous magnets and t-shirts for those feeling extra generous, so you can show off to your friends how giving you are! (BTW, the t-shirts were printed for our first skill share event with the kindness and generosity of G-Bear Prints, giving us shop space/time - gratis!)
The Impact
This all sounds great, right? But what impact does it really have on you? On your communities?
- Generosity Street firmly believes gift economy and service-based organizations are a vital part of our urban communities. Feeling that sense of connected-ness to our neighbors, in communities that often lack a common thread, is what will keep our neighborhoods safe and positive energy flowing. Sharing a skill, or learning a new one, creates that commonality that is necessary for this connected-ness. Generosity Street provides the safe haven to make these connections online. We're also quite excited to continue that ripple offline and have the ability to impact many more in our communities with Skill Share events.
- Our first Skill Share Event was a true success that impacted dozens in our community. This is just the beginning. Join us in growing the selfless movement of sharing skills, sharing our time, and building our communities from the inside out.
Got no cash? Volunteer at Generosity Street!
We get it. Not everyone has a dollar or two to spare. Times are tough. The non-gift economy has taken a toll on a lot of us. But remember I said we're 100% volunteer run? So, if you don't have the pocket change to spare... perhaps you have a little time?
We currently have the following opportunities open... but if you can do something for us that isn't listed below - please don't hesitate, let us know!
- Social Media Intern
- Help with Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
- Content development and writing
- Bloggers - share your inspiring stories of generosity with us
- And hey, don't forget - you can always pass the word on about Generosity Street (www.generositystreet.org), our Indiegogo campaign and Like us on Facebook! Oh, and use them Indiegogo share tools - share with the world!
Well... that was a lot, I know. Thank you with every fiber of my being for reading through and considering our request. Please check out our website and join us and your neighbors in service.
In kindness,
Danielle Schwartz
Founder, Generosity Street
