Through much of our lives, when we wanted to contribute to doing good in the world, we would donate to causes that we cared about. But we'd wonder, how much of a difference are we really making?
Then a few years ago, we learned about effective altruism—and it completely changed how we thought about giving.
If you’re not familiar with it, effective altruism is a movement focused on using evidence and careful reasoning to figure out how we can do the most good with the resources we have. It’s about making sure that the money we donate goes as far as possible in creating a positive impact on the world. We were shocked to learn that the most effective charities do 100 to 1,000 times more good with each dollar received than the average charity. That’s not a small difference—it’s huge!
Let me give you an example to illustrate what I mean.
Donating to a charity that provides guide dogs for the blind is certainly a good thing to do. But it turns out that for the same cost as providing one dog, you could provide around 100 people with cataract surgery, curing their blindness!
The effect of merely identifying which efforts give the biggest bang for the buck is staggering. Bigger still when you consider that some charities end up achieving nothing of value, or even doing more harm than good.
This realization made us rethink everything. We had always thought we were doing good by supporting causes close to our hearts. After learning about effective altruism, we realized we could do far more good by choosing charities carefully vetted to have the highest impact on the causes we care about. And this shift in perspective didn’t just change how we donated—it changed how we wanted to run our business.
We believe in more than just selling great products. We want to use our platform to make a transformative difference in the lives of others. That’s why we’ve made a commitment to donate 10% of the profits on every purchase to charities that have been vetted for high impact by effective altruism organizations, like GiveWell, Founder's Pledge, Effective Altruism Funds, and Animal Charity Evaluators.
I want to encourage you to think about your giving too. When you shop with us, you’re not just buying a product—you’re also contributing to a larger effort to make the world a better place. And together, we can make sure our collective impact is as big as it possibly can be.
Thanks for being part of this journey. It means more than you know.