Salvaged Revenue

Eleanor Saunders is the Executive Director of the Emergency Care Help Organization, known as: ECHO.  Her past achievements have included: pioneering the Seeds of Faith Community Garden, directing the Brandon Cold Weather Shelter, and owning a small business.  

Her past employers have included the Children's Home, Junior Achievement, and Bay Life Church.

Eleanor was recognized as a Hometown Hero by the Tampa Tribune (2014) as well as Fox 13 (2015).  She participated in the Inner City Capital Connections Program (2017) and received a certificate of Entrepreneurship through the Goldman Sachs 10,000 small businesses program (2019). 

Under her leadership, the organization has received the Bank of America Neighborhood Builders Grant, placed in the Children's Board Business Plan competition, and won the Social Venture Partners pitch competition. 

Eleanor is the proud mother of three independent millennials and resides with her husband, Mark in Brandon, FL.

The goal of our organization is to end hunger.  The leading cause of hunger in the United States is underemployment.  

Salvaged Revenue takes the overabundant resource  of discarded clothing and leverages it to produce a training/employment opportunity for the underemployed.  Salvaged Revenue elevates all those who participate by empowering them to provide for themselves.  But, it gets even better...

The project literally takes antiquated models of feeding the hungry and turns them on their head.  The one that is hungry is no longer solely on the receiving end.  Through their training and efforts, apprentices not only provide for themselves, but make a way for others.  The revenue generated by the project grows the organization.  

The potential to scale is enormous.  Any nonprofit in the immediate needs space, with a training room could buy in.  Two nonprofits have expressed interest in purchasing a program kit and replicating the model.

ECHO serves unincorporated Hillsborough County, just outside of Tampa.  If the area had a name, it would be the 4th largest city in Florida.  According to the Tampa Bay Network to End Hunger, 20% of all children in our part of the county have been identified as food insecure.  

ECHO serves 14 zip codes.  According to the Florida Chamber of Commerce Foundation, in the zip code of 33619, 44.1% of all children live in poverty.  In another zip code, 33596, this number drops dramatically to 2.8%.  Obviously, we serve a diverse population.  The average percentage of poverty within our 14 zip code service area is: 18.9%

As a result of COVID-10, child food insecurity is projected to increase another 9% (Feeding America National).  The total number of those served by ECHO in the 12 months preceding March 15, 2020 was 15,550.  In the the three months of April-June 2020, ECHO has served 15,444.  The hunger and need in our community is staggering.  Never has a program, that can be replicated throughout the country, been needed more.

Our neighbors are facing unemployment, eviction, and hunger.  Salvaged Revenue creates desperately needed funding.  Both for the nonprofit and the struggling that they serve.

Salvaged Revenue in a nutshell:

The community donates used clothing.  Clothing is sorted.  The best of the best is distributed, free of charge, directly to those in need.  The rest is sold at the ECHO Thrift Boutique, sourced for Salvaged Revenue, or sold to a recycling company.  

Potential apprentices enroll in a 6 weeks sewing class (the class is paid for through two students with the ability to pay.  Their tuition underwrites the rest of the class).  Upon completion, all receive a refurbished sewing machine (originally donated to the organization).  For those who show a strong aptitude and desire for the work, a 6 month internship is offered.  Artisans are paid by the piece at 25%.  Those who desire to learn sales, are hired on as account managers and retain 25% of all sales. The organization still nets, due to extremely low overhead and virtually zero raw material costs. Jeans become barista aprons, button down shirts are transformed into reusable shopping bags, and leather jackets find new life as tote bags.

After 6 months, an apprentice is graduated into an entrepreneurship tract or leverages their newly acquired job reference to attain higher paying employment.

ECHO serves those who live on or below the poverty line.  The minimum wage earning single mother who lives paycheck to paycheck, the homeless man who sleeps next to the railroad tracks in a tent or the grandmother who just took in her three grandchildren.  They are our neighbors.  Not our clients.  Not our recipients.  They are our neighbors.  We go to church together.  We pass each other in the aisles of Aldi's.  Where we live and work, there is a great sense of: we are all in this together.  

The apprentices of Salvaged Revenue (known in our organization as ECHO Handmade) are one of the team.  Volunteers, staff, and apprentices work side by side to reach a common goal.  When people are all working together, listening to good music...there is margin and space to really talk:  to share and to understand and to laugh.  Recently, one of our artisans described ECHO Handmade as a family.  That is truly the spirit of the project.  The process of manufacturing and creating is a shared experience.  

It is interesting.  The project provides additional income for the apprentices, but equally important, the workshop creates an environment of encouragement, refuge, and empowerment.

To my understanding, the Elevate Prize is awarded to innovators and problem solvers.  It is a serious problem when 20% of the children in my community go to bed hungry.  It is travesty that mothers and fathers have to put those hungry children to bed.  In my community, those below the poverty line are not just left behind, but expected to live hand out to hand out, never given the opportunity to think beyond the now.  

The Salvaged Revenue Project takes discarded excess and uses it to train, empower, and employ those in poverty. 

I had three babies in under three years.  When my youngest started school in 2002, I wanted to find a way to get to get paid doing something that I really loved...thrifting.  I soon found that I could buy vintage clothing and upsell it to specialty shops:  a business was born (Retro To Go).  In need of a bag that wouldn't slip off my shoulder, I created a cross body bag made from a vintage tie and suit coat. Everywhere I wore it, women would stop me and ask where I got it.  Another business was born (Eleanor Saunders Designs).  I sold my one of a kind tie bags for the next 10 years.  In 2013, in partnership with the then director of ECHO, Stacy Efaw, we piloted the tie bag concept as a social enterprise.  We employed a single mother and an adult with autism.  The bags were popular and we were profitable.  In 2015, I came to ECHO as the new Executive Director.  In 2016, we were awarded $15,000 from a business plan competition and a social enterprise was born (ECHO Handmade). 

My middle class parents raised me on the Eastside of Indianapolis, Indiana.  It was a challenging place to grow up.  I was never hungry, but my best friend was.  When a kid would break their arm or need stitches, they would come to the only nurse they knew, my mom.  No one could afford to go straight to the ER.   My parents were generous.  They shared what they had.  We ate dinner at 5:30 every night.  My friends were always welcome.  I grew up straddling two worlds:  Middle class and poverty.  I find that I am quite comfortable relating to both.  I now live in Brandon, Florida.  To say that it is diverse is an understatement.  It feels similar to where I grew up:  a strong middle class coupled with grinding poverty.

The simplest definition of poverty is: a lack of resources.  My life's mission is to equalize the playing field; to create opportunities for my neighbors to provide for themselves.  If they choose, I want to connect my neighbors to resources that will take them beyond the never ending hustle of poverty.  

I can lead.  I can build teams, I can lead a charge up a hill and tenaciously hang on until it is accomplished.  I have experience, brains, and grit.  I am a passionate and experienced social entrepreneur.

But, what makes me uniquely qualified to deliver the project is that I ask for help.  Everyday.  I am well aware that passion, vision, and energy can only go so far.  I forget significant birthdays, agendas for meetings, and enough copies to share at Board meetings.  I am not detailed oriented.  I am only as good as the team around me.  I am well aware of my strengths, but equally aware of my glaring inadequacies.  

The neighbors we serve do not need a leader that has it all together.  They need someone who readily admits when they need help.  They need someone that can relate to their struggles and views them as equals.  Not projects, not sad stories, and especially, not lesser than.  

I am a hybrid.  I have a nonprofit heart with a business mind.  I am motivated by changing the world and making the money necessary to make that happen.

Bottom line: A lot of people talk about social enterprise, but I am in the trenches, working at it, everyday.

In year three of the project, my priorities got out of whack.  I placed all of my focus on profit and put the program on auto pilot.  I hired a coordinator, instituted crazy sales goals, and ramped up production.  Did we make more sales than ever before?  Yes.  Did we land our first recurring wholesale account?  Yes.  Did I wear out our volunteers? Yes.  Did my coordinator fail to connect with the apprentices?  Yes.  Did the workroom become tense?  Yes.  Did our inventory controls breakdown; thereby creating an inventory glut?  Yes.  Did we lose money for the first time ever? Yes.  Did I become discouraged and question the model and it's future?  Yes.

So what did I do?  I let the coordinator go.  I placed the focus back on putting people to work.  We created a comprehensive curriculum for a sewing class that would serve as a proving ground for potential apprentices.  I connected our long serving apprentice with a job coach and I created an easy to use inventory control system. And, I apologized to my team.  

This year we enjoyed serving together, we launched our first entrepreneur, and the enterprise netted $11,968.54 for the organization.

For two years, I looked at a flat piece of land behind my church and thought:  someone ought to start a community garden.  A place where the community can gather, connect, and even donate to local food pantries.  So....I put an announcement in the bulletin that said:  "Do you like to garden?  Join me for an upcoming meeting."  Now, did I know anything about gardening?  Not really.  But, one of the five people that showed up did.  She was a master gardener.  She admired my passion and I admired her wisdom.  We both loved hard work.  In the first year, we grew the garden from 12 raised beds to 60.  Ten years later, the Seeds of Faith Community Garden has donated over 22,000 pounds of fresh produce to local food pantries, enjoys an engaged advisory team, and hosts monthly service days with 40+ volunteers.  And, the garden is self sustaining.  30 beds are rented out at $5.00 a month to community members.  The revenue collected fully supports the other 30 beds that are tended by volunteers, who then donate all of the produce to local agencies.

I love leading by serving on a team.

Salvaged Revenue is innovative in that it looks beyond the traditional thrift store model.  It takes excess clothing donations and literally transforms them into new products.  It creates a back to work program that pays for itself and then some.  

A plus is that the products become walking billboards for the organization.  Some are drawn to the product, some to the story, but all connect with the organization in a new way, creating natural advocates and potential donors.

Salvaged Revenue creates an environment for the underemployed to acquire new skills, increase social connections, and earn additional income; thereby ending hunger by providing for their families.

Data has been collected from one on one interviews with graduated apprentices:

Frank was homeless and came to ECHO for emergency food.

Frank joined ECHO Handmade as an apprentice.

Frank made friends, learned to metal stamp, earned an income, bought a car and drove back to his hometown to reconnect with his family.

Through re-established relationships and a steady income, Frank was empowered to create his own plan to recover out of hunger and homelessness.

Roslyn came to ECHO looking for resources after a recent move.

Roslyn joined the GED prep class and was recommended for an apprenticeship with ECHO Handmade

Roslyn learned to sew, grew her social connections, and earned an income.

Roslyn gained confidence by producing high quality products.

Roslyn graduated from the program and launched her own sewing business.

Through the creation of her own revenue producing business, Roslyn was empowered to chart her own course out of hunger.

The overall work of ECHO serves over 15,000 individuals annually.

The Salvaged Revenue project currently serves 9 individuals, with plans to double by next year.

The ultimate goal is to package the program model to be sold and distributed to other nonprofits working in the immediate needs/workforce development space.  Two nonprofits have expressed interest in replicating the model.  The multiplication of the model has the potential to reach thousands.

Double Participation: By June 2021.  We will achieve this by implementing a successful sewing/training class that will serve as a proving ground for potential apprentices.  

Formalize Launching Points:  Work closely with the Programs Director to refine two tracks for graduate apprentices: entrepreneurship or living wage employment.

Relaunch Website:  In light of Covid-19 and the current state of retail, we must relaunch the ECHO Handmade website, utilizing the 25% straight commission model for the moderator.

Program in a Box:  Formalize all processes, procedures, patterns, roles, gross margin charts, product catalog and curriculum.  Sell program model to the two interested nonprofits waiting in the que.

Distribution Center:  Relocate agency warehouse, donation drop off, boutique thrift store, and ECHO workshop to one centralized location.  This will require a capital campaign and tapping into the building reserve.

Covid-19 has posed a significant threat to the traditional nonprofit funding models.  A vibrant social enterprise is no longer an option for ECHO, it is a necessity.  We must continue to find new ways to monetize our existing resources.  

In order to continue to expand the social enterprises of the organization, a consolidated distribution center must be acquired.  This will necessitate a capital campaign, which will be challenging in the current giving environment.  

Finally, staff.  

• A senior sales rep to develop and build wholesale accounts
• A program director, specifically focused on ECHO Handmade
• A website account manager.
• A full time supervisor to oversee artisans, workshops, design labs, and inventory. 

Growth:  ECHO Handmade enjoys strong support from the community.  But, in order to grow, we must focus on wholesale accounts.  One of a kind products are simply too risky to fully support the enterprise.  The product line must be diversified.  We must know our customer before a new product is made.  Reusable shopping bags for the bulk stores, doggie bandana sets for the groomers, and aprons for the coffee shops must be prototyped and sold in large quantities in order to employ additional apprentices and grow the project.

Distribution Center:  The Board of Directors must take ownership and lead the push for the capital campaign.  Strong relationships with local foundations and philanthropists must be leveraged.  A strong vision and clear direction must be communicated in order to see the center come to fruition. The enterprise itself must continue to be revenue producing, while still empowering apprentices to new opportunities. 

ECHO works in concert with a myriad of social service, faith, and educational communities.  The Tampa Bay Homeless Initiative, Tampa Bay Network to End Hunger, Metropolitan Miniseries, Dawning Family Services, Hope for Her, multiple food pantries, Hillsborough County Schools, 25 local churches, Bulk Nation, local civic groups, corporate partners, and 8 grantors make up the community of ECHO.

Specific to Salvaged Revenue, individual community members donate clothing, volunteers aid in production, and the ECHO Thrift Boutique sells the products to the general public.

Salvaged Revenue provides training and supplemental income for the underemployed, a recycled purpose for discarded clothing, and delivers a high quality, purpose driven product to the consumer.

Program:  The Salvaged Revenue project provides training,  potential for employment, and ongoing job coaching services for neighbors facing the daily threat of hunger.

Program Delivery:  The Salvaged Revenue program currently includes the oversight of the Executive Director, 8 engaged volunteers, a sewing instructor, and a job coach.  

Specifically how?  A neighbor visits one of ECHO's outreach centers.  They are informed of multiple classes available in the Opportunity Center.  Once engaged, potential artisans are invited to join an upcoming sewing class.  The class is taught by a graduate of the program, who is assisted by the Opportunity Director.  At the completion of the class, those who have a sustained interest and an aptitude for sewing are invited to join the team as an apprentice. Apprentices receive 25% retail of all products manufactured(the average base is $10-$12 an hour).  The apprentice gains: a marketable skill, supplemental income, a work history, a strong reference, and job coaching.

Our customers have become vocal advocates for the brand.  Sharing on social media, frequenting our Boutique to check out the new arrivals, and supporting our apprentices through notes of appreciation and encouragement.

Our community is most intrigued by Salvaged Revenue because it is multi purposed in nature.  It is a give back that recycles and employs, while financially contributing to the overall mission of the organization.

Salvaged Revenue currently pays for itself and turns a profit.  But, the need for growth demands a flush of capital in order to build an online store, purchase commercial equipment, hire staff and relocate the operation.

After four years, it is time to scale.  In order to grow and multiply the model, there must be an influx of capital.

This capital is being sought out through individual donors and grants.

Start up dollars were granted through:

The Children's Board Business Plan Competition:  $15,000 (2016) (Prize)

Social Venture Partners Pitch Competition:  $25,000 (2018) (Prize)

The past three fiscal years are as follows (please note that the organization's fiscal year runs from July 1-June 30).

2018:  

• Sales = $16,511  
• Grant Income = $27,113  
• Expenses = $17,638,30  
• Revenue:  $25,985.70

2019:  

• Sales = $24,856.62   
• Expenses = $27,574.74  
• Loss:  -$2,718.12

2020:  

• Sales = $17,835.79  
• Expenses = $5,866.81  
• Revenue:  $11,968.89

In order to move into the distribution center, we are seeking 1.3 million dollars.  

But, specific to ECHO Handmade, an additional $100,000 is needed to hire staff, buy commercial sewing machines, and expand the workshop.

For the 2020-2021 fiscal year, the budgeted expenses for Salvaged Revenue are:  $17,000,

The uptick in expenses over the previous year is attributed to the launching of a formal sewing class that will require $7,500 in start up costs.

Capital is needed to expand the program.  It is time to multiply our efforts through creating and selling program kits to other nonprofits.  

Specific to the Elevate Prize.  We need the mentorship.  We need the expertise in marketing and branding.  

This is a proven model, if given the push from the Elevate Prize will ripple far beyond the town of Brandon, FL.

Finally, in order to grow as a social entrepreneur, I need to be around people who are smarter than me.  I need to be in the room.

Mentorship:  Because, honestly, you can never have enough mentors.  Ever.

Legal Matters:  Social Enterprise can still be a bit murky.  Salvaged Revenue falls under the umbrella of the nonprofit, ECHO of Brandon Inc.  We pay sales tax on all products sold.  But, is this correct?  Should we have the enterprise categorized as a separate entity?  

Monitoring and Evaluation: What are we doing right....revolutionary even?  But, equally important, what are we missing??

Marketing, Media, Exposure:  We have the story, we have a great product....now we need help in getting it out there and scaling. 

Social Enterprise Alliance.  I would like to attend a few of their conference and connect.