Not just for rich people?

Today I ended up doing nothing but making eye pillows and travel cases for them. I made five cases and prepped two more, filled seven inner pillow casings, and then made outer cases for them. I tried something new and left the outer cases open on one side so they can be removed and machine-washed. The open edges are a little awkward; I couldn’t figure out how to make them nice and smooth and sexy. But they’re practical, and overall the pillows still look pretty nice, especially because of that inner casing. It’s been a good day’s work.

As a consumer, I’m always hyper-conscious of the classism of my shopping habits; now that I’m a business owner, I see it from that perspective as well. I don’t want to just be making things for rich people. This is why I’ve considered donating a portion of my shop proceeds to various organizations, though this is problematic too. For one thing, it seems like a record-keeping and tax headache; for another, I already donate substantially as an individual, so donating the tiny amount that my current profits constitute would really only be a marketing gimmick (unless it encourages my customers to donate on their own — which would be wonderful). So at the moment I’m not using my shop actively for good. However…  while I was sewing today I thought of a different way I could go about it. I remembered that a while ago in Yoga Journal there was a beautiful article about Bay Area organizations that bring yoga to at-risk youth; maybe my scented eye pillows could be an extra little nice thing for these kids while they’re learning to relax in savasana. I emailed the Palo Alto-based Art of Yoga Project, which works with girls in juvie, to ask whether they’d be interested in a donation. If they don’t want the pillows, or if they’ve already got some, I’ll try the other organizations in the article and see what they say. I have no idea how these organizations work on the ground, so I don’t know whether my eye pillows would be practical for them… but if they are, I would love to send the pillows out into the world to do some good. 🙂

I’ve updated yesterday’s entry with some photos.