Flowers Supports Dreams of Chicago Charities

CHICAGO - Dec. 30, 2015 - PRLog -- At Flowers For Dreams, besides selling hand-curated, local flowers and offering flower delivery (https://www.flowersfordreams.com) in Chicago, IL, we are an organization proudly giving back a quarter of our profits to local charities. While these nonprofits receive a check for an amount ranging from $2,500-$10,000 from us, it’s safe to say the fulfillment, friendship and memories we receive from them are equally as, if not more, valuable.

Moneythink

Kristen Faiferlick of Moneythink said that our donation in 2015 "helped build out new features in [their] award-winning mobile app" and assisted in funding the most widely attended Summer Leadership Institute they've ever hosted. Here, the organization brought in college volunteers to "train, equip, and inspire them to have a bigger impact in the 2015-2016 school year" to educate underserved youth on the ways to save and spend wisely. This is an organization taking one topic that has fallen so low on the totem pole of education that it needs an intervention-like, fresh approach to breaking cycles of reckless spending in the next generation.

Chicago Lighthouse

At The Chicago Lighthouse, located in Illinois Medical District, our donations were used to fund what their Creative Director Lisa Birmingham explained as sending teacher-therapists to "provide one-on-one home therapy visits to children who are blind or visually impaired in [a] Birth to Three Program." This type of foundation for new families and mothers might be the most authentic way, in these situations, to help shape the development of young families and provide the support they need.

Pilsen’s Working Bikes

Julie Nicewander from Pilsen's Working Bikes, explained that our funds secured that tens of "local underserved Chicagoans are given a bike, a helmet and a new lock" which, she reminds us, "allows individuals to get to and from work, along with greater access to healthcare." Not only does this organization help with adults, but young children as well.

Freshwater Future

Becca Turner from Freshwater Future mentioned that the funds we donated during the month of September benefitted the recipient of an inside grant, Clare Tallon Ruen. Clare echoed this in her statement, saying that her work is meant to bring Great Lakes education into the classroom in Evanston and Chicago. Through her beaming smile she told us that grants such as this allow her to actually "bring the kids outside and to the beach" and "learn about the importance of stewardship in our Great Lakes region."

Namaste Charter School

Kathryn Nelson, Development Manager of the Namaste Charter School in Southwest's McKinley park area, remarked that our donations helped to send their students to the top-rated high schools of the area. This might seem like an overstatement but Namaste Charter School relies on donations to continue the immense strides they've made in transforming an otherwise standard brick building into what feels like a magical, Willy Wonka-esque bubble where education feels so tangible. Attainable. Exciting. Yoga, meditation, family style meals, and organic foods being implemented into this Southwest Side school are just to name a few.

One Tail At A Time

Our February charity was One Tail at A Time, a dog rescue shelter near Bucktown. Executive Director, Heather Owen, thanked us recently for the "long way" our donations went in 2015 in the launching of their new adoption center, allowing them to take in more dogs in need. The 'long way' she references trickled all the way to a customer named Michelle Janke, who adopted her dog Barney from One Tail at a Time this year. In her letter to our team, she writes: "we are so in love--we never would have seen him if it hadn't been for your charity program!" She sent this alongside a photograph of the sleepy Barney, paws taking up half of Janke's arm chair.

This year’s charities also included Boys and Girls Club of Chicago, Chicago Gateway Green, The Lynn Sage Foundation, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, and Chicago Coalition for the Homeless. These organizations opened our eyes to our city's issues both near and far.

Hannah Willage, Associate Director at CCH, thanked us for our 25% December donation in her introduction. We shook our heads, instead thanking each little girl, boy, mother and father in the CCH for allowing us the opportunity to share with them, participate in the memorial, and hear their story--they affected us just as much as we affected them. To us, this evening was the perfect way to end our 2015 year alongside our final, December charity of the month.

In his year reflection, Dyme phrases it best in his gratitude to Chicago, and the ways our city has “really taken to our very different flowers-for-good model.” For the past three years, he and Co-Founder Joseph Dickstein have carried out their vision of what they refer to as, “the tangible impact of our donations, right here in our own community.”


We're pausing at the end of 2015 to thank our nonprofits and thank our customers. Without the support of either, we wouldn't be here. Fulfilled, proud, pausing--and daydreaming about 2016.