Join & Connect

Today, conversations about the world’s most infuriating problems increasingly involve social entrepreneurs. Delivering results and impact requires new ways of thinking about problems and such opportunities attract the attention of individuals of exceptional creativity, drive and commitment. CJ is one such individual. At Hub Dot’s third anniversary she spoke about the inspiration behind Sal’s Shoes, an enterprise that enables children around the world to attend school.

‘My name is CJ and I have a son called Sal. Two years ago, after accumulating a bag of my son's outgrown shoes, I looked for an organisation that could tell me where his outgrown (but not outworn) shoes would walk again, if I donated them.

No one could . . . and this bothered me. So using my network from a childhood spent overseas, I decided to send the shoes directly to some kids I knew in need. A parcel was sent to a friend, who distributed them on a children’s oncology ward in Zambia, the only of its kind in the whole country. I received back a photograph of a child wearing Sal’s very first pair of shoes.

Sal’s pair of shoes had become those of another.

In many countries children cannot attend school if they don’t wear shoes. I started collecting more outgrown children’s shoes, initially just from family and friends but by harnessing social media, word spread, and soon I was inundated with pairs of barely worn shoes. ‘Sal’s Shoes’ had been born. Just over two years on, we have collected over 35,000 pairs of pre-loved shoes and found them new feet in 23 countries worldwide including in the UK.

Last year on a trip to South Africa, Sal accompanied me on a visit to two orphanages in a township to help distribute shoes. Whether or not he'll remember that visit in years to come . . . it was just very important for me to show him in practice what he had been the inspiration for.’

Thank you CJ.

Although CJ didn't mention it during her story, the scale of the problem is in the statistics. Out of the 58 million children in the world who do not go to school, 29 million of these are because they don’t have the means, as in many countries children cannot attend school if they don’t wear shoes. CJ and her son, through the simple medium of pre-worn shoes, are providing children with an education that in turn will help lift families out of poverty. They are indeed shoes with soul!