When I walk into my closet there are shelves on the left side that go all the way across the wall and all the way up to the ceiling. Of these shelves 2 of them are just shoes. Both two pairs deep and probably 7-8 pairs across. That sounds like a lot of shoes I’m sure, but I have fewer pairs of shoes than the other girls I live with, and probably fewer pairs of shoes than most girls my age. Yet I still have to choose what pair of shoes I am going to put on when I get up in the morning. If I wear sandals I have multiple to pick from and the same goes for boots, tennis shoes, business flats, ect. Often we get caught up in how little we have compared to our friends, but forget how much we have compared to the rest of the world. While we are making a decision about what shoes to put on our feet in the morning, a lot of people are wondering where their next pair of shoes is going to come from. The answer to that question might just be you.
When I was in high school, one of my brother’s friends decided that he was going to collect old running shoes and send them to another country for kids who didn’t have shoes as part of his senior project. My brother and I had saved every single pair of running shoes that we had ever run in, which meant we had a lot of shoes to donate. I can remember carrying multiple trash bags full of shoes out of our basement and out to his friend’s car. Just from my house alone he was able to collect 20+ pairs of shoes. As a whole, he probably collected over 150 pairs to send to people who needed them way more than we did.
While you might not be someone who runs and has old running shoes piled up around your house, you probably have a few extra pairs that don’t get worn a lot, and could be better used by someone else. Whether you decide to donate these shoes to your local Goodwill or you want to find a program that sends them overseas, there are a lot of options.
Most towns have a Goodwill or a store similar that runs on donations it gets from its community. I think these places are an awesome way for people to donate the things they don’t need anymore because it helps people who can’t afford to pay full price for the things they need. This is one of my families favorite ways to get rid of our stuff. Not only do we benefit from conveniently getting rid of things, but someone who needs something we have can get it at a relatively cheap price.
Another option is to look into different organizations that collects shoes to give out. I took some time to look into a few that make donating your shoes super easy. One organization that I found was Soles4Souls. They take shoe donations as well as monetary donations to help give shoes to people who do not have them. They also work with disaster areas to insure that people have lost everything will at least have a pair of shoes on their feet. To find one of their drop off locations go to this address: https://soles4souls.org/get-involved/give-shoes/dropoff-locator/ and put in your zip code.
Another program that collects shoes is called One World Running. This company collects used athletic shoes and ones that are “near new” are sent overseas to be distributed. The shoes they receive that are too beat up are sent to Nike’s Reuse-a-shoe program, where the shoes are then turned into tracks and playgrounds.
So next time you think about throwing your old shoes in the trash, remember that there are people out there that could benefit from them!
Sole Mate Shoes 