Cause Marketing

The spontaneous, viral reaction to one of Kohl’s holiday spots got us thinking about how we wanted to approach our philanthropic efforts: Was it just about money, or something more? 

It started with a humble but heartfelt holiday message. A couple quietly decorating their elderly neighbor’s apartment for Christmas—no fanfare, no big ta-da, no spotlight. The act of kindness spoke for itself. But it spoke to so many. And that started us thinking. What if that simple act of kindness became the inspiration for all our philanthropic efforts?

Because it’s not about a big corporation handing out money. Sure, we understand economic realities. We understand the importance of funding. We understand the value of a dollar better than anyone else, and have built a business on that understanding. But at the end of the day, it’s not just the dollar amount our customers remember. It’s the new garden, the clean river, the city playground. It’s the caring and compassion, the love and the laughter, the hands digging into the dirt, the hugs exchanged with survivors and supporters at the Walk for the Cure.

We give with our hearts, our hands, our time. More importantly, instead of just giving back to the community, we give with the community. We share our stories, our resources, our values, and encourage customers to create and share their own acts of kindness. We’ll make it our mission to bring more kindness to our own company, to the community, to the planet. What starts as a small ripple will grow wider and wider, a series of ever-expanding circles of kindness, each one touching more lives and inspiring others to do the same.

William Wordsworth called the best portion of a person’s life the “little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.” And though it’s a famous quote, we think Wordsworth might have been wrong about one thing. Those little acts won’t go unremembered by those whose lives were changed by them. They will live on and be transformed into other acts of kindness, because kindness is contagious.

So what would we like to be remembered for? We hope that we will be known for our values as much as our value; the belief that a good deed was as important as a good deal; and that one small act of kindness can be the start of something really big.