Partner Family FAQ

    

What are the requirements to apply to become a partner family?

1. Your family must be in the process of adopting a child from Africa

2. Your application to an adoption agency has been approved

3.  You have not yet completed the court process

4. Your family has an active blog that has been in existence for at least 3 months and is regularly posted to a minimum of 6 times a month.

Why is it important for our family to have an active blog?

We have found from our own experience and from the experience of others that a blog is a tremendous tool for spreading the word about your fundraising efforts.  It allows potential supporters to understand why you’re selling the t-shirts, and it makes it easy for you to link directly to the page where they can buy the shirts.  We also encourage families to use Facebook, Twitter, or any of the other social media tools to send others to your blog and the www.goseeklove.com website.

Can I become a partner family if I our application has been accepted but we haven’t completed our home study yet?

Yes!  In fact, our desire to do this was born out of a desire to help people who are precisely in that situation.  Just after your application is approved, the need for money skyrockets in order to keep the process moving. However most of the major adoption grant non-profits require that you complete your home study before applying.  That’s great but most families need to raise a lot of dough in between application approval and home study. Those early days of the adoption process can also be a challenging time emotionally.   Knowing that others are supporting your adoption by purchasing a t-shirt can be a boost.

How much does it cost to be a partner family?

Nothing. We understand that adoptive families don't have piles of excess cash sitting around. We've made the initial investment into inventory so that our partner families can begin turning a profit immediately. Never in the process will partner families be asked for money.

How do I apply?

We aren't currently accepting applications.

Why isn’t your application process more stringent?

The last thing adoptive families need is more paperwork!  We want to get to the business of helping people, not asking them to spend hours filling out applications.

How do you decide who to partner with?

We pray about it and partner with who we feel God leading us to.  There is no “ideal family” or key characteristic we’re looking for.  We realize it’s terribly un-scientific but it works.

What is the responsibility of the partner family?

Marketing.  We take care of the printing, shipping, and accounting.  It’s the job of partner family to get the word out to all their friends and family about the t-shirts.  Your profits depend on how well you promote your cause.

How long do you partner with families for?

Currently we are partnering with families for one month. We may chose to extend that time in the future based on sales and the feedback that we get from partner families.

How many partner families do you have at any one time?

One.  Currently we’re structured to handle only one at a time.  To partner with multiple families would require a significant investment of accounting and e-commerce resources.  We’ve grown slowly and incrementally and we wan to continue that trend. It could be in the future that making the investment to handle multiple families will make sense.

So, how does being a partner family work?

The partner family promotes.  We do the order fulfillment and send the profits directly to the partner family. 

Our website: www.goseeklove.com is the storefront that allows people to purchase shirts.  Partner families point people to the website (from their blog, facebook, email blasts, etc.) and encourage people to buy a shirt which will help to fund their adoption.  Once an order is placed, we fulfill that order and ship it directly to the person who has ordered it. We use PayPal to handle all of the financial transactions.

Once a month we will send a check to the partner family for 100% of the net profits. We'll also include a list of people who have purchased shirts in case you want to say 'thanks!'.

How much of each sale are you keeping for yourself?

None. 

Seriously?  Why?

See here.

How much can a partner family expect to make?

That depends completely on them and how well they get the word out. The profit margins on each item average out to be a little more than 50%.  So, if a shirt costs $15, the partner family will see about $8 of that.  Earlier this year we partnered with a family for four months.  During that time they raised almost $2000 for their adoption!

Why are you doing this and what’s in it for you?

In early 2009 we began our website as a tool to help our family sell T-shirts to raise money for our adoption from Ethiopia.  Amazingly, in only 7 ½ month’s time we were blessed with all of the money needed for our adoption. 

Having been blessed by the generosity of many, we now desire to help other adoptive families raise the money that they need to adopt a child.  As Christians we are called to do all that we can to help provide for, protect, and bless children living without mother or father.  Jesus tells us that whatever we do for “the least of these little ones” we have done for HIM. 

Through selling T-shirts we desire to help families raise the significant funds required to bring one of these precious children home. While we don’t benefit monetarily from this work, the joy of supporting adoptive families is more than enough. 

Is the “Go. Seek. Love.” design the only style you offer?

Currently, yes. It’s likely that somewhere down the road we’ll branch out with new designs based on the “Go. Seek. Love.” theme.

I’m not interested in becoming a partner family but I have a t-shirt design of my own.  Can you help me get it printed?

Yes!  If you have a great idea but are unsure how to go about having it printed, let us know. We'd be glad to share any knowledge that we've gained through the process. We also have a great relationship with the vendor who prints our t-shirts and would be happy to facilitate getting your t-shirt design printed by them.

 

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