Whenever you buy something from us at Story of Mum, you're also helping many other mothers around the world.
As a social enterprise, any profits we make are reinvested for social good.
When we profit, the mamas (and charities) that we regularly support also profit.
And many of our services are offered for free or at subsidised cost.
Why?
Because we believe that mothers have the power to change the world. We don't often feel that power, and we want that to change.
We want all mothers to feel happier, more resilient, creative, valued and vital.
As mothers, we are the heart of our families, and if we feel strong and happy, our families feel strong and happy. The happier we are as families, the more we are able to support our communities. And as our communities grow stronger from that support, we grow our power to create a kinder fairer happier world together.
We need that change. For ourselves. And for our children.
This means that when you purchase an ecourse place, a package of one to one support, or a gift package or voucher for someone else, you aren't just helping yourself or a mother that you care about, you're also helping us to help many others.
How do we help?
Subsidised Coaching
We offer a subsidised coaching package for mothers in need who have limited financial resources. This is offered at a third of the usual cost. The recipient pays £45 for two 60 minute sessions, and we cover the remaining £90. We aim to offer one of these bursary places per month.
If you would like to apply for a coaching bursary place contact Pippa. You simply need to tell us briefly why you would like to access this support and why you need the bursary, and if we have places available, we will arrange for a short 15 minute chat to discuss whether we can provide what you need.
In exceptional cases, we are able to offer one to two full bursaries each year for short term coaching support free of charge.
Mamas' Retreats
We work to keep the cost of our Sunday Morning Mamas' Retreats in Cornwall affordable in order to make these accessible to the local community. We also offer a number of lower priced early bird tickets for each retreat.
For those in greater financial need, we are sometimes able to offer a further reduction or the provision of goods or services in kind in return for a place - again if this is something that you would like us to consider, contact Pippa.
On our residential retreats, we always offer shared rooms at a lower cost.
Ecourses
We subsidise the costs of all of our ecourses to price them as accessibly as possible. In addition, we often donate a proportion of our sales income to charities whose work supports mothers.
For example, we donate 50% of all income from Mamas’ Mini Sofa Retreat to be shared equally between Save the Children and Womankind Worldwide.
We also create opportunities for mothers to access our ecourses for free when we can - for example, giving away 50 free places on Five A Day to celebrate our fifth birthday, so the support is shared as widely as possible
DIY Mamas' Retreat Kit
Sales of our DIY Mamas' Retreat Kit include a donation of 10% to be shared between two charities - investing in the mum advocacy work of our lovely friends at the Museum of Motherhood, and the vital work of Womankind Worldwide supporting women globally.
Newsletter
Our newsletter is an inspiring (and naturally, completely free!) love letter to remind mums each month of their importance - helping mothers to release feelings of guilt and let go of the 'shoulds', encouraging them instead to focus on remembering that they are enough.
Events and exhibitions
When we are able to access additional grant funding in addition to voluntary services, we arrange free events and exhibitions that celebrate and support mothers from diverse backgrounds, such as Story of Mum: Mums Making An Exhibition of Ourselves, and provide free workshops for incredible organisations like Wild Young Parents Project. We also host workshops and Mamas' Retreats for free at events like BritMums Live to help spread our message far and wide.
Story of Mum website
This resource includes over 70 mama-tested free creative activities that are designed to be used by groups of mothers, both formally and informally, to help mothers to explore their identities, desires, creativity and joy.
The site includes instructions about how to do each activity, and examples of each activity, made by mums. Anyone can upload their completed activities to the gallery.In addition to being regularly used by us at Story of Mum, these tools are used by midwives working with nervous new mothers, with groups of domestic violence survivors, by mums suffering from post natal depression, and church and community groups. They are free to use and open access.
Income we make is reinvested in keeping this website running - covering the hosting costs. Creating and logging new activities, updating the website, and general site management is done voluntarily.
Mamas' Everyday Retreat
We faciliate a private facebook group, open to any mothers who would like to connect, share gloss-free mama stories and to support each other. Just ask to join.
This group is hosted and motivated by regular inspiration from Pippa Best of Story of Mum. It includes a monthly live #somum chat to bring everyone together, as well as regular creative prompts and practical tools to help mamas to grow in confidence, self-knowledge and community.
Other charitable activities
We love to celebrate and grow mama activists and regularly host and inspire charitable fundraising events for causes such as Comic Relief and Sport Relief as part of Team Honk, creating fantastic ways to raise funds, as well as engaging with craftivist projects like I'm A Piece and the WellMaking Craftivists Garden.
We started #mykidsdressedme (join in here!) which spiralled into a viral fundraising campaign, (and went on to be picked up by Oxfam as their own annual fundraiser), and have hosted charity events ranging from an odd shoe adventure from Lands End to Truro (join in here!), to the UK's first Dance Walk Fitness event along Penzance prom...
What's next?
If you have an idea for how we could help a particular group of mothers or an important charitable cause, please do get in touch.
