Not the end of the line: What happens after consumption

We've concluded that TOMS shoes are an environmentally friendly shoe choice. But buying a TOMS shoe is not like buying any type of shoe. The commodity chain goes one step further as a pair of shoes also goes to a child who needs one. So, how does this occur?

Well, as mentioned in my earlier post, the production of these so-called, giveaway shoes, are produced in Argentina and Ethiopia, which are areas where a lot of the shoes go.

Areas where TOMS shoes are donated
http://www.toms.com/our-movement-where

Thus, the environmental impact of these giveaway shoes couldn't be any greater than an individual in the United States purchasing one. It would be significantly less since the giveaway shoes use local materials and travel shorter distances.

Yet, according to Blake Mycoskie (owner of TOMS), every 2 weeks, 15 volunteers are flown to Argentina (and sometimes, to Ethiopia and South Africa) to participate in a shoe drop, which is what their shoe donation process is called.

 we take 15 volunteers every two weeks to Argentina, and then sometimes even to Ethiopia in South Africa, to help us give away these shoes. We have a whole team of people for whom their sole job at TOMS is to review applications, to book travel, to organize these trips.

This seems highly impractical in an environmental sense, and it is. An average of 4,356lbs of Carbon Dioxide is emitted in each trip from Los Angeles to Buenos Aires.

This number was obtained from 3 Carbon Footprint Calculators: The Carbon Footprint, The Carbon Fund, and TerraPass. The Carbon Footprint is an English based environmental management firm that consults corporations on reducing their carbon emissions. The Carbon Fund is the leading non-profit provider of carbon offsets and climate solutions in the United States. TerraPass is an environmental for-profit that funds projects that reduce greenhouse gase emissions. These 3 very distinct institutions were chosen in calculating the average carbon dioxide emissions to mitigate any bias there could have been within their carbon footprint calculators.

Over the course of a year, that would be around 850 Tons of Carbon Dioxide emitted. That, according to the EPA, would be equivalent to...

- Providing energy for 67 homes for 1 year
- Using 86,447 gallons of gasoline
- .0002 coal fired power plants running for 1 year

But remember, this assuming that
- They really go every 2 weeks - 26 times a year
- They don't travel to Ethiopia or South Africa, which are farther away
- They only travel from Santa Monica (There is another TOMS headquarters in Seoul, South Korea and they, too, participate in shoe drops)

So then, how much carbon dioxide would each shoe really be emitting?

According to TOMS Giving Report (which can be downloaded on their website), they have given away 1 million pairs of shoes by 2010 through their one-for-one campaign. Starting in 2006, that means every year, they would have given away around 200,000 shoes/year. And if each year they contribute 850 Tons of carbon dioxide, it would mean that each donated shoe contributes 8.5lbs of carbon dioxide.

TOMS is contributing an extra 8.5lbs of carbon dioxide through their shoe drops. That's an extra 65% of their carbon dioxide emissions.

Why would TOMS do this?


Mycoskie has 2 main reasons.

1. We believe that the child gets as much satisfaction and joy out of the personal one-on-one interaction with someone from the first world as they do from the actual shoes.

2. Because we believe that it is not just that we’re helping these people get shoes. But we're also about helping people in the first world have a quality, safe, life-changing experience in the idea of giving.

Does the humanitarian aspect of TOMS outweigh its responsibility to Mother Earth? I'll take a closer look in a later post...stay tuned.