When BANGS Shoes learned about the power of Kickstarter, we knew it was something we had to pursue.

We are BANGS Shoes. Empowerment is the cornerstone of our business model and philosophy, linking the sale of BANGS Shoes to real, social change.

When you buy BANGS Shoes, 20 percent of net profits are invested with entrepreneurs around the world through our nonprofit partner, Kiva.

In a marketplace that’s abundant with brand’s “doing good,” BANGS Shoes is unique because we focus on helping people help themselves.

The beauty of the BANGS Shoes + Kiva relationship is that after your purchase lends 20 percent of net profits to help an entrepreneur aka Kiva borrower grow their business, that borrower re-pays their loan back to us. BANGS Shoes then reinvests that exact money with a different borrower. Rinse and repeat.

As you can see, after a period of time one purchase of BANGS Shoes will generate investment to support multiple entrepreneurs, creating exponential, sustainable, humanitarian support.

We believe there is amazing potential in this model, and our social impact is based on the sale of shoes. We need to continue growing.

There is a lot of risk in launching a business, and funding remains one of the biggest hurdles to growing a new idea into a flourishing company. And in our specific case, slower growth of BANGS Shoes means slower rate of investment for Kiva entrepreneurs.

Most small businesses don’t turn a profit in their first year, maybe even second. Hence new, start-up companies need to find alternate ways to finance their efforts. BANGS Shoes has been in business for 18 months, and as a grassroots, start-up shoe company, we know this funding struggle all too well.

In walks crowdsourcing.

Crowdsourcing is a term used to describe the power of online communities to share services, ideas, products or gather content. One specific area of crowdsourcing is crowdfunding. Crowdfunding uses an online platform to gather small amounts of money from an online community.

This model is amazingly unique because it can gather large amounts of funding through a compilation of small online contributions. Because crowdfounding is largely based online, the potential for sharing is unparalleled.

Crowdfunding can skyrocket ideas into reality.

The largest crowdsourcing platform in the world is a company called Kickstarter.

Kickstarter has launched an innovative crowdfunding model by leveraging themselves as the new way to fund creative projects.

One example of an amazingly successful Kickstarter campaign is a project called The 3D Doodler made by Wobble Works, LLC. The 3D Doodler Kickstarter campaign was launched to raise money to create a pen that allows artists, or whomever, to create tangible, three-dimensional objects by making gestures in the air with the pen. This is all done without software or computers.

Yes. Drawing in the air.

3D Doodler’s initial pledge goal on Kickstarter was $30,000 – it was fully funded to the tune of $2.3 million dollars, all gathered by donors online. As you can see, crowdfunding creates an opportunity to launch ideas into a reality that might not have access to traditional funding sources.

When BANGS Shoes learned about the power of Kickstarter, we knew it was something we had to pursue. Kickstarter is a start-up, helping people help themselves through the launch of ideas into business which sounds a lot like another story we know. Kindred souls if you will.

BANGS Shoes launched a Kickstarter campaign to raise funding to help develop and manufacture the second generation of BANGS Shoes.

One of Kickstarter’s hard and fast rules is that all campaigns must set a pledge goal (how much money you want to raise) and time frame. If campaigns do not hit their pledge goal within the set time frame, no funding is received. Zero. Zlitch.

The BANGS Shoes campaign asked for an initial pledge of $7,000 during a 30 day time frame. With six days left, we have more than doubled our initial goal. You can see our full campaign and help us reach our goal by clicking here.

Since inception Kickstarter has hosted 100,000 crowdsourcing campaigns, and 60,405 have been successful. Six million people have backed one project or another on Kickstarter. $1.08 BILLION has been pledged to the inventive projects on Kickstarter.

Specific to our mission, Kickstarter is providing an opportunity to help fund the develop of the next line of BANGS Shoes. The more shoes we sell, the more funding we generate to empower other entrepreneurs.

We’re a small start-up with big dreams. Through funds generated from our Kickstarter campaign, we can develop the next line of shoes to help spread an important ideology we feel passionate about. Click here and join us.

Hannah Davis is Founder and President of Bangs Shoes.