Heartfilled Handbags is empowering women this Valentine's Day by giving them handbags filled with gifts inside.
The filled bags can be donated to any Planet Bean location from Jan.21 to Feb. 11.The Heartfilled Handbags will be distributed to the women accessing the Women in Crisis Centre in Guelph-Wellington throughout the week of Valentines day.
It’s a local initiative by Shawna MacCallum, a Senior Manager for corporate events at Open Text. She teamed up with Women in Crisis to create a program where people can donate handbags with self care items inside.
Items in the handbag include makeup, facemasks. giftcards, creams, hair products, lip balms, nail care kits, mirror/compact, nail polish and any other self-care items.
“It’s about supporting our sisters, It’s about fixing another woman’s crown without telling the world it’s broken,” the card for the campaign reads.
The purpose of this initiative is to encourage women and make them feel loved.
“I had some difficult times in the past year and sometimes when you're going through things, having some support, some encouragement, even if its from somebody that you don't know that well or you don't know, you might just need that to encourage you to move on another day," says MacCallum.
MacCallum says that she was inspired by the Purse Project in Hamilton where people were taking used purses and placing items for donation inside them along with a note of encouragement.
“A piece that was really important for me is the note of encouragement to go inside that purse. I think the actual words of encouragement are so important.”
MacCallum first moved to Guelph four years ago and she wanted to do something to reach out to the people in her new city.
“We are very fortunate to have a lot of community support from different initiatives like this,” said Justine Morgan, fundraising and marketing coordinator for Guelph-Wellington Women In Crisis.
“Kindness and thoughtfulness goes a long way. It inspires a positive uplifting spirit in the community.”
MacCallum says teaming up with Women in Crisis helped refine her vision by giving women brand new purses instead of of used purses. They also encouraged the idea of using items for self care.
“There's so many of these different initiatives out there and they're giving you hats and gloves and things you need but it's kind of nice to have things you want too,” says MacCallum.
