Meet our founder.
Meet Elisha
It all started in June 2009, when I first stepped foot in Haiti. It was the summer of my sophomore year at the University of California, Los Angeles, and I was on my first mission trip with Chi Alpha, a campus ministry at UCLA. I saw the abject poverty firsthand, where families lived without basic needs, such as food and shelter, and parents could not send their children to school. I knew it was not right.
A few more Haiti trips later, I found my passion in ending poverty. I believe that if we can establish long-term solutions, we can help bring economic stability to a family, a village, and perhaps an entire nation.
In December 2013, I launched a social enterprise, Impactful Market (formerly known as Elisha C.), working with artisans and farmers throughout Haiti to support sustainable fair trade jobs. I also established a Scholarship Program in Fond Doux, Haiti to send at-risk youth to school, from preschool to university.
This journey led me to become the Executive Director of Fair Trade LA in 2018, a nonprofit that officially designated Los Angeles the largest Fair Trade City in North America, advocating for global artisans and producers to receive fair wages, and raising awareness for fair trade as a solution to ending human trafficking.
I’m also the host of the FAIR Talks Podcast, where we dive into fair trade, sustainability, and effective solutions to tackle some of the world’s biggest problems. Through interviews with industry experts, social entrepreneurs, and fellow world changers, we are providing access to quality content that will shape the future of how we do aid, think about business, and what products we purchase.
If you can’t tell by now… I’m passionate about creating lasting change to solve global issues so that families can thrive all around the world.
I want to invite you to join me on this journey.
Our time on this earth is so short. Time truly flies. So, how do we make it count?
I ask myself that every day.
This question has led me to start Impactful Missions, where we are on a mission to make an impact with our short time on earth.
