We were lucky to catch up with Jessica Brown recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Jessica, thanks for joining us today. Let’s kick things off with talking about how you serve the underserved, because in our view this is one of the most important things the small business community does for society – by serving those who the giant corporations ignore, small business helps create a more inclusive and just world for all of us.
His Children Foundation was created when we saw a need in our community. Children get pulled from their homes extremely quickly when being removed to foster care. They may have never had a suitcase or bag, and they grab a trash bag to fill up all their life’s belongings with. We know the connotation that carries. It makes them feel like all they are worth is a trash bag. That is why my husband and I created His Children. We provide children in foster care with a duffle bag customized with the child’s name. This is something that is solely theirs, and no one can take from them. In the bags, we put personal hygiene, toys, or a gift card, depending on age, and most importantly, a Bible. We want these kids to know that there is hope in their Creator. After being open now for four years, that remains our core mission. However, we also help with whatever need they may have. We have secured furniture and diapers and even have taken them to fun places like the movies!
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
My name is Jessica Brown and am primarily a Nashville native! I grew up in South Nashville and went to John Overton High School. My husband and I met in 2010 and got married in 2013 at the young age of 19! We have two young boys, (5 and 3) and we created a nonprofit back in 2021. My husband’s mom ran a group home in North Carolina and we started to hear the horror stories. The kids would come into care with nothing at all, or a trash bag. When we would visit her at work, the kids would freely tell us about their life. We couldn’t believe the things we heard. We knew we had to do something; we just weren’t sure what. After lots of prayer, we felt lead to create duffle bags. These bags are personalized and contain all the things a child would need for their first day of placement in foster care. We love hearing how much the kids love having their name on a bag. We are so proud to say that we’ve not only helped over 600 kids in the past years with duffle bag needs, but we’ve also helped over 500 with Christmas! Foster families know that they can come to us with whatever they need and we will get it done!
How did you build your audience on social media?
Social media has been the only reason we’ve survived. All of our foster families only know about us because of something they’ve seen about us online. We only have grown because of Facebook Ads and people sharing our posts. I would encourage everyone to always share your business posts!
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
We had to unlearn being afraid to be the little fish in the sea. It’s okay that there are other businesses out there doing the same thing as you. We should ALL be able to succeed, but remember that your business has unique features and that you need to really capitalize on those strengths to succeed as well!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.hischildrenfoundation.com
- Instagram: @hischildrenfound
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/hischildrenfoundation
