We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Joey Carbone. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Joey below.
Joey, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?
My name is Joey Carbone, and I started the MP Mini Library Mission in 2019. My wife had asked for me to build a mini library for our front yard, and I needed some roofing shingles. I decided to ask our local Neighbor page on Facebook and was amazed at the amount of responses that I received. Everyone was willing to donate some shingles! After posting a picture of our library, the demand for these increased exponentially. As a result, I started to offer to make mini libraries for the community and began to collect donations from neighbors, friends, and family members. I did not charge for the libraries, but rather used the donations gathered to create customized boxes for anyone who was interested in becoming a custodian of one. I was inspired by the generosity of the community, and did not feel as though reaping a profit was the right thing to do. I do not charge for any of my labor and continue to fund the mission with donations from the community. To date, we have planted 89 libraries in the community and are continuing to provide these handmade items to anyone who requests one. I was incredibly proud during the COVID-19 pandemic because the libraries became places where community members could donate food or other important items that were needed and were in short supply in stores. They were also popular locations to visit with children that were stuck in the house while social distancing rules were in effect. The libraries have completely changed the landscape of this community and are one of the biggest accomplishments of my life. I love that my children and wife are involved, as well as that we have an amazing team of people that help dig, plan, create and make decisions. Each library is created with love and is uniquely designed for the home owner. They have become a core part of our town.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
My name is Joey Carbone, and I started the MP Mini Library Mission in 2019. My wife had asked for me to build a mini library for our front yard, and I needed some roofing shingles. I decided to ask our local Neighbor page on Facebook and was amazed at the amount of responses that I received. Everyone was willing to donate some shingles! After posting a picture of our library, the demand for these increased exponentially. As a result, I started to offer to make mini libraries for the community and began to collect donations from neighbors, friends, and family members. I did not charge for the libraries, but rather used the donations gathered to create customized boxes for anyone who was interested in becoming a custodian of one. I was inspired by the generosity of the community, and did not feel as though reaping a profit was the right thing to do. I do not charge for any of my labor and continue to fund the mission with donations from the community. To date, we have planted 87 libraries in the community and are continuing to provide these handmade items to anyone who requests one. I was incredibly proud during the COVID-19 pandemic because the libraries became places where community members could donate food or other important items that were needed and were in short supply in stores. They were also popular locations to visit with children that were stuck in the house while social distancing rules were in effect. The libraries have completely changed the landscape of this community and are one of the biggest accomplishments of my life. I love that my children and wife are involved, as well as that we have an amazing team of people that help dig, plan, create and make decisions. Each library is created with love and is uniquely designed for the home owner. They have become a core part of our town.
Can you open up about how you funded your business?
In order to fund the MP Mini Library Mission, we rely solely on the donations of neighbors and community members. We have had Dine and Shares with local restaurants, sold T-Shirts, and worked with other community organizations in order to collect enough capital to continue to fund the mission. In addition, we created an Amazon Wish List which houses the items that are needed to create every library. Community members and library custodians will often donate either financially or provide some of the items on the wish list.
How did you build your audience on social media?
The main way that we market our mission is through Facebook, in particular the MP Mini Library Mission page. Community members or other interested parties join the page and use it as a way to gain information about the mission, any events we are having, as well as the steps taken to request a library. We also will post any events in local Facebook pages to advertise and let people know when/how they can donate. Our current Facebook group has over 900 members. My main advice to anyone started to build a social media presence is to have one location where people can find all of the information that they need. It becomes a central hub where others can learn about your initiative.
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Image Credits
Nancy Bussan Kaitlynn Thommes