Who said loving the earth had to last only one day? Clean the World celebrates planet Earth every day through our global hygiene revolution, but in light of Earth Day on April 22, we’re especially highlighting why our impact on it is so important— so we’re celebrating sustainability and green initiatives the entire month of April.

To put just how important it is to recycle into perspective; According to the Economist, the United States alone chucks away 11.4 billion dollars worth of recyclable containers and packaging annually. As an organization who’s passionate about sustainability and making an environmental change, we encourage you to take a stand. Taking care of earth starts with a small notion, and you can make a difference by just recycling in your own home or at work, or even by volunteering at one of our warehouses to help Clean the World recycle bars of soap and bottled amenities.

How Clean the World is Making a Change:

Five million bars of soap each day are tossed into landfills worldwide, just from the hospitality industry alone. To combat this, Clean the World diverts an astonishing 14.8 million pounds of waste from landfills through recycling bottled amenities such as shampoo, conditioner, and soap from more than one million hotel rooms daily, and we wouldn’t be able to do it without the help of our Soap Heroes!

An Ode to One of Our Soap Heroes:

Thank you to our partner, Guest Supply who makes our mission of recycling soap and saving lives possible. Since 2013, Guest Supply has helped Clean the World manage inventory from their six locations across the United States. They help us collect soaps and bins from over half of the hotels we recycle from, and over 800,000 hotel rooms. To continue making a difference, Clean the World is currently working on recycling not only the bottles of these products, but the liquid inside as well.

How You Can Get Involved:

Join in on our Earth Month movement. Use the hashtags #CleantheWorld and #CleanGoesGreen in your social media posts for a chance to be featured on our page. Help spread the word about why it’s important to go green, reduce, reuse and recycle to make our earth just a little more beautiful each day.

For information on volunteer opportunities with Clean the World, please email: volunteers@ctw2.wpstagecoach.com

Written by Gabrielle Lintz, an intern in the Clean the World marketing department.

In November, we wrapped up our inaugural nine-month Soap in Schools Program in Kenya, and we have the final results. Across the 12 schools, serving more than 4,000 children, we saw an overall reduction in hygiene-related illnesses (diarrheal diseases, pneumonia, and skin infections) of 56 percent. And school attendance increased 45 percent from when the program started at the beginning of 2016!

These numbers are huge for a few reasons. They show that our work achieved an impact in the first 90 days and that we were able to sustain that impact for the duration of the nine-month program. The outcome bodes well for our other Soap in Schools programs taking place or soon launching in other parts of the world. And it proves the power of soap and proper hand washing in making a significant impact on global health.

The results are a powerful indicator that we are on the right track with Clean the World’s mission. Thousands of kids are now healthier because of our work. They are going to school, getting an education, and will hopefully break the cycle of poverty that has plagued their families for generations. For many, this program might be a turning point in their lives — and for us, it shows just how impactful soap can be.

We’ve identified ways to carry this work forward through new partnerships in Kenya this year, so look for more details soon. We’ll also be sharing our first impact numbers from Tanzania soon as well. And as we move into 2017, we looking forward to launching outcome-based programs and partnerships in India, China, and beyond.

Thank you for being a partner in our life-changing mission and for everything you do to support us.

Thanks to the generous support of the Starwood Foundation, Clean the World recently launched a nine-month hygiene education program in a network of 12 schools across Kenya. The program serves more than 4,000 primary school children who live in extreme poverty in either urban slums or rural villages.

Unlike most of our international work, which we conduct through existing programs operated by other NGO partners, the Soap in Schools program is different. This time, we’ve designed and launched the program ourselves, and will engage other partners as necessary to accomplish our goals. The first steps were to identify the target population, conduct a baseline study to determine the “starting point” for measuring success going forward, design the hygiene education program to be implemented in schools, and train teachers to implement the programming.

Sam Stephens, managing director of Clean the World Foundation, traveled to Kenya in early March to conduct the baseline study and teacher training. Since then and through the end of 2016, ongoing hand-washing classes will teach the children how, when, and why to wash their hands – while also providing them, their families, and their schools with Clean the World soap.

The results of the baseline study showed an even greater need than we expected:

• Nearly 70 percent of the children suffered from a hygiene-related illness (diarrhea or pneumonia) in the previous month
• 80 percent had a hygiene-related skin infection during that time
• Nearly 40 percent had missed four or more days of school in the previous month as a result of these conditions

Our goal is to make these kids healthier and, therefore, help them attend school more often so they can receive the education they need to break the cycle of poverty.

Now that our hand-washing education and soap distribution are underway, we should see these problems getting much better in the coming weeks and months. We will measure our impact and progress every 90 days, so expect an update in June.

This outreach in Kenya is the first of many new Clean the World programs. We are about to launch a similar program in Tanzania. It’s a very exciting development, and it marks a big step forward in our mission to eradicate the top two killers of children globally.

Did you know that diarrhea and pneumonia are the leading causes of death among children in the developing world? Combined, they claim the lives of nearly 6,000 kids every day – more than AIDS, malaria, and TB combined.

Fortunately, there is a simple “vaccine.” Hand washing with soap is the most efficient way to prevent those deaths and can cut death rates in half. Through the Global Soap & Hygiene Initiative, a Clean the World cause, we focus on getting soap and hygiene education to those who lack access to it. In the past six years, we’ve distributed more than 30 million bars of soap to millions of people in 100 countries.

One person who received our soap is Ruth, a young mother living in rural Malawi. When we started working with Ruth, we learned that although she was familiar with soap, her family wasn’t buying it or using it. Like so many people living in poverty, Ruth had never been taught why soap and proper hygiene are so important for maintaining good health.

As a result, Ruth and her children were sick quite frequently. Several family members and neighbors had died from hygiene-related diseases. Ruth’s kids were falling behind in school and were about to drop out, and she was often unable to work and earn money to keep her family fed and nourished.

That changed when Ruth started participating in one of our projects, where she attended a local clinic each month with other parents to receive a free bar of soap and hygiene education. After nine months of participating in the program and using soap regularly, Ruth and her family no longer get sick. Better still, she and the other parents in the program see the value of soap and are buying it for themselves regularly as an investment in the health of their children.

To us, that’s success.

Guest Post by Julie Potyraj

Clean the World is one of a dozen groups working to promote WASH (water, sanitation, and hygiene) programs globally. However, it is among a smaller number of organizations starting to do this on a community and household level. Why? Because global change is anchored in community efforts. Improvements in infrastructure and policy begin with changes in the beliefs and behaviors of individuals. Programs at a local level are integral in laying a strong foundation for global public health achievements.

Global Importance of WASH Programs

WASH programs are a key strategy in achieving several of the United Nations Millennium Achievement Goals. Specifically, WASH programs aid in the reduction of child mortality, improve maternal health, help to combat disease, and increase environmental sustainability. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has extensively noted the health effects of poor water sanitation and hygiene practices. Currently, 780 million people do not have access to an improved water source and 2.5 billion people lack access to improved sanitation. Nearly 88 percent of deaths from diarrheal diseases can be traced back to a combination of unsafe drinking water, unsanitary conditions, and a general lack of water for hygiene purposes. WASH Programs could ostensibly prevent 9.1 percent of the global disease burden and as much as 6.3 percent of all deaths.

Risk to Children

Children are especially vulnerable to the effects of poor sanitation and hygiene. According to the World Health Organization, WASH programs can improve children’s nutritional status by preventing diarrheal diseases, intestinal parasites, and environmental enteropathy. Specifically, improved WASH resources could prevent as much as 361,000 (58 percent) of total deaths attributed to diarrhea in children under the age of 5. This is an incredible number considering that the CDC claims that around 801,000 children in this age group die each year from these causes. This represents 11 percent of the children younger than 5 who die each year.

Community-Based Prevention Programs

WASH programs have shown to make a significant impact on the health and well-being of those affected. In terms of reducing just diarrheal deaths, better water sources (21 percent), better sanitation (37.5 percent), improved drinking water quality (45 percent), and hand-washing (35 percent) have significant impacts. Expanding the reach of WASH programs requires a multi-pronged approach, including community-based interventions like soap distribution as well as demonstrations in hand-washing, safe household water management, and food preparation. According to US AID’s Maternal and Child Survival Program, “Hand-washing is the single most cost-effective intervention to prevent pneumonia and diarrhea in children, and reduces infections in mothers and children during pregnancy and childbirth.” If these programs have sufficient resources and are conducted with respect to the community, they have been shown to positively affect health in these communities.

Small Changes, Global Impact

Improved hygiene and sanitation practices are ultimately about changes in beliefs as well as behaviors of individuals. Workers are needed on the ground to provide demonstrations and positive reinforcement along with creating hand-washing stations and supplying soap, which reinforce the taught behaviors. Community- and household-level interventions are necessary to identify barriers as well as possible enablers to WASH behaviors in the home. Community-level workers are able to troubleshoot specific action steps for a given household or community to promote desired WASH techniques in the long term.

Supplies needed for these ventures are easily manufactured locally, which makes such community-based programs sustainable and cost-effective. As the saying goes, “Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish and he eats every day.” Organizations like Clean the World provide resources in addition to building skills, habits, and infrastructure from the ground up. Individuals are able to learn a set of skills that can have a lasting impact on their health as well as the health of their families and community. Once enough of these local-level actions take root, that’s when we will start to see global change.

Julie Potyraj is the community manager for MPH@GW, the online master of public health program offered by the Milken Institute School of Public Health at the George Washington University. For several years, she served as a community development specialist in Zambia coordinating youth empowerment programs and reproductive health education. She is currently an MPH@GW student focusing on global health and health communications.

Dear Friends:

As you know, the recent earthquake in Nepal has claimed more than 5,000 lives and created unspeakable devastation in a region already plagued by poverty. One of the greatest concerns following a catastrophe like this is access to water, sanitation, and hygiene. These disasters create environments in which diseases spread very rapidly, and soap is one of the most critical items needed to save lives and prevent further devastation. Amidst the chaos, many of the typical sources of soap have been cut off, leaving families, hospitals, and emergency response teams without access to such a vital resource.

That’s where Clean the World comes in. We’re responding by sending an initial shipment of soap to Nepal this week to serve over 5,000 families in camps and clinics, with distribution beginning by Friday. In the weeks to come, we’ll continue to provide shipments of soap and hygiene kits to help improve health and prevent the spread of diseases in the affected areas.

We know this effort is critical – and we couldn’t do it without your help. Will you join me today by making a donation to support our disaster response efforts in Nepal? Your gift will help us make sure lifesaving soap reaches those most in need, and will help provide an ongoing supply as the recovery continues. To make a gift, visit www.cleantheworld.org or click the button below.

Thanks so much for your support. And stay tuned for updates on our response efforts in the coming days.

With gratitude,

Sam Stephens
Chief Development Officer

One word sums up the feeling at Clean the World as we celebrated the holidays: Grateful.

We are so grateful for the hotels, volunteers, corporate partners, and supporters that fuel our mission to save lives with soap. Thank you to everyone who was part of the global hygiene revolution in 2014. Twelve months ago, we never could have imagined what an amazing year it would be.

Here are a few of the highlights:

Las Vegas Sands Donation

Las Vegas Sands Corp. has a long history of supporting our mission. They took it to a new level in 2014 by donating $1 million – the largest corporate donation in Clean the World’s history. Their generous contribution made it possible for us to add a new soap recycling production line in our Las Vegas regional operations center. The new machinery can sanitize and recycle enough discarded soap to produce nearly 20,000 three-ounce bars of soap a day.

The Sands donation also sponsored 100,000 ONE Project hygiene kits for distribution through the American Red Cross to local and national disaster victims. The kits were assembled by 2,000 volunteers during a mass community effort at the Venetian Ballroom.

Clean the World Asia

In May, Clean the World rolled out the red carpet at a new recycling operations center in Hong Kong. This new, expanded facility is outfitted with a complete production line to turn discarded hotel soap into clean new bars. Soap from hotel partners in Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore flows into the Hong Kong facility. The $1 million donation from Las Vegas Sands also helped fund this new production line and our expanded footprint in Asia.

First Florida Benefit Corporation

In July, Clean the World created the first benefit corporation under Florida’s new benefit corporation law. The law allows for a new type of company that uses the power of business to solve social and environmental problems.

Bi-Partisan Event on Capitol Hill

In September, we proved there are no political boundaries when it comes to the battle against hygiene-related illnesses. Legislators from both sides of the aisle joined Clean the World in the U.S. Capitol to promote hand washing and proper hygiene leading up to Global Handwashing Day on Oct. 15. To kick off the event in the Capitol’s historic Lyndon Baines Johnson Room, Clean the World founder Shawn Seipler was joined by the senators from Nevada, Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid and GOP Sen. Dean Heller.

Company to Watch

In October, Clean the World was honored by GrowFL as one of the 2014 Florida Companies to Watch. The program celebrates growing second-stage companies headquartered in the Sunshine State. Companies to Watch was developed as a unique way to recognize and honor companies that demonstrate high performance with innovative strategies and processes, making them “worth watching.”

Food pantry at the San Diego Rescue Mission.

When we founded Clean the World four years ago, our goal was simple: Collect discarded hotel soap, recycle it, and send it to developing countries. The idea was to save lives in places where millions of people die from illnesses that can be prevented with hand washing.

What we didn’t realize at the time was that we also had an opportunity to make a difference in our own back yard by partnering with community-minded organizations. Here in the United States, Clean the World’s ONE Project provides much-needed hygiene products to people who struggle to meet their family’s basic needs due to economic misfortune or natural disaster.

Companies, churches, schools, clubs and fraternal organizations host events where they assemble hygiene kits as a way to improve teamwork and create a renewed focus on community. By distributing the kits locally, they experience first-hand how something so simple can have such a profound impact on the lives of others.

In February, our friends at Starwood Hotels hosted a ONE Project event at their conference in San Diego. The group assembled 500 hygiene kits, which were donated to the San Diego Rescue Mission.

Recently we received a follow-up from Mark Legace, who is the individual gifts manager at the mission. He wanted to let Starwood and Clean the World know that hundreds of hungry and homeless men, women, and children will enjoy the high-quality hygiene necessities and notes of encouragement supplied in those kits.

“It was fun for me to cheer all the teams on and see all the beautiful donations being assembled to make a homeless person’s day,” Legace said. “Thank you again for organizing this great project to help so many hungry and homeless men, women, and children here in San Diego. Hopefully there will be more opportunities for us to partner together again in the future to help more San Diegans in need.”

That is what inspires all of us to keep pushing ahead with the Global Hygiene Revolution.

Thousands of great partners such as Starwood. Thousands of housekeepers collecting soap and bottled amenities. Thousands of volunteers processing the items in Orlando and Las Vegas. Thousands of supporters around the world. Hundreds of distribution partners. The entire Clean the World team. Collectively we are able to save lives with soap.

Thanks to each of you for doing your part.

Rosanna Kingston is the Nonprofit Partnership and Volunteer Coordinator for Clean the World. She works with organizations that require hygiene products to fulfill their missions, and arranges for the pickup and transportation of soap from Clean the World’s recycling and manufacturing plant in Orlando.

This post is from Rosanna Kingston, Clean the World’s Nonprofit Partnership and Volunteer Coordinator.

Our recent Clean the World soap distribution trip to the Dominican Republic departed from Orlando on Tuesday, April 23.

The team was made up of Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer, his assistant Kathleen Devault, Clean the World board member Paul Skomsky, Clean the World CEO Shawn Seipler, Jennifer Quigley, Ford Kiene of City Beverages, Rian Seipler, Clean the World videographer Robert Bahret, Sherry Bellomo, and Jeff Wolff, Marriott’s vice president of Guest Experience and Rooms Operations – Americas, and me.

The following post is from Rosanna Kingston, Clean the World’s nonprofit partnership and volunteer coordinator.

The Clean the World soap distribution team started their journey to Honduras on Tuesday, Feb 23. On the team I was accompanied by Terry Dunbar from the Hyatt Regency in Jersey City, NJ; Kathryn Coiner- Collier from the Aloft Charlotte Uptown in Charlotte, NC; Jami Rodman from Las Vegas; and Mary Coiner and Lou Collier from Virginia.

This is Kathryn’s third trip with Clean the World, but this time was special because she was joined by her parents: Mary and Lou. Even better, Lou brought his guitar and was ready to lead our now famous (at least in one small part of Honduras) hand washing song! Kathryn is the creator of this song and the “Super Jabon” character who sings it.

Terry Dunbar from the Hyatt Regency Jersey City.

We traveled all day on Tuesday. Our trip started with a one-hour flight from Miami to Orlando, and then a connecting flight to San Pedro Sula, Honduras. Once we retrieved our luggage and cleared customs, we were greeted by the in-country partners from Joint Task Force-Bravo, Iris Medina and Lieutenant Colonel Michael Frazier. We all boarded one vehicle and headed to Soto Cano Air Base in Comayagua. The drive time was three hours.

Soto Cano Air Base (commonly known as Palmerola Air Base) is a Honduran military base five miles south of Comayagua in Honduras. A modest concentration of U.S. troops and the Honduran Air Force academy use the airbase. The U.S. government once used Palmerola as a base of operations to support their foreign policy objectives in the 1980s. Now the U.S. military uses Soto Cano as a launching point for its war on drugs in Central America, as well as humanitarian aid missions throughout Honduras and Central America.

This post was written by Rosanna Kingston, Clean the World’s nonprofit partnership and volunteer coordinator.

Our teams visited orphanages, soup kitchens, schools, ghettos, landfills and villages. There appeared to be very little soap in any of these places before we arrived. Our team members learned how the citizens live and the challenges they face with hygiene and inadequate sanitation.

There is a landfill in Guatemala where subsistence workers live with their families within the borders of the landfill itself. Every day scores of the Guatemalan poor work in this landfill to search for scrap metal and other recyclables. They do this in order to eke out a living that is the equivalent of about three U.S. dollars a day.

International Children Rescue Ministries (ICRM) recently returned from a mission trip to Haiti. Johnny Narcisse of ICRM said the two-month visit was a great success, and that soap from Clean the World was a welcome gift in the community his organization serves.

ICRM’s mission is to rescue kids from poverty, feed as many kids as possible, and provide them with a safe environment. They work toward that goal by building self-reliant communities through education.

Johnny sent us these pictures from the recent trip:

If ever you feel down in the dumps, consider the people who live there.

Accompanying Clean the World staff members Rosanna Kingston and Holly Boland on this particular soap distribution trip were William Kellock and Becki Greif from Concord Hospitality, Keith Levit and Lois Hefling from Lakeview Hotels & Resorts in Canada, and Blair and Brooke Christianson from Canalta Hotels in Canada.

Venturing into the landfill to find families in need of better hygiene was simple in theory, but difficult in practice. The roughly 20,000 individuals who live on the edge of the Guatemala City Dumps struggle daily for survival, and the gift of a fresh bar of soap is a welcome and necessary hygiene product to stop the spread of disease, and also a bit of fresh-smelling hope for a cleaner, healthier life.

Demand for hygiene products is immense in this very poor region of Guatemala where children often pick through the landfill trash to find food, clothing, and other basic items just to survive. While it is difficult to imagine the daily struggles faced by individuals living in such poverty, it was a relief to see the smiles on faces of many, particularly the children, when they received soaps distributed by Clean the World and its adventurous partners in hygiene.

Keith Levit, president of Lakeview Hotels, is also a professional photographer. He captured many of the dramatic images of this soap distribution journey, which are highlighted in this photo gallery.

A total of nearly 13,000 soap bars were distributed in various locations surrounding Guatemala City, including 5,000 at the Guatemala City Dumps; 5,000 at Maria Teresa Ghetto; 2,000 at Hogar Solidario Virgen de la Esperanza Orphanage in Guatemala City; and nearly 1,000 at Dorie’s Promise Guatemala Orphanage.

The visit to Dorie’s Promise, a privately-run orphanage owned by Forever Changed International from which 400 orphans have been adopted into loving homes, really had an impact on at least one member of the group.

“It is incredible for me to see how they have been able to look out for these children, giving them a better life than they clearly had before,” says Concord Hospitality’s Kellock. “I am looking for the opportunity to spread the word about the great work that is being done here.”

Clean the World has scheduled a second trip to Guatemala in late April, which will feature more soap distribution adventures and include hospitality partners from Starwood Hotels & Resorts and Clean the World celebrity spokesperson Mariana Klaveno.

On a recent trip to her native country, India, Clean the World’s Paramita Das shared the gift of soap.

Having traveled around the globe for a family wedding, Das took time to visit some of the communities in India where soap is considered a great commodity, but is often hard to come by for children and families.

According to UNICEF and the World Health Organization (2009), India tops the list of countries in the total number of annual child deaths from diarrheal diseases, such as cholera and dysentery.

These fatal diseases — the top two killers of children younger than 5 worldwide — may be prevented by as much as 60 percent through regular hand washing with bar soap. Here are the sobering figures from that study:

Top 10 Nations – Diarrheal Deaths (Source: WHO, UNICEF, 2009)
Country – Total Number of Annual Child Deaths
1. India – 386,600
2. Nigeria – 151,700
3. Democratic Republic of the Congo – 89,900
4. Afghanistan – 82,100
5. Ethiopia – 73,700
6. Pakistan – 53,300
7. Bangladesh – 50,800
8. China – 40,000
9. Uganda – 29,300
10. Kenya – 27,400

If you’d like to join our global hygiene revolution, please make an online donation to the Clean the World Foundation. Thanks for helping Clean the World. Soap saves lives.

Clean the World, through the generosity of its hotel partners, recently donated soaps and hygiene supplies to victims of tornadoes that ravaged Kentucky in early March.

A series of tornadoes on March 2 damaged several Kentucky communities, destroying homes, churches, and schools and generally uprooting life for thousands of people throughout region.

After filling out an online donation request form, church leaders at Plum Creek Christian Church in Butler, Ky., put the wheels in motion for rapid and necessary disaster relief. Clean the World packaged and shipped roughly 5,400 bars of soap, 200 tote bags, and 50 “family size” bottles of body wash to help bring comfort to people who lost their homes in the storm. The church has helped set up mobile grocery stores in the area for people in need of food, clothing, and hygiene supplies. The items are available free of charge to tornado victims.

Clean the World’s Bethanne Doud, director of the Meeting Planner Recycle Program, was instrumental in guiding this relief donation to Plum Creek Christian Church. Doud was there to help distribute the hygiene items to people in need.

Jared Perkins, pastor at Plum Creek Christian Church, is administering to the needs of his extended congregation by distributing soaps and bottled amenities as needed to cleanse the body and lift the spirits of families in crisis. Roughly 150 families will receive hygiene relief through this effort.

“We’re grateful for the generosity of Clean the World and its hospitality partners in providing hygiene supplies for the tornado victims in our community,” says Pastor Perkins. “When your world is turned topsy-turvy by a tornado, and you’re unsure of where you’ll go next, the simple basics of a bar of soap, shampoo, and a nice shower can really go a long way toward bringing physical and mental recovery.”

It is not uncommon for Clean the World to contribute hygiene supplies following a natural disaster, at home or abroad. Nearly one year ago, Clean the World helped deliver relief supplies to natural disaster victims a world away in Japan following an earthquake and tsunami.

Clean the World celebrates the official opening of its Las Vegas Recycling Operations Center (ROC) with a ribbon-cutting event Wednesday, Feb. 29.

Which begs the question: How important is Las Vegas to Clean the World’s mission? Let’s look at the numbers.

It’s been more than two years since the island nation of Haiti was torn at its foundation by a 7.0 magnitude earthquake. 300,000 people lost their lives in that natural disaster and millions more were injured as the nation was literally turned upside down. [VIDEO: “I Keep Holding On”]

For months afterward, the world’s attention turned to Haiti and its plight. Celebrities hosted benefit concerts, dignitaries staged fundraising events. Both groups gave lots of speeches and individuals and faith-based organizations offered even more prayers.

At Clean the World, we took action. With the help of our hotel partners and a network of volunteers and supporters, our soap recycling organization mobilized to bring relief to children and families throughout Haiti. More than 2 million soap bars and hygiene supplies have been distributed to Haitian villages with the hope of halting the spread of preventable diseases. And the mission continues.

Recently, the Cap Haitien Health Network, through the leadership of avid Clean the World supporter and advisory board member, Dr. Ted Kaplan, kept the spirit alive with another soap distribution in Haiti. With the generous aid of AEROBridge, which provided transportation and logistics to and from Haiti, Clean the World helped send 34,400 soap bars to medical clinics served by Cap Haitien Health Network in some of the poorest communities in Haiti.

And that’s not the only shipment Haiti has received in the past few weeks. International Children Rescue Ministries Inc. recently received a donation of 2,000 soap bars, 2,880 bottles of body wash, and 10,368 body lotions from Clean the World. The hygiene items will be distributed throughout communities, such as Kenscoff, where children and families are battling poverty and poor sanitation conditions.

Finally, Clean the World is proud to be recognized by the Haitian American Visionaries Association for contributing thousands of soaps and bottled amenities for inclusion in hygiene kits that H.A.V.A. distributes at medical clinics throughout the country. We have a beautiful wall plaque as proof of our efforts, but the real measure of this mission is in the healthy smiles of children in Haiti who benefit from improved health and hygiene through regular hand washing with soap.

Soap saves lives. Thanks for helping Clean the World in Haiti and beyond. The mission continues…

It’s not often we receive an email that has so much potential impact. But, boy, is it fun when we do.

Marti Mosley, soap drive coordinator at Clean the World, received an email in January from BuyEfficient of Aliso Viejo, Calif.

The message was simple: We have lots of supplies and we want to help Clean the World.

After a brief conversation about Clean the World’s mission and how BuyEfficient could help advance our global hygiene revolution, the results are in: More than 8 tons of soap have been shipped to Clean the World to help stop the spread of preventable diseases worldwide.

BuyEfficient, which offers complete online purchasing solutions for the hospitality industry, worked with 11 separate HD Supply locations across the United States to collect and send 16,356 lbs. of soap and 235 lbs. of bottled amenities to Clean the World. The collective cost of the donation is nearly $24,000.

Clean the World’s Las Vegas Recycling Operations Center (ROC) has been busy preparing for its Feb. 29 grand opening event, but there is a lot of other good work being done there as well.

Recently, the Las Vegas facility set aside 10,000 soap bars for an essential overseas distribution.

Johnston says her first experience with Clean the World has been a good one, as she expressed in a note to Rosanna Kingston, who coordinates the organization’s non-profit partnerships.

Clean the World’s “hometown newspaper” – The Orlando Sentinel – recently published a terrific piece about our organization’s origin and growth in three years of operation.

The article by reporter Kate Santich has been syndicated to multiple media markets throughout North America and has gained quite a bit of attention for Clean the World and our mission to save lives with soap. By placing Orlando at the center of our global hygiene revolution, readers of this original article, and those who come across it in other media outlets, can confidently target Central Florida as a vital and developing hotspot for sustainable business in one of the world’s best known hospitality and tourism locations.

As always we wish to thank our valued hospitality partners, some of whom are mentioned in the article, for their investment in our hospitality partnership program and support of our global hygiene revolution.

We could not reach so far, so fast without the encouragement and involvement of people who truly believe in sustainability and socially responsible programs in the hospitality industry. As Clean the World grows, you will grow right along with us. Together we will achieve great things. We already have.

With the Mayan calendar apparently predicting the end of the world in 2012, Clean the World has stepped up production to make this a clean and comfortable year for people close to where that prediction was made.

Several soap distribution trips are planned in the new year and preparations are already underway to bring lifesaving soap to people who need it most.

A February trip to Honduras has already been scheduled and all participants are secured. But two more Clean the World soap distribution trips to Guatemala — home of the famous Mayan ruins — are planned in March and April, and the soaps to be distributed have already left their destination bound for Central America.

During the first week of the new year Clean the World packaged more than 60,000 freshly pressed soap bars at its Orlando soap recycling facility for distribution to children and families in Guatemala.

The soaps are on their way and will be awaiting the arrival of Clean the World personnel and invited hotel partners in coming months. The soaps, which originated as soaps collected from Clean the World’s more than 1,200 hotel partners throughout North America, will be handed out to individuals in disadvantaged areas of that country. They are intended to provide hygiene relief and comfort for thousands of children and adults who struggle with hygiene issues due to lack of proper sanitation and access to soap.

If you’d like to participate in future soap distribution trips with Clean the World, please contact Rosanna Kingston at rkingston@ctw2.wpstagecoach.com.

As we approach Thanksgiving, we arrive at another moment for Clean the World to reflect and give thanks for the incredible movement that has begun and the results it has driven. If I may ask yet another question: “What Have We Done?”

In 2009, we set out to solve a problem: How do we prevent partially used hotel soaps and bottled amenities from being discarded in landfills, and instead distribute these lifesaving hygiene products to those in desperate need all around the world? Little did we know that in solving this problem, together with the worldwide hospitality industry, we would lead a Global Hygiene Revolution! The industry has responded in an incredible way. And we are thankful!

To date, millions of bars of soap have been collected and distributed by Clean the World and our more than 1,200 hotel partners across North America — more than 9 million bars of soap to be exact!

And in establishing our leadership in this field as the first and foremost recycler of hotel amenities, we have learned about individual hospitality industry efforts, such as Rosen Hotels in Orlando, Fla., with their in-house program that delivers recycled soap to Haiti.

Most recently, the Hilton Worldwide – Global Soap Project social enterprise has been formed to ensure that Hilton soaps are recycled and distributed to those in need on a regular basis. This is great news for the children and families who will receive recycled soaps. Our efforts created demand for these hygiene products, and success always invites imitation.

Clean the World has also collected and either recycled OR re-purposed and re-distributed more than 500 tons of plastic bottled amenities from North American hotels. And so many more hotels are making it a regular practice to partner with local shelters, missions, and food kitchens to make sure that all of those little bottles of shampoo and bath gel that still have product in them, are being used to the final drop.

Ladies and Gentlemen- We have started a Global Hygiene Revolution! And hotels across North America are now faced with a wonderful decision: to recycle their soap and bottled amenities after use or send them to landfills. Why is this a “wonderful” decision? Because as the tremendous, positive response continues, it will lead to more children receiving soap worldwide!

And the revolution is still in its infancy. We’ve only just begun. In 3 years, Clean the World’s soap distribution efforts (9 million bars) combined with others such as Global Soap (150,000 bars) have no doubt resulted in an incredible amount of recycled bars of soap delivered to children and families around the world. But in that same time that we have operated, more than one Billion bars of soap have landed in North American landfills. Yes, Billion with a “B”! And millions of pounds of plastic have unnecessarily arrived there as well.

We cannot stop what we have started! We must continue to adopt and implement soap and plastic bottle recycling programs. Some may say that these programs come at a cost and therefore cannot be implemented today. Indeed there is a cost to participate: from the time and talent it takes each housekeeper, every day to collect these items, to the $0.02 per day cost to operate Clean the World’s Hospitality Recycling Program OR the shipping and material cost to operate other programs.

If you cannot justify the expense today, please budget for it in the future. For such a small financial outlay, these programs are making an incredible impact! As one who has had the privilege and honor of personally delivering tens of thousands of bars of soap to children in tent cities in Haiti and in homeless shelters across the United States, the impact is being felt and is realized daily!

We call upon the global hospitality community to keep the movement strong! One way to do so is for all hoteliers, meeting professionals, and soap and bottle recyclers to continue to communicate the impact that we are all making. Communicating quantifiable results to the industry and public is a great way to do this. It is one of the most effective ways to create awareness and drive positive results from our collective customers. Clean the World will begin posting on the home page of our site the actual amount of diverted landfill waste (soap and bottled amenities), as well as the amount of recycled and distributed hygiene products.

And in December, in addition to regular Impact Statements provided to our hotel and meeting professional partners, we will provide our partners web tools to assist in effectively displaying and communicating the actual sustainable and socially responsible impact that they have made.

In 3 years, and with 1.7 million pounds of inbound product collection, Clean the World has processed and distributed more than 85% of the collected product with outbound trucks, pallets and boxes of product daily! On behalf of those receiving the soap and bottled amenities that we deliver, we applaud Clean the World hotel partners and all who are using some method to recycle these desperately needed hygiene products. And we offer special thanks to the more than 5,000 volunteers who have dedicated their time and talent to make Clean the World a success in such a short period of time.

Thank you to the Clean the World Hospitality Partners who have joined, and continued to join, our Global Hygiene Revolution: Walt Disney World Resorts, Central Florida Marriott Business Council, The Peabody Orlando/ Memphis, and Caesars Entertainment; Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, Carlson Hotels, Best Western International, Marriott Vacation Club International, and Joie de Vivre Hotels; Mandarin Oriental, Larkspur Hotels,  Preferred Hotel Group, Lakeview Hotels and Resorts, and Bellstar Hotels and Resorts; Canalta Hotels, Concord Hospitality, Hersha Hospitality, Kana Hotel Group, and Kelco Management; Wynn/ Encore, Venetian/ Palazzo, The City of Laguna Beach, Calif., and the Las Vegas Strip; all of the Meeting Professionals, the 165 individual Marriott properties, the 100 individual Wyndham Worldwide properties, and the 100 individual Hilton Worldwide properties; Gilchrist & Soames, Marietta Corporation, and LATHER.

Now, look what you’ve done!

Happy Thanksgiving,
Shawn Seipler
CEO, Clean the World

Children International kicked off its partnership with Clean the World by filling a truck with 108,000 bars of soaps bound for typhoon and flooding victims in the Philippines. It is the first of two truckloads to be filled each month as part of the partnership to help stop the spread of preventable diseases by providing and promoting better hygiene opportunities.

Children International is a humanitarian organization focused on overcoming poverty. The soaps have been ticketed for communities in the Philippines that are suffering from lack of access to basic hygiene supplies.

“Clean the World is committed to helping as many children and families as possible by recycling soap to save lives, especially in the wake of a disaster like the recent typhoon in the Philippines,” says Shawn Seipler, CEO and co-founder at Clean the World. “This partnership with Children International helps us open doors to communities in Asia where demand for our soaps is great. The partnership is one that we’ve targeted for some time, and we’re grateful to be working with such a well-known and well-respected organization to help advance our global hygiene revolution.”

The soaps were fresh off the soap press at Clean the World, having been sanitized and reformed into uniform bars for easy packaging and distribution. This initial pickup by Children International should help provide enough soap for nearly 11,000 children for an entire month.

You’ve often heard and read about Clean the World’s accomplishment of distributing more than 9 million bars of soap and more than 6.2 million bottled amenities in the United States, Canada and in more than 45 other countries.

But where do the soaps, shampoos, conditioners, lotions and gels ultimately go? You may be surprised to learn the answer.

Clean the World successfully works with more than 1,200 hotel partners to collect and recycle hotel soaps for distribution to children and families in need. What you may not know is that Clean the World also encourages and receives a substantial number of donations from schools, church groups, corporations, community organizations, and individuals with a shared goal of helping others stop the spread of preventable disease with soap.

And many of these items go to domestic homeless shelters, rescue missions, women’s shelters and children’s charities that have expressed a need and desire for hygiene items to comfort those in their care. [Note: If you know of an organization in need of hygiene supplies, please click here to request relief help from Clean the World.]

Since its founding in February 2009, Clean the World has distributed 1,042,917 lbs. of soap and 581,754 lbs. of shampoos, conditioners, lotions and gels to people in need.

More recently, Clean the World delivered 2,500 hygiene kits to communities in the Dominican Republic through an organization called FUNDHUBA, a D.R.-based non-profit that works in rural areas promoting hygiene issues. The kits, which contain soaps and bottled amenities, are wrapped in reusable PeopleTowels that were donated specifically for distribution to children and families overseas. Another 4,000 kits will be shipped to Haiti this week, with plans to send thousands more to Honduras and, possibly, Guatemala and Nicaragua in the near future.

Earlier this year, Clean the World formed a special partnership with Harvest Time International. Each week Harvest Time picks up a semi-truck of sanitized bottled amenities and re-distributes them to domestic homeless shelters and other non-profits across the Caribbean and Latin America.

Clean the World has also been involved in major worldwide relief efforts. More than 2 million bars of soap have been distributed in Haiti, most of it through a series of soap distribution trips following the Jan. 2010 earthquake and subsequent cholera outbreak. But Haiti is not the only beneficiary of such generosity on the part of our partners and supporters. Through a series of additional distribution partnerships, Clean the World delivered hygiene kits, soaps, bottled amenities and bottled water to victims of the tornadoes in Joplin, Mo., and earthquake and tsunami victims in Japan, Pakistan and the Philippines.

In the United States and Canada, Clean the World frequently donates soaps and hygiene-related items to The Salvation Army, Las Vegas Rescue Mission, New Missions, Fresh Start Ministries, Opportunity House, Bronx Neighborhood Cluster Program and many more deserving organizations that have requested hygiene items from Clean the World.

This Christmas season, as we did last year, we will work with our friends at Project Shoebox and many other church groups across the United States to deliver much needed hygiene products in shoeboxes for those hurting right here at home.

You can help, too. If you know of any organizations that can benefit from receiving soaps and bottled amenities from Clean the World, please visit our website and let us know. We are the leaders of a global hygiene revolution, but we will not overlook those who are struggling in our own backyard. Soap saves lives, and it all starts with passion and a willingness to help others. Thanks for helping Clean the World.

Clean the World Foundation has updated its Soap Distribution Map to include new countries in which we are helping to save lives with soap. View the map here.

Recent additions to our map, which now represents 45 countries touched by Clean the World, include Peru, Paraguay, Uruguay, Kenya and an island off the coast of Africa that many people remember best as the name of an animated film by Dreamworks.

That most recent addition to our list may be the most exotic — Madagascar. Check out the smiling faces on these children, many of whom live way below the poverty level in an economically depressed nation. The children are really appreciative of the soaps, which were donated through a number of school, church and individual soap donations received by Clean the World.

If you’d like to start your own soap drive in your community, please visit this link for tips on how to make it a success. You’ll help people all around the world receive the gift of hygiene, and you’ll be helping Clean the World.

Sheraton San Diego, a Starwood Hotel

It’s been just two months since Starwood Hotels and Resorts chose to partner with Clean the World on the corporate level, and already some properties are experiencing terrific results.

More than 55 Starwood properties have joined Clean the World since that Earth Day announcement. The newcomers bring to 86 the total number of Starwood properties within the fold at Clean the World.

Still, with the potential of adding up to 500 branded properties to the Clean the World family, opportunities to welcome more Starwood properties improve with each new success story that is shared. So let’s keep sharing them…

Several Starwood properties stand out among the many in terms of soap and bottled amenities contributions to Clean the World. The top five performers for May 2011 are: Westin Diplomat (Hollywood, Fla.); Sheraton San Diego (California); Sheraton Sand Key (Clearwater, Fla.); Sheraton Indianapolis (Indiana); and Westin Denver Downtown (Colorado).

Several Starwood properties have stood out among the many in terms of soap and bottled amenities contributions to Clean the World. The top five performers for May 2011 are: Westin Diplomat (Hollywood, Fla.); Sheraton San Diego (California); Sheraton Sand Key (Clearwater, Fla.); Sheraton Indianapolis (Indiana); and Westin Denver Downtown (Colorado).

Westin Diplomat (Hollywood, Fla.):
Soaps collected: 8,055 lbs.
Bottled amenities collected: 6,110 lbs.

Sheraton San Diego (California):
Soaps collected: 6,979 lbs.
Bottled amenities collected: 7,270 lbs.

Sheraton Sand Key (Clearwater, Fla.):
Soaps collected: 3,337 lbs.
Bottled amenities collected: 3,295 lbs.

Sheraton Indianapolis (Indiana):
Soaps collected: 3,050 lbs.
Bottled amenities collected: 2,409 lbs.

Westin Denver Downtown (Colorado):
Soaps collected: 2,420 lbs.
Bottled amenities collected: 2,714 lbs.

Sonia, housekeeper at The Westin Copley Place in Boston

Not only are the properties performing well with collections of soaps and bottled amenities, but these hotels have also displayed much excitement for participating in the Clean the World program.

“It’s a wonderful program,” says Sylvia Butler, director of housekeeping at Sheraton San Diego. “We want to be ‘green’ in everything we do, but this just takes it up a notch.”

Butler says her housekeeping staff has shown a renewed sense of purpose since participation began with Clean the World.

“They take a lot of pride in the program,” she says. “When we made the announcement, the housekeepers asked, ‘Where does the soap go?’ and ‘Where is it delivered?’ They are really curious about the program and who will benefit most from their efforts.”

Butler is especially appreciative of what Clean the World is doing to reduce the amount of hotel waste, which she views as essential to promoting a cleaner world for the next generation.

“By recycling these soaps and bottles each day, we’re affecting generations to come,” Butler says. ”It’s a good footprint we’re leaving behind for our kids. Anything that we can do to keep trash out of landfills, we will do. By recycling guest room amenities, we’re getting hygiene items out of the hotel bathrooms and into the hands of people who can really use it.”

The Westin Copley Place in Boston, a recently implemented Starwood property, started its Clean the World participation with a bang.

Laura Schell, housekeeping manager at The Westin Copley Place, reports that room attendants collected 29 lbs. of soap and 25 lbs. of soap on the first day of implementation alone.

“If this rate continues” she says, “by the end of the year we will have recycled 5,220 lbs. of bottled amenities and 4,500 pounds of soap!”

The Westin Copley Place is the first Starwood Hotel in the United States and the first hotel in Boston to join Green Hotels Global, an environmental program that requires hotels to disclose their carbon footprint, energy consumption, water usage and waste generation associated with room-night usage and event bookings.

Thanks for joining the global hygiene revolution, Starwood Hotels and Resorts. We look forward to adding new Starwood brands going forward. Thanks for helping Clean the World!

As we recognize Earth Day with celebrations around the globe, let’s pause to realize something quite powerful. By participating in the Clean the World hospitality program, our nearly 900 hotels and bed-and-breakfast partners throughout North America have helped divert in excess of 550 tons of hotel waste from polluting local landfills.

Think about that for a moment. Without your participation in Clean the World, more than 1.1 million pounds of soap and bottled amenities would be trashed. That’s a lot of garbage and, in the truest sense of the term, a great waste of valuable resources.

By teaming with Clean the World, you’ve helped turn trash into treasure, providing soaps, shampoos, conditioners, lotions and gels for people in need. And you’ve improved sanitation conditions for communities everywhere.

Enjoy Earth Day. You have reason to celebrate because you’re helping Clean the World.

As Japanese residents continue to deal with the aftermath of multiple earthquakes, a tsunami and damage to a nuclear reactor, Clean the World has partnered on an effort to provide relief.

Clean the World is collaborating with Ohio-based Matthew 25: Ministries to provide soaps, shampoos, lotions, conditioners, body wash and bottled water to help comfort the suffering in Japan as well as other disaster relief or humanitarian aid locations.

Matthew 25: Ministries has already shipped 44,000 pounds of desperately needed disaster relief to the devastated area and is preparing additional disaster relief supplies for Japan, including food from Matthew 25’s Food Processing Center, blankets, cleaning supplies and first aid supplies, along with personal care products and hygiene kits.

A truck filled with relief supplies left Clean the World headquarters in Orlando on April 18 on its way to Matthew 25: Ministries headquarters in Blue Ash, Ohio, a Cincinnati suburb. The supplies will be received by Matthew 25: Ministries and prepared for shipment to the victims of Japan’s multiple disasters and other disasters worldwide.

These are the specific items en route to Japan:

Medical Supplies – 2 pallets

Water – 5 pallets/ 6,400 bottles

Soap – 2 pallets/ 7,000 bars

Shampoo – 4 pallets/ 32,400 bottles

Lotion – 1 pallet/ 8,100 bottles

Conditioner – 3 pallets/ 27,000 bottles

Body Wash – 1 pallet/ 6,550 bottles

Many of the donated items may be packaged in hygiene kits distributed by Matthew 25: Ministries. Based on requests from partners on the ground in the disaster area, kits will be packaged onto pallets and included along with other relief items, and flown or sent via cargo ship to the hardest-hit areas of Japan.

Thanks to all involved for helping with this relief effort. Your financial contributions are also welcome to help address the ongoing suffering in Japan. Please give generously and keep the Japanese people in your thoughts and prayers.

Ohio-based Matthew 25: Ministries will help Clean the World deliver soaps, bottled amenities and water to Japan

Clean the World (http://localhost:8888/cleantheworld/) and Matthew 25: Ministries (http://www.m25m.org/) are collaborating on an ambitious effort to get hygiene supplies into the earthquake and tsunami-stricken regions of Japan.

And the relief cannot come soon enough for the Japanese people in this region. Click here to help.

Another earthquake rocked Northeastern sections of Japan today. The 7.4-magnitude quake, one of many aftershocks that have followed the major quake on March 11, triggered a new tsunami warning for Japan, and brought the plight of the Japanese people back into world focus.

Orlando-based Clean the World, which recycles hotel soaps and bottled amenities for people in need, has partnered to work with Ohio-based Matthew 25: Ministries, a non-denominational, humanitarian aid organization, to transport soap, shampoos, conditioners, lotions, bottled water and other hygiene supplies to alleviate suffering for the victims of Japan’s multiple disasters and other disasters worldwide.

Matthew 25: Ministries is preparing many kinds of disaster relief for Japan, including food from its own Food Processing Center, blankets, cleaning supplies and first-aid supplies, as well as personal care or hygiene kits.

“We’ve wanted to get supplies into Japan ever since the first news broke of the March 11 earthquake, but the Japanese government requested only financial help,” says Shawn Seipler, executive director of Clean the World. “We have such tremendous hygiene resources available here, courtesy of our nearly 900 hotel partners in North America. Now that we have this opportunity to get the goods into Japan, we have to seize upon it to help people who are hurting.”

Clean the World reached out to Matthew 25: Ministries after learning that the organization had mobilized to prepare hygiene kits in Ohio for distribution in Japan.

“We knew that our soaps would be an ideal fit for those hygiene kits, and so are the bottled amenities,” Seipler says. “Children and families can receive soaps, shampoos, conditioners, lotions and gels to help provide comfort when dealing with unsanitary conditions as a result of the earthquakes and tsunami. Sometimes getting clean is the first step toward getting healthy and getting stronger in the face of tragedy. We just want to help however possible.”

Clean the World intends to fill a truck full of donated and recycled hygiene supplies and drive that truck to Matthew 25: Ministries headquarters in suburban Cincinnati, Ohio. The products may be packaged in hygiene kits and will be placed in containers, along with other relief items, including pallets of spring water, and will be flown or sent via cargo ship to the hardest-hit areas of Japan.

The relief effort is reminiscent of what Clean the World did for Haiti following the 2010 earthquake in that Caribbean nation. The organization will rely on generous and continuing donations from its database of supporters to help finance and fortify this relief effort, and ensure that the maximum amount of hygiene products will reach their final destination in Japan.

“We’ve been through this drill before, so we can draw upon that experience,” Seipler says. “We’re grateful to find a partner like Matthew 25: Ministries to help with this effort.”

Watching tragic events unfold around the globe, particularly as the result of natural disaster, helps sharpen the focus of Clean the World’s mission to save lives by promoting better hygiene.

“In times of crisis we are all called upon to do a little more for the common good,” Seipler says. “I’m asking all of our supporters to begin soap donations in their communities and increase financial contributions to help advance our hygiene revolution. We can’t do it without your help, but we’ll do all we can to help people improve their living conditions and stop the spread of preventable diseases with soap. That was our mission yesterday; it remains our mission today, and will be our mission tomorrow – in Japan, Haiti, the United States and all around the world.”

Financial donations to Clean the World are greatly appreciated and may be made online at this link: http://localhost:8888/cleantheworld/donate-money.asp

Soap donations are also encouraged and should be sent to the following address:

Clean the World
400A Pittman St.
Orlando, FL 32801

Please pray for the people of Japan and all who suffer from natural disasters and lack of access to hygiene supplies. Thanks for helping Clean the World.

A friend of the Clean the World family, Amy Sindler recently took some of our recycled soaps to Africa to distribute to children in Lesotho, the southern most landlocked country in the world. Amy is an Orlando resident and friend of Steve Cooper, Clean the World Operations Director. Amy first went to Lesotho as a member of the Peace Corps. Lesotho is one of the poorest countries in the world. According to Human Development Indices about 40% of its population live below the international poverty line of $1.25 per day.

Amy was kind enough to send us a post card and picture of her efforts.

“The children and adults here in the village of Nyakosoba, Lesotho loved getting the soap! I put it on a table and let everyone choose what type of soap they wanted. Of course the children liked the ducks, hearts and stars! By the way, they are wearing shirts donated by Track Shack. The children were given an apple then the t-shirt and we did a fun run through the village. When we returned we sang the Lesotho national anthem. They got another apple and then selected soap.
Thank you.
Amy”

We are grateful for your good works Amy. We are proud to have you as part of the Clean the World family!

Humbled … and hopeful.

Those are the two words that came to mind as I listened to William Lowry describe his experience delivering our first load of recycled soap to Haiti. William is the founder and executive director of Central Care Mission in Orlando, the organization with which we formed a deep partnership to handle our sterilization and packaging operation.

William rode along in the Missionary Flights International DC-3 that departed Fort Pierce, Fla., on Tuesday, July 7 to deliver 2,000 pounds of soap to Cap Haitien, Haiti – the poorest city in the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Once there he met up with Pastor Julio Brutus of the First Haitian Church in Winter Haven, Fla. Pastor Brutus is a native of Haiti and he is our man on the ground in Haiti.

Actually, Pastor Brutus is THE man. This guy knows all the right people … how to get around … how to work the system … and he served the very important role of interpreter.

With Pastor Brutus, William was able to visit and bring soap to two orphanages, and to an estimated crowd of more than 10,000 at a four-hour, mid-week worship service at the Tabernacle of Praise church.

In a country that has suffered a near total collapse of government, the poverty and hopelessness is inconceivable to most of us in the United States. When people barely have any food to eat, many live in homes without proper roofs or walls, and there is an absence of garbage disposal or a proper sewage system – things like personal hygiene tend to fall by the wayside.

People are living in filth, and they don’t have soap. That is a recipe for disaster.

William said that in the three days he was in Cap Haitien, he never saw soap in a public restroom. He didn’t see soap on the shelves of the one small store he found. The desperate need for soap was illustrated by the thousands of people who mobbed the distribution team at the church service. “It was what you imagine it would be like if you delivered a truck full of food to an area where no one had eaten in a month,” said William. “You hope to have some sort of order and an organized distribution, but it just doesn’t work because everyone wants to make sure they get theirs.”

After his visit, William is convinced there is no question about the importance of our mission to distribute recycled hotel soap in places where it is needed most.

“If we can get soap to them, not just once, but over and again, we will have a major impact on their lives,” said William. “Soap can save lives. It’s not just a concept, it is today a reality. It is fact.”

See the entire photo gallery from last week’s Haiti trip.

Some soap has already been distributed at an orphanage, but the majority will be handed out tonight at the large worship service. Here are a few pictures from yesterday’s flight and our arrival in Cap Haitien: http://picasaweb.google.com/johnterry64/CTWHaitiJuly792009?feat=directlink