Three hundred million children across the globe do not own a pair of shoes. And in America, 1.5 billion pairs of shoes sit idle in closets.
So in Alabama, Baptists are working with friends across the nation to use that surplus to meet the overwhelming need through relief effort Soles4Souls.
Soles4Souls began as short-term aid to those in Indonesia affected by the tsunami in 2004.
While watching the news of the disaster on television, Wayne Elsey, president of footwear company Kodiak USA, noticed a pair of shoes floating in the water and recognized an unmet need. It wasn’t long before he linked up with Baptist minister Paul Wilson, Wilson’s brother Nelson and Tripp Skipper, pastor of Wadley Baptist Church in Randolph Baptist Association, for a large-scale church shoe drive that garnered 100,000 pairs of shoes for tsunami victims.
Two years, 2 million pairs of shoes and 12 countries later, Soles4Souls has turned into a long-term, worldwide effort, partnering with churches, schools, civic groups, footwear companies and other relief organizations to provide shoes to those in need.
After the tsunami, the group knew that it could rally footwear from sources all over the world. So when Hurricane Katrina ravaged the Gulf Coast in 2005, Soles4Souls was able to quickly spring into action.
It created a Web site specifically for the purpose of getting footwear to displaced people in the Gulf region. The site was a great success — almost a million pairs of shoes were collected.
"We really looked at the Indonesia effort as a one-time thing," said Paul Wilson, now president and general manager of Soles4Souls. "But … we decided to continue because we knew the need around the world was tremendous."
So the group decided to turn the disaster-to-disaster rallying into a true ongoing effort, officially forming Soles4Souls in March 2006.
And the group’s success is thanks to churches and other organizations that host shoe drives, collecting everything from high heels to flip-flops, Skipper said.
Though Soles4Souls’ official headquarters is in Nashville, the organization’s primary distribution center is in Wadley, where new and used footwear is processed, inspected, sorted and packaged. It also has a warehouse in Las Vegas that serves as a receiving site for donors in the western half of North America.
Shoes deemed not good enough are sold to brokers by the pound, and the proceeds are used to buy new shoes or ship shoes around the world.
In addition to collecting shoes, Soles4Souls is now manufacturing its own line. Churches, groups and individuals can purchase the shoes — a basic flip-flop or an athletic shoe — to distribute themselves or to be shipped to those in need.
Soles4Souls has made strictly shoe distribution trips itself, and its latest large-scale project was delivering shoes to victims of recent tornados in Florida.
Soles4Souls also frequently works with partners from small churches to large organizations such as World Vision and Feed the Children.
"Everybody we partner with is doing great work around the world. Even if they’re doing water purification, medical relief or evangelism, footwear is still a need," Wilson said.
Recently Soles4Souls began working with international Major League Baseball players including the Los Angeles Angels’ Orlando Cabrera of Colombia and former players Manny Mota and Raul Mondesi of the Dominican Republic. It has partnered with these three stars to distribute about 45,000 pairs of shoes to communities in their respective home countries.
"For me, partnering with Soles4Souls is one more way that we can demonstrate the love of Christ to people in need," Skipper said. "Having a pair of shoes is so important. It allows you to be able to work, play, live and enjoy life."
For more information, call 866-521-SHOE (7463) or visit www.soles4souls.org.
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