While the most common ideas and actions of philanthropy involve open your wallet and writing a hefty check, one nonprofit is proving that all you need is a good idea…and volunteers. When Wei Min “Al” Sheen died in 2012, his son Alex had an epiphany while writing his eulogy. Even though his father had never accomplished anything that most people would see as being newsworthy, he left a legacy in his family that Alex felt the need to pass on to others; that of the importance of keepings one’s word.

To spread his father’s message to others, Alex founded the nonprofit “Because I Said I Would” with the idea that he would help other realize both the importance of keeping your promises as well as the good feelings that come from it. His company distributes “promise cards”. Simple blank white business cards with the phrase “because I said I would.” in the bottom corner. The idea is to write a promise on the card and then give to the person who you’ve promised something to. When you have followed through with your promise, you get the card back as a reminder of what you did.

While the company had some minor success, a series of high-profile cases and interviews with various people have raised the profile of this small company to new heights. Heights so high that they are now having trouble fulfilling all the orders for the cards people are asking for. So many have inundated his office with requests, that the staff of four is having trouble distributing the 70,000 cards that are asked for every week. And that’s ignoring the fact that there are still 11,000 that have been requested but not yet shipped. With an upcoming appearance on the Rachel Ray show, one can easily assume the demand is going to increase even more.

If you want to get involved with a small nonprofit with an interesting idea or are located in/around Lakewood Ohio, you should look them up and check them out. They can use all the help they can get.

For more information as well as where and how to help, read this:

http://www.cleveland.com/lakewood/index.ssf/2014/03/lakewood_man_seeks_volunteers.html