User:Vipul/Living Goods

Living Goods is a non-profit organization headquartered in the United States and currently operating in Uganda. Its goal is to build a sustainable distribution platform for products designed to fight poverty and disease in the developing world. Specifically, Living Goods operates networks of independent entrepreneurs who make a living by selling cheap products to poor people that can help improve their health, wealth, and productivity. The deal is thus beneficial both for the entrepreneurs selling the products and their customers. One of the selling techniques used by Living Goods entrepreneurs is door-to-door selling, and Living Goods has been likened to Avon Products in terms of its marketing style. The project aims to be fully self-funded at scale.

Living Goods was founded by Chuck Slaughter in 2007.

Funding
Living Goods seeks funding from both individual donors and foundations.

Foundation funding
Living Goods has received funding from the Children's Investment Fund Foundation, Omidyar Network, the Mulago Foundation, Jasmine Social Investments, Peery Foundation, and many other foundations.

GiveWell review
Charity evaluator GiveWell singled out Living Goods for special recognition in 2009 because Living Goods was cooperating with the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab to perform a rigorous evaluation of its program.

In 2011, Tobias Pfutze, an Assistant Professor of Economics, participated in GiveWell's "Find the Best Charity" experiment whereby he would spend about ten hours researching the best charity (or charities) using GiveWell and then allocate $2500 (funded by GiveWell) to the charity or charities. Pfutze allocated the entire $2500 to Living Goods and explained the rationale for his decision to GiveWell in an interview. GiveWell followed up with a blog post discussing some of the issues raised in the discussion.

Media coverage
Living Goods has been covered in the Huffington Post (article written by the Living Goods CEO), Good magazine, National Public Radio, and other news and opinion sources.