Mittens For Detroit, Inc.
Warming Hearts, Two Hands at a Time
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
For thousands of children, teens, and adults in and around Detroit, Michigan, a single pair of gloves to protect their hands is a luxury they cannot afford. Maybe they are using socks as makeshift mittens. Imagine being bare-handed as holding your toddler, while waiting for the bus. Think about the children who cannot play in the snow and fully enjoy winter because they don't have mittens to keep their little hands warm and dry. Children miss school, because it is not "their turn" to wear their siblings' shared winter clothes. Picture yourself sheltered in a doorway of a building, with your hands bundled into your coat sleeves, trying to avoid frostbite. These cold hands belong to kids, grandparents, veterans, parents – people who are homeless or in transition. Imagine yourself in that reality, trying to warm your hands after they have been exposed to the cold for some time... because you didn't have warm mittens or gloves to wear. Mittens for Detroit works solely to warm those hands.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Collection and distribution of new mittens and gloves
Mittens for Detroit collect and purchases new mittens and gloves annually. These are distributed through network of Distribution Partners in Detroit, Highland Park, Hamtramck, Dearborn, Pontiac, and other nearby underserved cities. Distribution Partners include schools, shelters, veterans organizations, soup kitchens, medical facilities, and other locations that will distribute the new pairs to their students, families, guests, and clients. New pairs of mittens and gloves are collected in an annual Community Collection, as well as purchased with grants and financial donations. Generally, Community Collection Partners number about 100 and Distribution Partners number about 80 annually. Since its start in 2010, Mittens for Detroit has collected, purchased more than one-quarter million pairs.
Where we work
External reviews
Photos
Videos
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
Mittens for Detroit works as a conduit between people in the community who can and want to give and the people in the community who are in need of warm mittens and gloves. Since 2010, Mittens for Detroit has distributed more than one-quarter million pairs of new mittens and gloves through a growing network of Distribution Partners.
Our focus is on public awareness about the health importance of having warm hands, the importance of this small basic need, and the problems that are caused when this need is not met. We work to deliver these pairs through shelters, schools, veterans' groups, senior centers, health facilities, programs for the unsheltered, and the like by working with these agencies and schools to best determine their needs. Each glove, each mitten is delivered with dignity in mind for the recipient.
Our overall goal is to engage the Metro Detroit community in solving the problem by focusing on how important warmth is to those who are in need. This engagement is done in positive and often fun ways, always with dignity and understanding of those who will have warm hands because of the community's caring about them.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
In order to best engage the community, we work to find ways in which they can help at the level at which they are comfortable. Each September through January, we hold a Community Collection Season, where individuals and groups can host boxes for collection of new, warm, durable pairs of mittens and gloves. We started in 2010 with 12 partners and last season we had 100. More than 345,000 pairs have been collected and distributed since our start in 2010 – that's more than one-quarter million pairs. About 1,000 pairs each year are handmade by MittenMakers in Michigan, across the USA, and we have knitters in Canada and Australia!
Tens of thousands of pairs are donated by the community or purchased by Mittens for Detroit. These are sorted by size, counted, and then boxed by hundreds of volunteers in our largest volunteer opportunity – The Big Sort. Teams of individuals, employee groups, religious and social organizations come to our office to literally lend a hand to us. We average about 300 volunteers, many of which come back year after year. The teams choose their Big Sort date, and they spend several hours in a very fun and meaningful event. Often they will bring carts of boxes to the curb to load into the Distribution Partners' vehicles, where they can meet the recipients.
The Distribution Partners have grown from 12 in 2010 to 85 last season. Our model is to work with the partner to assess how many pairs they need, and then we make sure that we are meeting their requests. We rarely see the recipients as distribution is best accomplished by the partners.
Our social media and e-newsletter outreach rounds out the community connections and engagement.
Our fundraising occurs throughout the year, with individual donations, corporate support, and grants. We are known to be a very good nonprofit to invest in because our goals are so tangible and attainable. The donors feel a connection to their piece in solving this puzzle of meeting the need for warm hands each winter.
Throughout all of this, we present a positive, honest, upbeat, and clear picture of how this small part of challenges of living in poverty and staying healthy can be helped to be fixed by an engaged and positive community. Mittens for Detroit goal is to be the connection between all of the partners, to warm the hearts and hands of those in need each winter.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
Mittens for Detroit is a small but mighty nonprofit charity. With a very small budget and only one staff person, we are able to create change and work toward our goal of getting tens of thousands of pairs of mittens and gloves on hands each year. How? By cultivating strong relationships with the community at large, with our business and corporate partners, with hundreds of volunteers, and with the many Distribution Partners that we have worked with since 2010.
We have grown tremendously since that first collection, and we are working currently to build our capacity to continue to meet the needs of all of our partners. Currently we have a 1-staff office, and we are working on adding an additional staff member by January 2024.
Our ability to raise funds during the pandemic was challenged. Our ability to meet our mittens goals was hit hard. However, because we are small and have an excellent Board of Directors, we were able to change our model and regroup around fundraising and grantwriting. We switched our annual fundraising event to an online silent auction (raising nearly $25,000 in two events!). We are able to be flexible and nimble with the support of our community, because of the trust we have cultivated with them. Although we are back on track with our community collection, we continue to find innovative ways to raise the funds we need each year.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
When Mittens for Detroit was started, it was during the recession back in 2010 as a volunteer community initiative. The community response was so strong that by 2013, we changed our model and added a part-time Executive Director to help us grow into a 501(c)(3). Because of the incredible support of the community and our commitment to delivering services with dignity, honesty, and transparency, we achieved the status in 2016.
Since that time, we have grown every year, increasing the number of community partners. This comes from our ability to build trust and to be transparent. Over the years we have developed ways to streamline the process of collecting, purchasing, and distributing pairs. We have stayed flexible and explored new ways of doing things to better meet our needs. The faster we can get pairs collected and purchased, the faster we can get them on hands. By streamlining processes, using the "modern" yet cost-effective fundraising and tracking platforms, we have seen our work being much more efficient and effective. Our wonderful Big Sort volunteers help move these thousands of pairs each year through our offices and on their way to the people who will wear them.
The response we get from the community is that while they never thought about how important mittens and gloves were, that they never thought about how essential they are to keeping hands and people healthy (especially with children and the elderly), they now find it difficult to believe that not everyone realizes how much they can help by donating quality pairs of mittens and gloves. We are so proud of this response from our community, and we know that this kind of awareness, the nonjudgmental acceptance and understanding of those less fortunate than they are can truly help change things for the better.... one pair of mittens at a time. Mittens matter!
How we listen
Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.
-
How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?
To identify and remedy poor client service experiences, To identify bright spots and enhance positive service experiences, To make fundamental changes to our programs and/or operations, To inform the development of new programs/projects, To identify where we are less inclusive or equitable across demographic groups, To strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals, We are developing a new feedback collection system this year.
-
Which of the following feedback practices does your organization routinely carry out?
We collect feedback from the people we serve at least annually, We take steps to get feedback from marginalized or under-represented people, We aim to collect feedback from as many people we serve as possible, We take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on people’s interactions with us (e.g., site, frequency of service, etc.), We engage the people who provide feedback in looking for ways we can improve in response, We act on the feedback we receive, We share the feedback we received with the people we serve, We tell the people who gave us feedback how we acted on their feedback, We ask the people who gave us feedback how well they think we responded, We are beginning a much more thorough feedback process this year.
-
What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?
It is difficult to get the people we serve to respond to requests for feedback, We don’t have the right technology to collect and aggregate feedback efficiently, It is difficult to find the ongoing funding to support feedback collection, Staff find it hard to prioritize feedback collection and review due to lack of time, We have not had a system for collecting feedback prior to this year.
Financials
Unlock nonprofit financial insights that will help you make more informed decisions. Try our monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights?
Learn more
about GuideStar Pro.
Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
Mittens For Detroit, Inc.
Board of directorsas of 09/07/2023
David Agius
Mittens for Detroit, Inc.
Term: 2016 -
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
-
Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? No -
CEO oversight
Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? No -
Ethics and transparency
Have the board and senior staff reviewed the conflict-of-interest policy and completed and signed disclosure statements in the past year? Yes -
Board composition
Does the board ensure an inclusive board member recruitment process that results in diversity of thought and leadership? Yes -
Board performance
Has the board conducted a formal, written self-assessment of its performance within the past three years? No
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
Gender identity
Transgender Identity
Sexual orientation
No data
Disability
No data
Equity strategies
Last updated: 06/07/2023GuideStar partnered with Equity in the Center - an organization that works to shift mindsets, practices, and systems to increase racial equity - to create this section. Learn more
- We seek individuals from various race backgrounds for board and executive director/CEO positions within our organization.
- We have community representation at the board level, either on the board itself or through a community advisory board.