PLATINUM2023

Boundless Mercy

seeking freedom for those in the sex trade

aka The Ark Bakery & Café   |   Kingwood, TX   |  https://thearkbakerycafe.org/

Mission

Boundless Mercy's tag line is "seeking freedom for those in the sex trade." We seek freedom for those in the sex trade through prayer, awareness sessions, and regular intervention (outreach) to employees in the sex industry. The Ark Bakery & Café, an arm of Boundless Mercy, is combatting trafficking in tangible ways and making every crumb count by selling bakery items to the public to raise awareness of human trafficking in northeast Houston.

Notes from the nonprofit

Since the beginning of our anti-trafficking initiatives in 2011, we have functioned as a small team of volunteers. No one receives any compensation whatsoever. At some point in the future, we plan to generate enough proceeds from sales to be able to hire staff for the bakery arm (the public face of Boundless Mercy, aka The Ark Bakery & Café), as we are well aware that we must first establish a healthy, functioning business prior to welcoming people exiting the sex industry into the business environment. They will receive corporately endowed culinary internships at a living wage, but we must first have a context into which we can invite them. Therefore, our lead staff and board members operate on an entirely volunteer basis. What surprises us is how much we have been able to accomplish with a small team in a few short years (11+ years of outreach, 3+ years of actively selling product, now transitioning into outreach plus a more public sales operation).

Ruling year info

2018

Founder & President

Christine Marie Ege

Main address

2734 Whispering Fern Ct.

Kingwood, TX 77345 USA

Show more contact info

EIN

83-0803649

NTEE code info

Public, Society Benefit - Multipurpose and Other N.E.C. (W99)

Civil Rights, Advocacy for Specific Groups (R20)

Christian (X20)

IRS filing requirement

This organization is required to file an IRS Form 990-N.

Communication

Blog

Programs and results

What we aim to solve

SOURCE: Self-reported by organization

Houston is a major hub for sex trafficking in the United States.

Our programs

SOURCE: Self-reported by organization

What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?

Awareness Sessions

We conduct information sessions to raise awareness of the causes of sex trafficking and the scope of the problem, particularly in the Houston metro area.

Population(s) Served
Adults
Adolescents

Every two weeks, our team visits 12-20 locations in the sex industry (strip clubs, brothels, sex shops) with gifts of artisan cookies and notes of encouragement. We have permission from managers on-site to visit the businesses and have built relationships of trust with them.

Population(s) Served
Adults
Adolescents

As of November 2019, Boundless Mercy dba The Ark Bakery & Café has been engaging in direct sales (under the Texas Cottage Industry Law) and receiving online orders from the public for the cookies we have been distributing free (and will continue to distribute free) to employees of the sex industry. Due to the expansion of product sales from cookies to additional types of bakery items and the resultant increase in sales, Boundless Mercy is now leasing commercial kitchen space to expand production of items and is seeking a sales outlet location to sell frozen product to the public (for consumption off-premises). This phase of the organization's development is intended to increase awareness with the public of human trafficking and to generate interest from corporate grant and endowment programs to enable the bakery to ultimately secure a space of its own (for combined production and sales), in addition to establishing culinary internships for those wishing to exit the sex industry.

Population(s) Served
Adolescents
Young adults
Older adults
Sex workers

Where we work

Our results

SOURCE: Self-reported by organization

How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.

Number of individuals attending briefings and presentations

This metric is no longer tracked.
Totals By Year
Related Program

Awareness Sessions

Type of Metric

Output - describing our activities and reach

Direction of Success

Holding steady

Context Notes

speaking at the University of Texas Cizik Nursing School (session on marginalized populations)

Average number of service recipients per month

This metric is no longer tracked.
Totals By Year
Related Program

Outreach

Type of Metric

Output - describing our activities and reach

Direction of Success

Holding steady

Context Notes

Individuals working in the sex industry (managers of strip clubs, all strip club employees, occasional customers, brothel workers, sex shop employees)

Goals & Strategy

SOURCE: Self-reported by organization

Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.

Charting impact

Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.

We desire to give employees in the sex industry in Houston hope for other lifestyle and career options through building relationships of trust. We regularly distribute the local anti-trafficking hotline number available to sex industry workers in Houston; we also give away artisan cookies and notes of encouragement. Our next step is to procure space for an office and The Ark Bakery & Café (a non-profit dba of Boundless Mercy), which serves to raise public awareness of the sex trafficking problem in northeast Houston and fund anti-trafficking initiatives. The goal will ultimately be to solicit corporate endownments for culinary internships to hire women and men exiting the sex industry and train them in culinary arts and small business management.

In addition, we provide awareness and training sessions to various groups upon request. These sessions educate participants in the scope and severity of the sex trafficking problem in our city and help direct them toward available courses of action to combat the problem.

Through prayer, awareness sessions, and regular outreach activities, we strive to re-direct those in the sex industry to other lifestyle and career options. We provide encouragement, assurance, and a sense of personal worth to those we visit regularly in our target locations. We also ensure they are equipped with the local hotline number, which provides services for those wishing to exit the industry. We work equally with club managers, customers (when they initiate conversation with us), dancers, prostitutes, traffickers (when they speak with us), as well as security guards, club bartenders, and valet parking attendants. Our desire is to build relationships with them and encourage them to have confidence in their ability to learn viable skills outside the sex industry.

Over the past 11+ years, we have sustained a regular, consistent outreach schedule to strip clubs, brothels, and sex shops in northeast Houston. Managers have given us permission to visit their employees, and they consider us a part of their regular routine; they have said repeatedly that they look forward to our visits. We distribute artisan cookies and personal notes of encouragement to each person; our average number of people visited every two weeks is 150 (around 3500 encounters annually). This interface requires 4000 notes written and 8000+ cookies baked (each person receives two cookies). The percentage of repeat encounters is approximately 30%, as we visit the same locations regularly. The numbers of women versus men: 2:1 (roughly two thirds of our encounters are females; one third are males). Our capacity to maintain a high-intensity level of outreach has been proven and maintained.

Similarly, we conduct awareness and training sessions when requested by any group to do so. We cover topics that are needed by the requesting group: scope and severity of the sex trafficking problem, how to recognize a potential sex trafficking victim, how to decide what type of outreach or intervention might be useful in a given community, how to identify possible locations to be visited, ideas for strategies to combat human trafficking in a given community, and how to speak with potential victims of human trafficking.

Please see above. Outreaches can continue to expand as more people are trained to visit sex industry workers. The proposed bakery (which went "live" online in August of 2020) serves to raise public awareness, as it openly advertises that all funds received above cost are used to fund anti-sex trafficking initiatives. The bakery is currently in the black, as sales (not including any donations) are covering the cost of goods sold to the public as well as the cost of goods given away free to sex industry workers. The long-term plan is to hire those who desire to exit the sex trade and train them in culinary arts and small business management.

We currently are operating online and by word of mouth under the Texas Cottage Industry Law. In 2021, we expanded our product line from cookies to a number of other baked goods. The customer base is growing. Our next step is moving our baking efforts to leased local commercial kitchen space prior to soliciting corporate donors for our own commercial space and for endowed, salaried positions with benefits for those we wish to hire out of the sex industry.

How we listen

SOURCE: Self-reported by organization

Seeking feedback from people served makes programs more responsive and effective. Here’s how this organization is listening.

done We demonstrated a willingness to learn more by reviewing resources about feedback practice.
done We shared information about our current feedback practices.
  • How is your organization using feedback from the people you serve?

    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 strengthen relationships with the people we serve, To understand people's needs and how we can help them achieve their goals

  • 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 take steps to ensure people feel comfortable being honest with us, We look for patterns in feedback based on demographics (e.g., race, age, gender, etc.), 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

  • What challenges does the organization face when collecting feedback?

    We don't have any major challenges to collecting feedback

Financials

Boundless Mercy
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Operations

The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.

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Connect with nonprofit leaders

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lock

Connect with nonprofit leaders

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  • Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
  • Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
  • Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations

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Boundless Mercy

Board of directors
as of 02/07/2023
SOURCE: Self-reported by organization
Board chair

Christine Ege

Sara Barnes

Agent Architecture

Brian Beneda

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Stephen Ege

Retired, Chevron Phillips Chemical Co.

Mitchell Jerome

Senior Source, LLC

Board leadership practices

SOURCE: Self-reported by organization

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? Not applicable
  • CEO oversight
    Has the board conducted a formal, written assessment of the chief executive within the past year ? Not applicable
  • 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? Not applicable
  • 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? Not applicable

Organizational demographics

SOURCE: Self-reported; last updated 1/13/2023

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
White/Caucasian/European
Gender identity
Female
Sexual orientation
Decline to state
Disability status
Decline to state

Race & ethnicity

No data

Gender identity

 

Sexual orientation

No data

Disability

No data

Equity strategies

Last updated: 01/21/2022

GuideStar 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

Policies and processes
  • We help senior leadership understand how to be inclusive leaders with learning approaches that emphasize reflection, iteration, and adaptability.
  • We engage everyone, from the board to staff levels of the organization, in race equity work and ensure that individuals understand their roles in creating culture such that one’s race identity has no influence on how they fare within the organization.