Sweet Sleep, Inc.

Each CO•OP is empowered to carry out different income generating activities to earn a living and are offered training opportunities, mentorship and financial seed funding, counsel on scalable market-based business options, mentorship, continuous monitoring support for 12 months after project origination, and demand-driven refresher trainings. Once training has begun, typically within the first two months of the project, the CO•OP is given a financial grant from Sweet Sleep to start an approved, market-based group business of their choosing, which will provide long-term sustainability for the group.

Additionally, a savings group (VSLA) will be established within each CO•OP, from which members will learn to save together, borrow money from a common pool for their own investments, and repay the common pool with interest. The savings group provides banking opportunities, is a resource for emergency needs such as medical care, and is predominantly used for members to start small-scale individual businesses which create immediate sustainability for each family.

All training, monitoring, and reporting is carried out by our indigenous Ugandan staff women and in cooperation with local Ugandan partner NGO organizations.

All told, one CO•OP creates an average of 13 to 15 businesses which support about 60 women, children, and dependent elderly. Since 2016, Sweet Sleep has created 120+ CO•OPs in Uganda, creating nearly 1300 group and individual businesses, benefitting more than 7500 beneficiaries. Because of the way we have scaled project initiation and follow up, Sweet Sleep CO•OPs have a 100% success rate to date.

Impact
• CO•OP members move from making less than $1 per day to between $5 and $10 per day within the first 12 months
• CO•OP members generally prioritize paying school fees for their dependent children, and most are able to return children to school within the first three to six months
• CO•OP members are able to pay for medical care, provide two meals per day, and purchase basic necessities such as mosquito nets, beds, and household items within the first 3 months

Sweet Sleep's vision is to provide TRUE REST as God declares in Matthew 11:28. Our one-year vision is to grow in depth rather than width, reaching more than 5000 women and children annually while utilizing a multiplying discipleship program to reach 10,000 men, women, and children with the Word of God in 2023.

Our three-year vision is to continue to grow in depth, but to additionally have grown wider -- replicating the CO•OP program into neighboring countries such as Rwanda and Tanzania.

Women are empowered to sustainably provide for the children in their care through the following strategies:
•Business training and start up capital, provided by indigenous Ugandan staff members
•Specialized training and support is provided by local experts in the field of the group's market-based business model
•Microfinance savings and interest-bearing loan training is provided and overseen by Ugandan staff before seed funding is given to the group. Annual cycle has shown up to 300% growth
•Multiplying three-tiered discipleship program is accomplished through trauma healing storying / orality teaching and train the trainer events where community based volunteers are empowered to penetrate the community
•Monitoring and evaluation is carried out by on-the-ground staff using defined metrics
•Expenses are reconciled monthly and are audited in Uganda and in the United States by third party accounting firms

Program implementation is carried out by a team of Ugandan staff members
•Program outcomes are physically monitored and evaluated by the US-based leadership team on a quarterly basis
•In order to scale the program while maintaining the program quality, four Ugandan staff women have been added to the indigenous team
•We maintain consistency in discipleship teaching by utilizing an orality trauma healing storying method. We achieve three-tiered discipleship through train the trainer events in which community based volunteers who bare trained in the orality method are able to further penetrate unreached communities

Funding will be secured to support program services by focusing on the following strategies:
•Recruit one engagement event / microevent each month
•Maintain donor communications through regular social media presence, monthly email communications, and quarterly print pieces
•Engage the board in committees: development, strategic planning, governance, board development
•Increase monthly donor program through new branding and marketing with an eventual end goal of underwriting general operational expenses
•Contact major donors six times per year
•Develop VBS curriculum that focuses on CO•OPs and reenergize our VBS programs through conference attendance, redesigned trade show materials, and church outreach via calls, visits, and emails

Since 2016 the following metrics have been achieved:
•125 CO•OPs formed
•1380 women trained in group business and microfinance
•5071 vulnerable children have been sustainably nourished, clothed, and educated
•2482 dependent elderly have been provided for by CO•OP members
•7553 individuals served

Financial progress
•1300% return on annual savings group earnings
•CO•OP members go from earning $1 per day to $5 to $10 per day on average

Continuing growth opportunities
CO•OPs that demonstrate a mastery of business and microfinance principles, remain in good standing among the group and within their community, and have demonstrated an intentional discipleship effort will be given the opportunity to create a budget for and save 50% of the cost of a water system, which Sweet Sleep will grant the balance, to be used for collection and sale of clean rainwater or well water.