Hippy Feet is a Mpls sock and apparel company and their mission is to provide employment to young people that are experiencing homelessness. Homeless youth are paid to work on the packaging, screen printing, and embroidery operations. Hippy Feet helps get homeless youth back on the pathway that leads them towards self efficiency. They started as a buy one give one company because socks were the most requested item at homeless shelters at that time. Homeless are walking a lot which causes their socks to wear out quickly. They realized that was not helping the root problem and wanted to play a pivotal role in preventing homelessness. One way to have the largest impact was to help homeless youth get back on their feet and develop job skills for the future, breaking the cycle of homelessness.
How does your business model work?
Hippy Feet brings the socks to youth homeless shelters or drop in centers. They aim to provide barrier free employment, no transportation needed because the youth are already at the center for other services. Hippy Feet works with Youth Link, The Link, and Elpis Enterprises. The youth help with screen printing, embroidery, and packaging right at these locations. The youth are able to earn “street cash” that may help them get food or supplies they need.
What made you start this business?
Michael was first inspired to work on Hippy Feet when he was a senior in college. During his senior year he had a traumatic brain injury after falling off a longboard. That left him in recovery for 3 months. He was not able to work or drive and was depending on his family and friends. Michael says he felt so lucky to have a support network and realized if he didn’t have his network he could have ended up homeless. This lead to him wanting to start a business to help people who need support, and employment, because he knows homelessness can happen to anyone.
How do you get connected to the youth and how many youth do you work with a a given time?
It varies for each nonprofit, but they try to work with the most youth they can. Average is about 5-8 people per day. Hippy Feet gets connect with youth through pop up employment at shelters or drop in centers. They like to focus on places with transitional housing on site or a place where youth are showing up for education, food, or bus tokens already. They can then offer them employment for the day.
How old are the youth?
Ages 16-24 because homelessness is a cycle and they want to end that cycle before it happens. At age 25 you have aged out of youth homelessness. The general homelessness community has a harder time getting services and attention.
Are many of the youth you employ able to break out?
It depends on the person, but Hippy Feet has had a lot of success stories. They want to be the first step in employment, not a long term employer. These jobs help the youth earn street income in a positive, legal way.
How many hours per week and how long are youth employed by Hippy Feet?
It depends on the orders of socks they need to package. Usually 2 hour shifts so it is not a lot of time commitment and they don’t have to get stuck in one place for too long. Not a lot of expectations are placed on the youth.
How have things changed for Hippy Feet since Covid-19?
Business to business sales, custom sales, have stopped. People are not interested in custom socks at this time. All of their attention is on selling the socks online through our website. Hippy Feet is not going into the drop in centers or shelters right now.
Where can people find your socks?
- First Avenue-custom sock 30 retailers across the midwest
- Rose and Look
- Jackson and Grey
- Mpls Information Center
Right now you can shop online on the Hippy Feet website
Why is it so hard for homeless youth to find employment?
Many times it is not because the youth lack skills, it is because the employers don’t have experience working with this type of the population. They are not patient. They have the ability to turn over employees easily. They don’t feel the need to invest in their employees. Sometimes it is also due to lack of drivers license and address. Hippy Feet would like to see more employers be patient and invest in individuals.
Do you have to turn people away or how do you pick the youth to work with?
We turn away more nonprofits than individuals. The 2 nonprofits we have right now serve the largest amount of homeless youth in the Twin Cities. We pick nonprofits based on the number of youth they see each year and what they can bring to the table. We look for places that have expertise that we don’t. We like to target places that have onsite housing.
Where do you see Hippy Feet going in the future?
Long term vision is to have a pathway toward employment. We are offering step 1, survival cash for youth instead of having them hit the street. We would like to be able to provide more of a pathway for the youth to help them gain longer permanent employment at another place. You could have an internship with Hippy Feet and learn more skills for future jobs. Hippy Feet is also trying to expand into other regions of the United States.
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