Programs
This is a full-day workshop for people on employment assistance that prepares them for transitioning into the workforce. We offer job-specific clothing, personal care items and first impression training for job seekers. Participants gain hands-on experience that enhances their self-esteem and in turn, employability, by getting the tools and tips they need to make that critical positive first impression on future employers. They also leave the workshop with six new work-related clothing items and a gift bag full of personal care items.
This includes Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSB) job training placement for people with intellectual and/or physical challenges who are training in basic work skills. Participants come to us to learn basic back-to-work skills in the warehouse, boutique or administrative capacities. They gain the confidence and experience needed to help secure and maintain a job.
This program collects and distributes brand-new children’s clothing and other basic-needs items to social service agencies and programs working with children facing abuse, poverty, homelessness, parental drug abuse and crime, immigration and settlement. The clothing and other basic-needs items we provide for the children are crucial not only for meeting their basic needs, fostering pride and self-esteem, but also for participation in school activities.
Our dress boutique sells brand-new designer wedding, cocktail and prom dresses at outlet prices. This program offers hands-on employment training to economically vulnerable participants giving them the experience and skills they need to enter the mainstream workforce.
Rogers cell phone dealers from various cities around the country donate cell phones and start-up phone cards to people who cannot afford them. Participants include those searching for employment and families with children. For many of them, these phones become a lifeline—literally.
For every dollar BRANDS FOR CANADA spends to operate, we put $56 into the social service system. Talk about ROI!
How do we do it? With help from our partners.
Our programs enhance the social service system by donating over $28 million of new goods to the families who need them most. Brands for Canada partners with approximately 100 social service agencies in the Greater Toronto Area and across Canada.
New agencies are signing up with us every year to help us continue reaching a broad spectrum of people in need. These partnerships ensure that all donations we receive will be distributed in an appropriate and timely manner to various communities throughout Canada.
Why donating is good for business.
Our donors include generous fashion brands, retailers, manufacturers, importers and distributors here in Canada and occasionally from the US. Before Brands for Canada, companies often had to store their surplus inventory, sell it below value or put it in landfill sites—all of which are wasteful, costly and environmentally unfriendly options.
So we make it easy. Brands for Canada picks up donated goods from companies and issues in-kind donation receipt. Plus, companies can rest assured knowing that their unwanted surplus items are being distributed to the most vulnerable citizens in a fair and equitable manner—while simultaneously fulfilling their own corporate responsibility commitments. It’s a win-win scenario.
Here’s what we need.
We receive donations of brand new clothing, personal care items, housewares and other essentials that people require for daily life. Items include basic clothing such as underwear, socks, T-shirts, jeans, and sweaters and coats, plus job-related attire like suits, shirts and shoes and work boots. We also accept toiletries such as shampoo, soap, razors, toothbrushes and toothpaste, deodorant, and housewares like pots and pans, dishes, cutlery, comforters and blankets. All items are new!