IMPACT 360: Fashion Show Spotlight!

As IMPACT 360 quickly approaches, we want to continue to share with you a little more about our fantastic fashion show participants! As most of you know already, we have 10 Dress for Success clients walking down the runway on June 5th at IMPACT 360, showcasing their stories and beautiful confidence to give us a better understanding of what happens after our clients leave the doors of Dress for Success Vancouver.

For some background on our IMPACT 360 event, visit our previous blog post about what you can expect to see there. You can also purchase your ticket before it's too late!

TARANA SULTAN

What has been your most important lesson from the PWG program?

​I met many different women and learned a lot from them. I got an insight into issues that women in Canada face. More importantly by participating in inspirational workshops by PWG I felt myself empowered and encouraged to further develop myself and achieve my professional career goals.

What made you want to be a part of IMPACT 360?

​I appreciate all the support and the assistance that received I from DFS and want to contribute back with my participation in the IMPACT fundraising event. I believe this project  will ​have a significantly positive impact on many women,  their personal and professional development.

DEEPIKA D. GUPTA

When did you first get introduced to Dress for Success Vancouver?

I first got inroduced through Langara College, where I completed Business & Computer essentials certificate course. 

How has this experience impacted your life?

My experience with Dress for success was a touchy one. I came in all nervous & unknown of the fact that the team at DFS is so nice and helping.

What has been your most important lesson from the PWG program? 

Every moment of life teaches us a new lesson, but some learnt are treasured and so is the my experience with PWG. The lesson of collectively and consistently working leads to an overall success.

What is your occupation? 

I am working as an administrative assistant in an engineering company.

If you could share a piece of advice to other women looking for a career, what would you tell them?

My advice to other women would be: The journey of life is not meant to be feared, it is meant to be traveled and enjoyed. Hence, keep trying never lose hope and keep moving consistently on the paths of self improvement and development cause you never know what grand is coming your way.

What made you want to be a part of IMPACT 360?

I wanted to be a part of Impact cause I believe "There's no substitute for rolling up your sleeves and working with the people who can make a difference. They get the benefit of your participation and you gain a direct understanding of the real problems and potential solutions, which makes you a more informed giver.”

What inspires you?

My inspiration is my dad, who left us alone in this journey of life years ago, but left some very important principles of life for us. One of which I keeping telling my kid too. He always use to say Education, learning are the most valuable treasures, that can make you grand in all aspects but no body can ever steal them from you.

Where is your dream vacation?

My dream vacation would be at VIRGINIA BEACH. Nothing works for me better than Sand & Sea.

What is your motto?

My motto in life is to be successful & to be happy in whatever I do!!

Celebrating Fashion, Fundraising for Change

IMPACT 360 is quickly approaching and we've decided to give you the inside scoop on what you can expect to see, who will be there, and what your ticket will be contributing to.

IMPACT 360 is our signature fundraiser of the year. This year’s theme is ‘Celebrating Fashion, Fundraising for Change’. The night will include a myriad of different activities, from live & silent auctions, vodka & scotch tastings, beauty bar, fresh fare, and door prizes! It will be held at the brand new Regency Lexus at 6^th and Burrard on June 5^th.

The name ‘IMPACT 360’ comes from the idea that these women have come full circle in their lives, and this event is a chance for them to share their stories and impact other women the way that they’ve been impacted. ‘360’ also represents how much it costs to put one woman through all of our programs for a year, including dressing services, Career Centre services, the Professional Women’s Group (PWG), and much more.

Our main spectacle of the evening will be our fashion show. It will feature 10 of our Dress for Success clients who have shown tremendous growth from our programs, exhibit leadership in their lives, and share a strong passion in their careers and everything that they do. They have shown us a willingness to share their stories, all of which you will hear at IMPACT 360. Some have also volunteered to be a part of a promotional video for the event. You can watch the video here.

We wanted to introduce you to these 10 incredible women to give you an insight on who they are, and why they were chosen to represent the values and mission of Dress for Success Vancouver. Over the next couple of weeks, we will be featuring Q & A's with all of them and sharing them here on our blog. Tune in to follow their inspiring stories and don't forget to buy your tickets to IMPACT 360 to hear these stories from the women themselves!

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Our first feature is Sunny Johnston. We've recently featured Sunny in one of our Client Spotlights, but we thought we would share some more about how and why she got involved in Dress for Success in her own words.

Sunny came into our program about a year ago, looking for a stepping stone to push her towards pursuing the goals of her life:

"When you walk into a work place and you’re not dressed appropriately for the job you’re pursuing even though deep down inside you know I am awesome for this job, I can do this job, I can give a one hundred percent, but I don’t look the part, people won’t hire you and it sucks, but that’s just the way that it goes. It’s nice to have the confidence, knowing that there is someone out there that is just like you, that is in the same exact situation that you are. It’s almost healing in a way." 

How has this experience impacted your life?

Coming to Dress for Success and being a part of the PWG has always given me the power to meet these women and these women are the strongest women I have, so I am very happy. My experience at DFS has been absolutely phenomenal, amazing, I have been treated so well. It’s been a blessing in disguise really.

If you could share a piece of advice to other women looking for a career, what would you tell them?

For any person that actually wants to come into this program, just do it, you’re going to find so much more than it is that you’re actually looking for. It’s more than just a shirt. It’s more than just a pair of shoes. It’s something more. It’s confidence, it’s a reason to go out there and get the job that you want. 

What is your motto?

"Enough"
One day I will be...
One day I will have...
One day I will accomplish...
Because "Enough" is all you will ever need...

To read more about Sunny, visit her Client Spotlight!

Tune in for more spotlights in the coming weeks on these 10 inspiring stories of the women who have been so kind to share their stories with us.

To purchase your tickets for IMPACT 360, visit our website!

The Body Shop partners with Dress for Success Canada

Since the Fall 2012, we have been exploring a partnership between the Canadian Dress for Success affiliates and The Body Shop. It has been exciting to see this relationship develop. The Body Shop is about to launch a major fundraising campaign starting August 12, 2013 in which Dress for Success in Canada will be a participant.

Dragon Fruit Lip Butter Campaign

The Dragon Fruit Lip Butter Campaign is an In Store Promotion run by The Body Shop in support of small local charities and grassroots initiatives. The profit from the sale of the lip butter will be shared with three charities. The profit is directed to the charities through the Dragon Lip Butter Grant Program of The Body Shop Foundation in the U.K.

Specifically, The Body Shop will donate 100% of the profits to charity. 25% of the donation will be paid to the Body Shop Foundation to support its international initiatives. 75% of the donation will divided between three Canadian charities based on the following format:

• Every customer will receive one token for every lip butter product purchased in the store. The customer may vote by placing their token in the voting box to indicate their preferred charity.
• The most popular charity will receive 50% of the donation amount
• The second most popular charity will receive 30% of the donation amount
• The third most popular charity will receive 20% of the charity amount

While the campaign will run for one year starting Aug 12, 2013, the product will be actively promoted in store for 3 months. The vote allocation at the end of three months will determine the donation distribution as noted above. As part of the campaign, each charity will be profiled for one month in every store. Dress for Success Canada will be profiled in September. The other two charities involved in this year’s campaign are Polar Bears International and the Seeds of Diversity.

In 2012, the campaign ran for 6 months and raised just over $22,000. The charities involved were The Humane Society of Canada (1st place), Canadian

Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies (2nd place) and the Canadian Parks & Wilderness Society (3rd place).

So please make sure you vote for Dress for Success Canada- we look forward to your support! Thank you.

The Power of our Walk!

We held our 3rd annual Power Walk for Dress for Success Vancouver on Saturday, May 11th. Because of the support from all our walkers and sponsors, we raised over $25,000! This amount will allow us to support an additional 166 women through the Dress for Success programs: Dressing Services, Career Centre and the Professional Women's Group Program.

  

We were honoured to have our Power Walk speakers share their inspiring stories: Paralympian Elisabeth Walker-Young, Purdy's CEO Karen Flavelle and PWG Alumni Member Aurea Lucas.

Congratulations to Jen Newstead who was our top fundraiser this year! A big thank you to Paolo Kalaw and his team, The Frontier Dental Group who were the top fundraising team. Congrats to our best dressed team, UBC Sorority group Team Alpha Phi.   

Thank you to the most amazing Power Walk committee led by Jackie Powell and our gracious volunteers. All their hard work and efforts helped us make this walk the most successful one yet! 

A special thank you to our sponsors: PwC, Oakridge, Racinne and Oakwest Insurance.  Our in-kind sponsors: Safeway, HBC, Spud, Omega Nutrition, Cointreau, Skinny Girl, Aveda- Eco Chic Boutique, Jennifer Thomas Personal Training, Canadians Baseball Team, Seasons in the Park, Skinny Girl Wines, Purdys, Clearly Contacts, Chateau Fairmont Whistler, YYoga, The Keg Restaurant, Sidecut Restaurant, Tourism Whistler, Lia Sophia, Kind Bars, Vancouver Aquarium, Lady Sport, Blenz and David's Tea.

We'd like to thank all our participants for sharing their time with us on an early Saturday morning to help a worthy cause. Your positive energy made this year's Power Walk a great day to remember.

Check out our Power Walk photo gallery! 

Support Dress for Success Vancouver by shopping at Calvin Klein