Share Our Soles

This page is dedicated to answering some of the most common questions about Share Our Soles. If any of your questions are not satisfactorily answered here, please contact us directly.

A: Each S.O.S. chapter is actively involved in collecting running shoes via donation sites and individual arrangements. Donation sites, usually located in schools, gyms, or running stores, allow you to drop off shoes at your convenience during normal business hours. To find the donation site nearest you, please visit our chapters page.

S.O.S. also accepts monetary donations, which are used to purchase new shoes and socks for underprivileged youth. Please contact us for more information on how you can donate to Share Our Soles, as well as how your donation will benefit those in need.

A: Share Our Soles donates shoes near and far to underprivileged youth who are in many cases receiving not only their first running shoes, but their first shoes of any kind. By operating on both a local and global scale, we aim to foster a better understanding of and deeper empathy for all underprivileged children. To date, we have donated most of our running shoes to Liberia, Mali, Sudan, Uganda, and Kenya in Africa; but we have also donated shoes to at-risk youth in Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and inner-city Los Angeles. We also donate shoes to Haiti to help those suffering from the aftermath of the Haitian earthquakes.

Through local involvement, we strengthen our communities by creating connections between the givers and receivers of S.O.S. shoes, who in many cases run on the same trails and race on the same tracks.

Through global outreach, we involve our communities in our increasingly globalized world by aiding and learning about people living in vastly different cultures and circumstances than our own. Indeed, we not only learn about those to whom we donate shoes; we learn from them as well about maintaining hope and persevering through great adversity. One receives shoes; the other receives a new perspective on life.

S.O.S. donates to underprivileged youth living both across the street and across the globe because we feel it is the most effective way to strengthen our communities and our world. In short, we feel that whether children are walking along our streets or upon distant lands, they deserve support and guidance on their journeys.

A: Since its founding in 2006, S.O.S. has worked with Sports Gift, Inc. of San Diego to donate running shoes to orphanages in Sudan, Uganda, and Kenya, and in Africa -- and, more recently, to underprivileged youth living in Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Liberia. Sports Gift is a non-profit organization which provides sports equipment to underprivileged children around the world -- for more information, please visit our supporters page or go to www.SportsGift.org. We at S.O.S. cannot fully express our deep gratitude for Sports Gift's help both in transporting shoes on our behalf and in raising awareness of our cause, and we hope you will aid us in thanking Sports Gift by learning more about the good it does.

Share Our Soles has also distributed shoes through wonderful outreach programs available at the University of Southern California: this past December, for instance, Founder and President Greg Woodburn was able to personally distribute socks and shoes to villagers in Sikoro, Mali with the help of the USC Africa Health Initiative.

Most recently, we have worked with various charities and organizations that have been part of the overwhelmingly positive support for Haiti to help donate shoes to the earthquake victims.

A: S.O.S. currently has chapters in Los Angeles, CA; Ventura, CA; and Worcester, MA. If you live in a different area and are thus unable to drop off your shoes at a donation site in person, we first of all apologize for the inconvenience, and secondly encourage you to found a chapter of Share Our Soles in your area.

If you are interested in starting a chapter; setting up a shoe donation site where there is already an S.O.S. chapter; or holding a temporary shoe collection drive, please see our Get Involved page.

You can also mail us your shoes if there is not a donation site near you, though the cost of shipping shoes can be very expensive. If you would like to mail your shoes to S.O.S., please contact us, and we can give you the mailing address for the S.O.S. chapter nearest you.

A: While Share Our Soles focuses on collecting running shoes and aims to promote the sport's many benefits, we accept athletic shoes of all types as long as they are in good condition. Indeed, S.O.S. has received enthusiastic feedback from many orphanages about the high quality of our donations, and it is very important to us to continue giving our recipients quality shoes.

There is no definitive measure of whether or not a pair of shoes is in good enough condition to donate, but common sense and personal judgment are usually right. If there are tears in the mesh or seams, for example, that pair of shoes is not suitable for donation. For, while mud can be cleaned off, damage to the support of the shoe permanently negates its function.

The most important thing to remember is that these shoes are going to other people. Ask yourself, for instance, if your friend or child would wear these shoes on a hike or rainy day -- in other words, when they care about the function rather than fashion of the shoes.

If you still have reservations as to the condition of your shoes, or realize your shoes are too beat-up to donate, we strongly recommend you recycle them.

A: There are numerous ways to become involved in Share Our Soles requiring different amounts of commitment. One simple thing everyone can do is help spread the word about S.O.S. by telling your family, friends, neighbors, classmates, teammates, coworkers, etc. about our mission and by encouraging them to take a look at our website for themselves.

Additionally, if you have new or used (but still in good condition) running shoes, you can donate them to S.O.S. by visiting one of our many shoe donation sites. Both spreading awareness of S.O.S. and donating shoes, while requiring minimal time, are enormously helpful -- and essential -- to our work.

One larger yet extremely rewarding commitment is to start an S.O.S. chapter or donation site in your community. If you are interested in helping oversee the collection and donation of shoes in your area, please find more information here and contact us.

Whether you contribute shoes, recommend S.O.S. to friends, or found a new chapter, we are very grateful for your support and look forward to working with you to improve our world one shoe -- indeed one life -- at a time.