The No Project – Wayne

If you’ve only just tuned in, Bento is currently running a little initiative called ‘the No Project’. The basic premise is that for every potential stockist that tells me no (as in, refuses to stock the collection or see me), I put aside $3. At the end of the week, I take the total sum of money ‘collected’ for the week and give it to a homeless person.

The idea is that although my heart breaks a little every time someone refuses to consider the label, I can turn that negative into a positive for someone who really needs it.

Usually, I go and do this on a Friday. I think it helps to make their weekend that bit better. This Friday however, I couldn’t find anyone to give the money to! I searched the city for two hours and couldn’t find a single homeless person…

Today though, I had more luck.

Today my husband and I met Wayne. Wayne is an entrepeneurial and creative person. Instead of sitting on the street with just a sign, he paints and sells his artwork. He also told us how he saved up enough money to get his best pieces professionally printed onto greeting cards, and then sold the cards.

Sadly however, Wayne’s work has gone downhill as he’s almost run out of art supplies. Some helpful people sometimes buy him little bits and pieces, but it’s not enough. Enter us! I got 14 nos this week, so I had $42 to give to Wayne to help him buy some more supplies. He was pretty thrilled, and apologised many times for not having any ‘finished pieces’ to give us in exchange for our contribution.

With Wayne’s business mind though, this won’t just be $42. He can turn that $42 into even more.

Wanye's Sign & Unfinished Art

Pretty cool, right? Kind of helped make some of those nos worth it. That said, universe / powers that be, if you’re listening… I’d love some more yeses.

Current No Project tally = 0 (this isn’t as good as it sounds… they’re just ignoring me).