Black Lives Matter

Anti-Racism: A note to our Community

June 7, 2020

Dear Rainbo family,

I write this note to our community with a grieving heart to address the painful wake-up call and shift we are experiencing relating to Black lives and all racially marginalized people and communities (BIPOC: Black, Indigenous, People-of-Colour).

There has been a monumental shift in the awareness and consciousness of White people and we are a few hundred years late. I feel this revolution reverberate through every cell in my being.

I am open.
I am listening.
I am learning.
I am unlearning.
I am uncomfortable.
I take responsibility for my position of privilege.
I am committed to this change. And I am committed to Rainbo being an ally force for this change so that we actively work towards a new status-quo.

I want to express my deep, deep commitment to this work, both personally and professionally. Collectively we have a long way to go to becoming allies but I am here to show up, support and amplify BIPOC.

We are still a very small women-led start-up here at Rainbo (aside from myself, one other full-time employee and one intern!). Please know that I am committed to growing this team by hiring and promoting minorities and BIPOC to positions of power. This is part of how the industry can and will change from the inside out.

Since the beginning, every decision I make has been considered environmentally and will now also be considered from a BIPOC equality perspective.

Beginning in Fall 2019, for every Rainbo bottle sold online, one tree has been planted. I am now choosing to split that donation. Meaning, half will go to One Tree Planted, and half to NAACP and Black Lives Matter Canada.

As a purpose driven individual, I have always measured Rainbo’s success by more than just revenue. Of course, being revenue-positive is essential to the survival of any business, however I will never waiver in my belief that revenue and social impact go hand in hand. In our world, they must.

I will continue to measure Rainbo’s success by the impact we are making: sustainably, locally, environmentally, by the reviews we receive, the betterment of your health, the lives we improve and importantly, the ways we are supporting marginalized BIPOC internally and externally.

There is a long road ahead.
Yours in solidarity,

Tonya Papanikolov
Founder & CEO 

 

Anti-Racism Actions that Rainbo is taking and committed to: 

  • We commit to practicing anti-racism as a core value at Rainbo and integrating this work and perspective into everything we do
  • When the time comes to expand our team, we will prioritize workplace diversity during the hiring process to ensure future inclusion of all voices and perspectives 
  • Internally, each team member will be speaking to their anti-racism learnings at our weekly team meeting and bring a new resource to share with the group
  • Our team has completed the Spiritual Activism 101 online course by Rachel Rickett’s and this will become an on-boarding and training requirement for all new employees
  • We will be creating a culture of open dialogue around anti-racism. Our entire team is encouraged to hold every team member accountable, regardless of position or level of management
  • We have started an internal anti-racism book club – our team is going to be reading and discussing together, starting with White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo
  • We strive to only work with freelancers and agencies who align with our commitment to anti-racism and we will always have open conversations about this before establishing a working relationship
  • We commit to listen to, collaborate, partner and uplift BIPOC in the wellness industry
  • We commit to work with, support and hire black creatives – photography, recipe development, creative content, writing, etc.
  • Reparations: to make our products more accessible to marginalized communities, we will be offering a BIPOC subsidized price with a discount code (please email us at info@rainbo.com to use this option)
  • Donations from online orders: Instead of solely donating to One Tree Planted, for the foreseeable future we will be splitting that donation to also support black marginalized communities in Canada and USA (please contact us if you would like to see any donation receipts)
  • We have a resource guide for our community that we will continue to update 

This is just a start. We welcome constructive feedback on these efforts from BIPOC as well as all others in our community.

We know there is a long and indefinite road ahead of learning, unlearning, messing up, being transparent and having persistence, humility and patience.