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Teen Raises Big Money for Cancer Research Through Her Invention
< < Back toIn 2015, Jordan Phillips mother, Nicole, fought a bout with breast cancer. The diagnosis and treatments were totally unexpected and caught the family off-guard.
Jordan, then 12 years old, was sad and frustrated and wanted to do something to help her mother and others like her. So, Jordan, on her own, created a cozy for coffee mugs. She sewed them herself and has sold them in various ways for donations to cancer research.
She has called them “Cozys for the Cure” and to date, she had raised over $100,000 in donations for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure organization.
While delivering a speech about her project in New York City, along with her mother, Jordan piqued the interest of a manufacture and distributer.
As a result, her Cozys for the Cure are now being sold in over 1,600 Walmart Stores across the nation with a portion of the sales proceeds being donated for cancer research.
Jordan explains that one day she saw cardboard coffee cup cozys with illustrations drawn on them. That gave her the idea to make cozys out of cloth. Since she has sewn since she was five, she turned to her sewing machine and created the cloth coffee mug cozys.
She then went into full-out production in her home and started selling her cozys online and through Facebook to raise donations.
She even solicited some of her friends from her former home in N. Dakota to help out. A group of nine young girls, calling themselves “Jojo’s Cozy Tribe,” helped aid production along with two talented “sewing ladies.”
Just recently, the 14 year old has become an official business “Cozys for the Cure, LLC.” This will enable her to not only provide additional donation money to fight cancer but also, at a very young age, learn how a real business works.
Jordan told Spectrum that she wants to become a female entrepreneur and she wants to fight cancer until it is cured. Both are noble goals.
Jordan’s mother, Nicole, also has been dedicating her life to the spreading of kindness.
She is a much sought after public speaker and author of the book “Kindness is Contagious.” She also will be launching a new podcast about kindness in late October. Produced by WOUB Public Media, it will be distributed initially through Apple Podcasts, Google Play, and NPR One.