If you want a unique, fun, and impactful way to support your corporate social responsibility strategy, look no further than World Vision’s Global 6K for Water — an annual event that invites participants to bring clean water to those in need by walking or running six kilometers.

Why 6K? It’s the average distance women and kids in the developing world walk for water every day. Whether you host your own Global 6K or sponsor one, it can help elevate your brand, engage your employees, and change the lives of women and children by freeing them from a life spent collecting dirty water.

What began in 2015 as a national event with 1,400 participants has grown steadily year over year. In 2018, 48,000 participants at 930 locations in 30 countries helped bring clean water to more than 63,000 people, with 53 businesses of varying sizes — including international corporations — partnering with World Vision to make the event a success.

86 percent of consumers believe that companies should take a stand for social issues.

— “Brands & Stands: Social Purpose is the New Black,” Shelton Group, 2018

How the Global 6K can benefit your business

By hosting the Global 6K for Water, you can:

• Unite your employees with a healthy team-building activity
• Engage your community around a good cause
• Elevate your brand in the eyes of stakeholders
• Promote your company’s wellness strategy
• Boost visibility in key markets
• Achieve your CSR targets

In 2018, the Global 6K for Water generated 789 million total media impressions, including traditional earned media, influencer engagement, PSAs, and paid ads.

What business owners are saying

“We hosted our first World Vision Global 6K last year in Edinburg, TX, and it was a success. Over 180 participants plus several local businesses came out to join this amazing event to raise funds and awareness for those needing clean water around the world.”

— Lani Dolifka, President & CEO, Watermill Express

“We say our mission is to save water locally and change lives globally … Monday through Friday life can be hard and chaotic. This is a chance not to think about the pressures of work, but instead to think, ‘Hey, we’re making a difference in the world.’”

— Tom Hutchison, Chairman & CEO, HOH Water Technology

“Having our president show his passion for the Global 6K for Water inspired our locations and employees from around the world to rally to be part of something together … . Our company encourages people to give back to their communities, whether it’s in their backyard or halfway across the world.”

—Allison Smith, Well Specialist, Magna Exteriors

78 percent of Americans believe companies must do more than just make money; they must positively impact society as well.

— 2018 Cone/Porter Novelli Purpose Study

How to get involved

Choose from two great ways to benefit your company through the Global 6K: hosting or sponsoring.

As a host, you’ll organize your own 6K for Water. We make it easy! Reach out to your World Vision representative or register online to create a custom participant sign-up page. We’ll send our turnkey event kit for hosting a successful 6K, including everything you’ll need to engage your employees, customers, and community.

As a sponsor, you’ll reach a targeted audience at the World Vision host sites in Seattle and Chicago. Contact your representative or email proudsupporter@worldvision.org to get more information or get started. Depending on your sponsorship level, you’ll take advantage of benefits like logo placement, branding privileges, marketing and PR support, and stage time on race day.

87% of Americans will purchase a product because a company advocated for an issue they cared about.

— 2017 Cone Communications CSR Study

Benefit your business. Influence your world.

Partner today with World Vision through the Global 6K for Water, and help transform lives on May 4. However you participate, you’ll engage employees and customers, elevate your brand, and change lives worldwide.

Last year, people gathered around the world to walk or run 6 kilometers in support of the Global 6K Water Challenge. In the end, more than 48,000 people and 29 businesses joined together to provide clean water for over 63,000 people. And this year, we plan to do even better!

Why the Global 6K?

Every day, nearly 1,000 children under the age of five die from diarrhea caused by contaminated water, poor sanitation, and unsafe hygiene practices. We can change that!

Clean water frees children from deadly diseases, liberates women and children from hours spent collecting dirty water, and opens the door to a promising future. By supporting the Global 6K, you can save lives by providing clean water to more children and their families!

Benefits to your company:

• Unite your employees with a healthy team building activity
• Engage your local community around a good cause
• Elevate your brand in the eyes of stakeholders through Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
• Promote your company’s wellness strategy

BRIGHTON, CO — Imagine if you had to trudge nearly 6 kilometers every day to get water. Then imagine if that water was so dirty it caused diarrhea, cholera, and other life-threatening illnesses. For many people in developing countries, this is just a way of life. Yet it doesn’t have to be.

Watermill Express, which focuses on providing safe and affordable drinking water to communities in the United States, has already taken steps to help remedy the situation. “We hosted our first World Vision Global 6k last year in Edinburg, Texas, and it was a success,” says Lani Dolifka, CEO and co-founder of Watermill Express. “Over 180 participants plus several local businesses came out to join this amazing event to raise funds and awareness for those needing clean water around the world.”

For Dolifka, the Global 6K is an event that is close to her heart. In 2016, she traveled to Kenya with World Vision to experience the hardships of the vulnerable firsthand. In fact, she carried water like so many women and girls do around the world. “Carrying heavy cans of water every day is a physically and emotionally draining task” she recalls. “In some cases fetching water may take hours and often the water these women bring home is unfit for human consumption leaving the family little choice but to risk sickness and in some cases even death.”

“Although World Vision’s work is not easy, their commitment to building sustainable solutions for the poor reminds us that God’s love can overcome life’s toughest challenges.”

Dolifka’s passion for clean water carried over to the employees at Watermill Express. The staff banded together to serve as the organizers of the Global 6K, ensuring it was a fun and engaging activity for all the participants. This year, they hope to have more than 200 people from across the Rio Grande Valley entered in the event.

World Vision works in some of the hardest to reach places in the world,” notes Dolifka. “And although they are a Christian organization, they help people of all faiths and religious beliefs. Through my visits to the field, I’ve seen them care deeply about the most vulnerable—women and children. Although World Vision’s work is not easy, their commitment to building sustainable solutions for the poor reminds us that God’s love can overcome life’s toughest challenges.”

COLUMBUS, OH – Sharing a faith-based mission to help others has made the partnership between World Vision and Thirty-One Gifts—a direct-sales retailer of purses, totes, home décor, and jewelry— incredibly special.

As a family of more than 60,000 independent consultants and 1,000 employees who lead with their hearts, Thirty-One Gifts has donated millions of dollars’ worth of products to help girls, women, and families around the world.

For the last several years, they’ve been funding and packing Women’s Hope Kits full of essential hygiene supplies for women in the U.S. who have survived domestic violence, poverty, or disaster.

“At Thirty-One, giving back is part of who we are. It’s in our DNA and the driving purpose for all that we do,” says Wendy Bradshaw, Executive Director of Community Affairs & Philanthropy. “We love our partnership in providing Hope Kits to help support and empower women, as well as various products that support World Vision’s programs that keep babies warm, deliver medical supplies, and keep girls in school.

“At Thirty-One, giving back is part of who we are. It’s in our DNA and the driving purpose for all that we do.”

— Wendy Bradshaw, Executive Director of Community Affairs & Philanthropy

“We know we are working with trusted experts who know when and how to distribute products. The World Vision team is a wonderful steward of our funding, deeply appreciative of our support, and excellent at sharing the stories of our impact.”

Thirty-One Gifts is also dedicated to giving back in the wake of a disaster—and in 2017 alone, when hurricanes were especially destructive in the U.S., the Thirty-One Gifts family assembled 5,000 Women’s Hope Kits or women’s hygiene kits.

“Taking care of each other and our community is ingrained into our culture, so if we have the ability to respond to disasters in a meaningful and timely way, we are going to do so to the best of our ability,” Wendy Bradshaw says. “When disaster hits, it impacts our whole family: independent sales consultants, customers, employees and their families.”

Thirty-One Gifts has been World Vision’s premier match sponsor for Giving Tuesday since 2015, and Bradshaw says other groups will benefit from our ability to partner on projects that align with their own vision and values.

“One of BMC’s core values is ‘people count.’ Disaster or not, BMC is committed to giving back in our communities.”

—Joe Barnes, Senior VP of Operations & Supply Chain

“Feeling inspired? Learn how to partner with World Vision or give a one-time gift.
Visit worldvision.org/corporate/ways-to-partner.”