Lady Volta @ Swank

For all of you who haven’t been religiously reading each post (“Never! We read every single word Meghan! Even about colons and poop!”), last September I was lucky enough to meet two really cool Brits: John and Becks. Both of them volunteered for three months in Ho, a town in the Volta region. John was involved in construction work, which honestly I don’t know all that much about, but Becky is a jewelry designer, and worked with local craftwomen. Jewelry? That sparked my interest!

Becky’s work consisted of revamping the local women’s jewelry business, to improve their advertising, sales, and profits. She’s already a seasoned pro at jewelry, running her own website of self-designed creations at http://swank.bigcartel.com/. During her time in Ho, she got to trade styles with the women, and add a little bit of her own flavor to some of their jewelry. The final product? The 2010 Lady Volta line.

Becky helped the women design the line, and showed them the benefits of online business by posting the collection on her website (The women were initially skeptical, and didn’t want her to make them their own site.). In one week, she more than doubled their sales. I myself fell victim to the Lady Volta line, and may or may not have bought, well, quite a few of their pieces.

The profits from this particular line go to the women of the Volta region, to support their ongoing business and to help bolster their business skills. I’ve noticed that there is a lot of opportunity for teaching managerial skills and business tactics in different parts of Ghana, especially the rural areas. The Lady Volta line is a great example of how partnering successful small-business people with interested groups in developing nations can be incredibly successful.

Anyway, I encourage all of you to check out the collection on her website. It’s a great way to support people in a relatively unknown area of the world, and well, the jewelry is pretty awesome.