Jessyca Dewey from The Y Collective and Indie CPG are teaming up to support brands impacted by LA wildfires. Read on for how you can get aid or offer support ♡

With LA still burning, last week has served as a reminder of what most of us have long known — our CPG community is full of some of the kindest, thoughtful, vibrant, creative and generous people in the world.

The heartfelt donations, emails, texts, and offers for help we’ve seen have come in from all over the world while pallets of products ranging from personal care to food and hydration are coming in strong — even brands in evacuation zones have found impactful ways to contribute aid.

Our mission is to ensure that LA CPG brands, founders, and employees are able to overcome the losses endured by these fires both in the immediate and long-term.

We’ve created the Wildfire Aid for the LA CPG Community hub as the resource to help community organizers and friends in the industry navigate next steps and identify solutions with high-impact outcomes — a source of clear direction for action.

We’re leading with empathy and respect to compile the following resources so that we as a greater community can collaborate and find necessary information in one place.

Here’s what you’ll find (click to jump ahead)

Our Form to Ask or Offer Help - ask for support (both personal and business needs) / tell us how you’d like to offer help (time, donations, office space, warehousing, etc)

GoFundMe for the LA CPG Community - founders and team members who’ve lost their homes in need of immediate financial support

Social Media Fire Response Guide: What to Do/Not Do on Social Media This Week

Brand Donation Guide - items in demand and our friends organizing donation drops and meals for first responders

Are you working on a resource we can share? Please let us know!

We will be sending regular email dispatches of asks and resources for those interested in helping on the ground or from afar in the coming weeks and months.

Ask for Help or Offer Support

Please use this form to help us best support your asks and offers to help. You can trust us to lead with empathy and respect on both sides of the table. Our goal is to create future resources based on responses to this form, so please don’t hesitate to reach out to us with anything you need in the coming weeks and months.

https://airtable.com/appTvYRhnsQ7Ddyug/paguZizS5Bi6tYLS1/form

We have a space as a future donation drop center, but first need to know what you need most. Some of the asks we anticipate our friends will need in the coming weeks:

• Temporary and long-term housing (perhaps in other cities too)

• Safe rides in/out of Los Angeles

• Home products (beds, sheets, towels, baby cribs, kitchen appliances)

• Food & Beverages (protein, easy meals, pantry, kids snacks, allergy free needs)

• Pet and child care

• Business support (design, marketing, a desk or office space)

• Logistics (warehouse space, transportation of inventory)

GoFundMe for the LA CPG Community

Brand Donation Guide

Not sure where to send your products? We recommend these non-profits, centers, and community organizers. We are hearing from friends on the ground to hold off on in-kind donations for the short term as many centers are at capacity this week. Definitely still contact these groups directly to see how you can support later this month and year.

LA Regional Food Bank (recommended by Partake Foods)

LA Dream Center (recommended by Habiza hummus)

World Central Kitchen

_{Impactful Products Your Brand Can Donate}

LA2050 with Tara Roth and her team from The Goldhirsh Foundation created two helpful documents:

Our friend Dhruv Patel shared this list of LA Fires Mutual Aid Resources and:

• Groups Packing Supplies + Providing Shelter

• MALAN Fire & Wind Storm Resources

Social Media Fire Response Guide

By Jessyca Dewey of The Y Collective a social media and marketing agency in LA.

Depending on your algorithm, you may or may not know that LA’s historic wildfires are still ravaging the city. 

For some, Instagram, TikTok and LinkedIn might feel like business as usual, with brands posting lifestyle scenes and running paid ads as we look toward the Super Bowl. 

For others, social media feeds are full of horrifying wildfire images, well wishes, and mutual aid sources. 

It can be difficult to assess the best next steps for CPG brands to be taking on social media this week. Yet, life continues across the world, even if everything has changed in a city as big and influential as Los Angeles.

We at The Y Collective have leveraged our social media expertise to develop a quick guide to help CPG brands both in and out of LA navigate the current social media landscape.

• This is the week that it may be okay to resume posting as usual, with thoughtful consideration lent toward LA. Even though this is an active crisis with far-reaching implications for our industry, we understand business needs to continue.

• Pause before every re-share. Remember there’s a difference between intent and impact.

  • Ask yourself before posting:

    • Is this actionable, unique information? 

    • Is this updated? 

      • We are operating on an hourly basis in LA. Information on donations and aid needed yesterday may be drastically different today.

    • Is this tied to politics? 

    • Is this fact-checked? 

• Discuss your crisis plan with your brand marketing team (if you have a brand marketing team!)

  • If your brand does not have a crisis comms plan in place, this is a good reminder that you might want to consider creating one.

• Re-evaluate your upcoming content to ensure it’s not tone deaf. 

  • Examples: If you’re launching in the LA region, evaluate the copy, timing, and tone. Everyone in LA is being impacted, but many are still shopping. 

• Take a look at your paid media, and consider using geofencing to slow or stop your spend in LA altogether for the immediate future.

  • Other options for paid media include adding a financial contribution for every purchase. If you go this route though, best to ensure your ad creative highlights this effort. 

• If you’re a brand in LA:

  • ASK for support. Post about how the fire has directly impacted your or your brand. 

    • Remember, your followers want to support you and your brand.

  • Ask your consumers to be patient with you as we work through this but to keep their orders coming.

Don’t make these mistakes:

• Don’t clog the algorithm with lots of fire content, fearmongering, or emotional content not tied to direct action. Keep those on your personal accounts. 

  • Remember: the more people post unhelpful information about the fires, the less important, actionable  information people are able to see.

• Post about the fires without action tied to it. 

  • It’s better to resume posting as normal than to address the fires without taking any action.