Operation PinkBus
Supply. Rebuild.
PinkBus is helping Ukrainians win the war one vehicle at a time. Do you need PinkBus help? Ukrainians tell us what they need and we find ways to help.
Guerrilla-style fundraising:
PinkBus operation statistics
About PinkBus
Our first mission started on February 28th 2022, and by the 10th of March we had raised over $400k. Minivans were the number one request.By March 15th 2022 we had provided 22 minivans for humanitarian evacuations and supply transportation as well as support for organizations at critical junctures from the war zone. We donated to small NGOs all over Ukraine; our vans were in Chernigiv and Donatsk, Mariopol and Odesa, Kharkiv and Sumy, Lviv and Ivano-Frankvisk. We used the opportunity to establish a strong logistical corridor for future engagement, and we are happy to report that to-day the path is strong and our Ukrainian partners are using it regularly.
As of May 15th, we have US Public Charity status which enables us to directly distribute aid on the ground: procuring gas, food and medical supplies. Our overhead has been less than 1%, and we fully intend to send all the proceeds to the people doing the heroic work on the ground. We strive to film as much as possible of this process, with our various drivers turned filmmakers and guerilla teams, to preserve the historical legacy of everyday people working together to repair and rebuild.
We anticipated donor fatigue. The PinkBus founder and our resident artist, Natacha Merritt, came up with a grand way to raise larger funds, and create a relic to preserve the history of Ukrainian perseverance and ingenuity. It is a response to war porn as art that bridges the gap between us and them. The Ukrainian PinkBus team were thrilled to participate in the Art Hack. They exchanged one of the vans from our original PinkBus fleet, that saved children and women from the deep southeast for two new vans knowing that we intended to turn it into a sculpture and sell it for more funds.
The sculpture, Objet Petit A, has since become an international project bringing Silicon Valley veterans together with French and British counterparts all working to take instruction from our Ukrainian partners and Ms. Merritt.
The Auction Collective auction starts June 5th, 2022 and will be live for 3 weeks, ending June 26th, 2022.
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