When Rikki Mendias was struck with the idea to hand out his treasured sneaker collection to the homeless living on the streets of Los Angeles, there was no way he could have known the magnitude that loving act would have on so many lives. Inspired by his personal experience with homelessness as a child and [...]
For Rikki Mendias, the founder of Hav A Sole, a pivotal moment of his childhood occurred when he experienced an act of kindness while living in a shelter with his mom, who was recovering from the throes of addiction. For those of you who may not know the story of Hav A Sole, this act [...]
Last week, Hav A Sole took a special trip up to the Bay to hand out shoes to the local children of Marin City. While most people may be familiar with Marin County, Marin City is a small unincorporated community just five miles north of San Francisco, that experiences significant economic hardship. Despite Marin City [...]
It was as if all the stars aligned last week when Hav A Sole and Joey Brezinski, a local street skateboarder, collaborated on an event. Joey’s idea was fairly simple. He wanted to donate new shoes from his own shoe company, but he wanted Hav A Sole to facilitate it while our friends at Uninterrupted [...]
In order to bring people together and ignite social change, you have to take action. Hav A Sole was built upon this principle, and with the motto “Just Do It’, it’s safe to say Nike understands this concept too. March 26th is celebrated amongst sneakerheads as Nike Air Max Day, paying homage to the day the [...]
At first glance one might think Hav A Sole is all about shoes and yet, there is actually more meaning to our shoes than initially meets the eye. While the shoes we give serve a practical purpose, they also provide an intimate way to connect with one another, which is ultimately what Hav A Sole [...]
Last night we had the pleasure of being honored at the Covenant House’s Dream event but before we go into how incredible it was, I want to share a quote from our partner Alana Weinroth last night. “Every young person deserves shelter 🏠, clothing 👖, support 🙌 , and most importantly to be loved [...]
Today was a very special day for our team as it was the first time in the history of Hav A Sole that we visited San Diego, CA. We were invited by Project Homeless Connect to join in on their one day resource fair at Golden Hall in Downtown San Diego for those battling homelessness. [...]
Meet the former sneakerhead who's putting Los Angeles' homeless in a new set of sneakers with his nonprofit Hav a Sole.
Cruising down Redondo Blvd at Pico Blvd, I felt the hot wind in my face. My windows were down and it was another blistering day in LA. It was around 4:30pm when I noticed a guy pushing a shopping cart. His cart was the size of a Smart Car overloaded with 12 bags of cans. [...]