One Tenth Boutique gives 10 percent back to local, global charities
Writer / Michelle Kaufman
Photographer / Amy Payne
One Tenth Boutique recently opened in Greenwood, but the store’s products and mission have a global impact.
Owning a store has been a dream of Theresa Carmichael’s for a decade, but it wasn’t until about two years ago that she knew what kind of store it would be.
“I wanted to create a place for women to come that they could feel loved and worthy and to know that they were wonderfully and beautifully created,” Carmichael says. “About two years ago, I actually just started with a journal. As I would have dreams and visions and just through supplication of prayer, I would have different ideas and I would just continue to write them down.”
She went on a “boutique mission” with her daughter, visiting several boutiques in Indiana, Kentucky and Tennessee to see what products they carried and how their customer service was. Her and her daughter also traveled to Haiti on a mission trip a year ago, and it was eye-opening for Carmichael.
“After serving there for two weeks, I was just like what can I do? I have to do more,” Carmichael says. “I knew that it was part of the boutique, that I was supposed to also carry products that help those in other countries that are not as well blessed as we are here in America.”
One Tenth Boutique carries gift items from countries such as El Salvador, Kenya and Vietnam as well as American fashion trends and accessories.
“They’re uniquely made, you can’t go a lot of places, especially here in Greenwood and find these products because they’re made out of kay-ay grass or they’re made out of just the resources they have,” Carmichael says. “There’s products here that have a story behind it and that’s the biggest thing – shopping with a purpose.”
The name One Tenth comes from a Bible verse, Malachi 3:10, which says that if someone tithes, or gives 10 percent of one’s income back to God, there will be an abundance of blessings upon that person.
One Tenth’s 10 percent will go to local and global charities. A T-shirt line that One Tenth carries will allow customers to choose which of three charities their 10 percent will go to. Carmichael hopes that as they grow, eventually they can give 100 percent of those T-shirt sales back to charity.
In addition to the variety of merchandise, the furniture was hand-crafted. Some of the walls came from a barn built in the 1800s, including a prayer wall where customers can place prayer requests on a tag. Those requests are prayed over by Carmichael daily.
“The heart behind One Tenth is to give back, to be the change, to be different, to be kind,” Carmichael says. “I think my biggest thing is sometimes we just have to be still. I just hope when people come into One Tenth, that they slow down and realize that we live in such a bigger world than what we even see. And I hope that the pieces that we carry actually show that we go from here to there.”
One Tenth Boutique is located at 202 N. Madison Ave, Suite 5. Greenwood, IN 46142 or you can give them a call at 317-893-2116.
