Social, Tikkun Olam

Á-Lom // 1 child – 1 bed

About this project

The goal of the Á-Lom project (a pun in Hungarian, splitting the word 'dream' to 'Á' and 'lom' meaning 'trash') is to provide quality beds for disadvantaged children without a bed of their own. The project started with two one-month-long campaigns in 2019, and in 2021 it became a permanent project of Charity Taxi. We collect surplus children's beds and eventually deliver them to municipalities where there is a need. Our local contacts take pictures of the donations, which we later use to give feedback to the donors. One of our target groups is donors in Budapest; the other is disadvantaged families in partner municipalities of Charity Taxi. In two years, the program has already provided beds for nearly 600 children in 22 municipalities.

Why is it important?

According to a recent survey, there are approximately 50,000 children in Hungary without a bed. This phenomenon could start a series of health, social, and developmental problems for those affected. An impact assessment is supposed to be completed by 2022 to measure the changes in the families that received support. Until then, the only feedback is that most people are very grateful and appreciate these donations.

Why is it special?

The Á-Lom project is fully aligned with Charity Taxi's mission, as it bridges the gap between surplus and need. As with our core activity, we promote material donations. Moreover, as far as we know, there is no other organization in the country that would have run a campaign of this magnitude on furniture donations because nonprofit organizations usually cannot bear its costs and logistics. The innovation of the project is that no storage place is involved. In contrast to our usual donation collections, the beds are delivered directly to the supported municipalities. The success of the project is based on our huge campaign, during which we managed to shoot a campaign movie with the help of a professional film crew.