Razom’s teams of volunteers – a truly diverse group of individuals and partnering organizations across US, Europe, and Ukraine – have been urgently working to establish highly efficient procurement, logistics, and distribution channels. We are constantly working against the clock on this and cannot begin to properly thank all those determined to make it happen! At the same time, we have been hard at work analyzing the overwhelming amount of support in donations from you and are finally here to deliver some long awaited updates.
Razom was founded on purely volunteering efforts of Ukrainian Americans in NYC during the 2013-14 Revolution of Dignity in Ukraine. Razom, which means “together” in Ukrainian, believes in the enormous potential of dedicated volunteers around the world united by a single goal: to unlock the potential of Ukraine. We work towards that mission by creating spaces where people meet, partner, and act.
Razom has maintained an open Emergency Response project since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014 where we mobilized to procure medical and tactical supplies to the eastern front. We picked up this project again in 2020 at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic to fundraise for, procure, and deliver medical supplies across covid hot spots in Ukraine. Since 2014, the Emergency Response fund has always remained open for donors so that we were in a position to act swiftly in support of Ukrainians in crisis situations. When reports came that Russia began amassing troops on Ukraine’s borders, we began actively promoting for the Emergency Response fund again on February 18, 2022.
Given that Razom is an entirely volunteer-run organization, our grassroots network is our key asset. All of our fundraising efforts for the Emergency Response project are conducted via social media and word-of-mouth. Donors have the option to donate via Facebook and Instagram where individuals are able to start their own fundraising campaigns on behalf of an organization. Razom has spent years amplifying voices from Ukraine in conversations around the world, therefore we were able to swiftly communicate to our community the reality of the war in Ukraine. We organized resources for those interested in an easily accessible information hub (Linktr.ee/RazomForUkraine) and our awareness and global reach grew at least sevenfold in a matter of one-and-a-half days. Razom’s list of resources via the Linktree went viral, even so far as to become a poster slogan at major rallies across New York and D.C. and posted through the social media accounts of people with large followings.
Since our campaign going viral, to date, people have donated over $768,000 via social media alone. These funds will take as much as four weeks to transfer to our accounts, as per the policies of Meta. However with the increased visibility of Razom as a trusted resource for individuals looking to do something about the injustices and tragedy in Ukraine, many people chose to donate directly to our PayPal and bank accounts. Since February 18th, we’ve raised over $1.05M through those efforts. Within 5 days 14,371 donors contributed directly; the average donation size was under $100. In total, we expect to have $1.8M to deploy.
Over the past eight years, Razom has led several projects or partner projects in the healthcare space. These include programs that allow doctors based in the US to train doctors in Ukraine (Co-Pilot Project) and organizing container shipments for hospitals in Ukraine. During the global pandemic Razom led several waves of projects to procure and distribute PPE (in the early days of the pandemic) and later, medical equipment to hospitals. Thanks to the relationships nurtured and impact of those projects, we were able to identify doctors across the United States who could procure medical supplies on behalf of Razom. This list of doctors doubled and tripled within hours through word-of-mouth allowing us to purchase more goods at once to fill large shipments.
When it comes to the logistics and transport process, Razom is building a scalable, repeatable logistics operation to efficiently prioritize needs and deliver goods to the appropriate destinations. We’re partnering with organizations in the US, Ukraine, and Poland, that we’ve worked with since the Revolution of Dignity in 2014. Given the urgency and scale of the needs however, we are also actively building new partnerships. We hope to provide more details soon, and in the meantime you can keep tabs on our progress over on our website.
Thank you so much for your continued support!
Stay razom.
