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Giving feels good, but it's also good for the bottom line. Charity is a viable growth strategy for a lot of companies. Our customers get excited to be a part of what we're doing. If you ask anyone wearing Toms how they first heard about us, most won't mention an advertisement; they'll say a friend told them our story.

I feel a deep sense of responsibility to share everything that we've learned from TOMS, so that others can learn from both our mistakes and the counterintuitive principles that have guided our success.

I can honestly say that TOMS is my future. I mean I have no desire to start any other company for as long as I live because this is the perfect blend of business and philanthropy to me.

There's something to be said for giving and helping to change people's lives.

Some charities treat donors like cash machines. Until now there hasn't been any effective way for them to provide a more personal or interactive giving experience.

The gratification of helping others is a very American tradition and a Judeo-Christian tradition. Now it is great to see young people creating funds and giving back in all sorts of productive ways. It's a terrifically satisfying thing.

People often ask me what I consider my goal to be at TOMS. The truth is that it's changed over the years. When we first began, the goal was to create a for-profit company to help the children that I met in a small village in Argentina.

The future of TOMS is really creating a whole new business model of this one-for-one giving and expanding the TOMS model from shoes into other products as well.

Shouldn't you put the same amount of effort into your giving as you might for your for-profit investments? After all, philanthropy is an investment, and one in which lives - not profits - are at stake.

I like the idea of helping people help people.