Social Entrepreneur Peter Thum Is Converting Guns Into Jewelry

Posted on July 20, 2013 0 Comments18
While University of Texas student Cody Wilson has raised controversy by creating the world’s first 3D printable gun, social entrepreneur Peter Thum is taking the opposite tack. Thum has created a company that works with municipalities and law enforcement leaders to repurpose the illegal guns they seize  into jewelry. The resulting pieces include two bracelets, a necklace and a ring in a unisex spike design from Philip and Courtney Crangi, the brother and sister team of Giles & Brother. Each piece of jewelry carries the serial number of a gun taken out of commission.

The jewelry is intended to send a message about reducing and eliminating gun violence. The company, Liberty United, will contribute 25% of its profits to nonprofits working to reduce gun violence in America.

This is not Thum’s first philanthropic entrepreneurial venture, nor even his first that involves guns. In 2011 he co-founded Fonderie 47 (Forbes coverage here)  a venture to transform AK47 rifles from Africa into jewelry and accessories to fund disarmament. So far, Fonderie 47 has been responsible for removing and destroying more than 32,000 assault rifles from African conflict zones, according to company reports. Thum has also founded Ethos Water, acquired by Starbucks in 2005, which has provided some 500,000 in disadvantaged regions with access to safe water and sanitation and hygiene education.

Thum is being aided in his current efforts by celebrity help: His wife, Cara Buono is an actress, mother and humanitarian whose acting credits include Mad Men and The Good Wife (a personal favorite). Born and raised in the Bronx, the issue of gun violence holds an especially strong relevance in her humanitarian efforts. Actor Mark Ruffalo is also assisting and participating in the company launch.

Would you like to know more? Thum will formally launch the Liberty United collection and website next Monday, June 17th at a New York City event hosted by Mark Ruffalo, Cara Buono and designers Courtney Crangi, and Glenn O’Brien.  The next step, he says, will be additional events in partnered communities including Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Syracuse and Orange County, New York. If you’re not able to meet Thum in person at his launch events, you can visit his site and preview the new jewelry pieces  at www.libertyunited.com.

On a related note, not every day in social entrepreneurship is a smooth one – an April 11, 2013 AP article picked up by the Wall Street Journal and others notes that Thum recently filed suit against a Connecticut woman for copying his idea and business model and passing it off as her own in the wake of the Sandy Hook shootings. Results of that lawsuit are pending, but in the AP article, Thum promises to donate any damages awarded to charities working to reduce gun violence.

Will the project succeed? Regardless of whether the new pieces, ranging in price from $85 to $690, take hold as fashion phenomena, I give props to Thum and his team for dedicating their entrepreneurial abilities to this effort. I look forward to a follow up story on the impact the company makes as well as learning more about the business model structures that are allowing Thum and others like him to succeed as a social entrepreneur.

This news is published in www.forbes.com.

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