Frequently Asked Questions

Karmalize helps people spread good karma by supporting socially impactful businesses that are making the world a better place.

We do this through a mobile and web app that lets people:

• Search for socially impactful businesses,
• Tell others why they like them,
• Share these businesses with friends on their social network, and
• Crowdsource our data by suggesting new businesses to add.

Ultimately we want to help socially impactful businesses thrive and continue make the world a better place, but we are not a shopping app. We encourage you to vote with your wallet online and offline with these businesses, and our role is make you aware of them so that you can do so.

Beyond voting with your wallet, you can also help socially impactful businesses by spreading the word on their behalf. Write a review, share with your friends, and suggest businesses that we don't yet know.

No, we are a 100% crowdsourced app and rely on people like you to suggest businesses for everyone to support. We don't upload businesses from arbitrary lists and databases. Every business listed here was personally suggested by someone who knew them and believed in their story.

No, we are a Public Benefit Corporation and provide this app as a free service for all users.

From the home page, there's three ways to search for businesses:

• By entering what you're looking for (e.g. “pizza").
• By entering a city name (e.g. “Dallas").
• By clicking on the down arrow to choose from a list of social causes that you want to support (e.g. “Sustainability" or “Women-owned" business or “Hunger").

The social causes we provide are based in part on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, a “common global language and plan of action for people, planet, and prosperity, by enabling the collective power of individuals worldwide now and into the future". We've also added communities that have historically been underserved or disadvantaged simply because of who they represent. The social causes are organized into three main groups:

Sustainability – promote sustainable practices for a healthy planet and future generations

• Clean Energy – ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
• Climate Change – take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts
• Green Cities – make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
• Land Life – protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss
• Oceans – conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development
• Reduce, Reuse, Recycle – ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
• Water – ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all

Equality – reduce inequality within and among countries

• Black-owned businesses
• Disability-owned businesses
• Gender Equality – achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
• Justice – promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels
• LGBTQ-owned businesses
• Minority-owned businesses, for all other minority groups not already covered (e.g. Latinx, Asian American and Pacific Islander, etc.) from a United States perspective
• Native-owned businesses representing Indigenous communities in the United States
• Non-profit 501c(3) organizations as defined by the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS) organization, and also operating as a social business that sells a product or service
• Small Business as defined in United States Small Business Administration (SBA) guidelines which vary by industry and counts either revenue or employees (e.g. $8-12m for a restaurant, $12-30m for a retail store, 500-1500 employees for various manufacturers)
• Veteran-owned businesses
• Women-owned businesses

Human Rights – ensure basic rights and freedoms for all people based on universal shared values

• Education – ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
• Global Development – strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development
• Healthcare – ensure healthy lives and promote wellbeing for all at all ages
• Hunger – end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture
• Jobs – promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all
• Poverty – end poverty in all its forms everywhere
• Public Infrastructure – build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation

The official United Nations Sustainable Development Goals website provides a definition, overview, targets, indicators, annual progress information for each goal.

Here's a suggested reading list organized by SDG to learn more about underlying social issues. 

Every business on Karmalize has a detailed page dedicated to information only about that business. Near the top of the page is a section showing their review score. When you click the link labeled “Add A Review", you'll be able to leave a review which includes:

• Overall Score (1=lowest, 5=highest) for how much you like this business based on their level of social impact
• Review Title for a 1-line headline about why you like them (e.g. “They'll feed anyone who's hungry and needs help!")
• Content for your feel good story about why everyone should support this business
• Images to optionally upload pictures you'd like to share

Yes! While Yelp reviews can tell you lots about the food experience (e.g. price, offers delivery, takes reservations, outdoor seating) or the service experience (e.g. fast response, virtual consultations), they tell you very little about their impact on the world around us.

That’s where your Karmalize review comes in. We’re looking to support businesses that make the world a better place. Tell us how the business is making an impact in the people, the neighborhood, the city, or social causes and issues around them. Tell us how the business is owned or run by people who represent a community we should all do more to support. Tell us how supporting them will make our world better!

Above all, treat everyone with respect and use your voice with honesty and authenticity. We all benefit when there’s diversity of opinions, but this means that not all reviews will be agreeable to everyone. Nevertheless, we welcome all opinions and ask you to observe these guidelines to maintain a positive environment for all users:

• Equality: Don’t discriminate based on race, ethnicity, nationality, gender or gender identity, sexual orientation, age, or disability.
• Privacy: Don’t publicize anyone’s personal private information, such as name, photo, phone, email, address or other personally identifiable data.
• Civility (in speech): Don’t use threatening, harassing, libelous, defamatory, inflammatory, bigoted, sexist, racist, homophobic, misogynistic, xenophobic, obscene, lewd, profane, or hateful speech.
• Civility (in imagery): Don't use obscene, pornographic, or lewd images. Don’t use imagery of violence, drug use, nudity, near nudity, or sexually explicit acts.
• Sincerity: Don’t impersonate other people or organizations, create or use multiple user accounts, spam a business with multiple reviews, post promotional material, or solicit business.
• Objectivity: Do be as unbiased and objective as possible, recognizing that there are no entirely perfect or entirely imperfect businesses. Celebrate those who are trying their best.
• Legality: Do respect intellectual property and refrain from using copyrighted material without permission. Don’t post any content that is illegal or promotes illegal activity.
• Judgment: Don’t use this platform to debate the worthiness of one person, business, social cause, community, or political ideology over others.

If you see any review that appears to be in violation of these guidelines, please Contact Us. We reserve the right to remove a review for any reason at any time.

Every business on Karmalize has a detailed page dedicated to information only about that business. Near the top of the page is a link labeled “Share", from which you'll be able to share a link to this business via:

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Email 
• Copy which copies the link to your clipboard

Yes! Every business on Karmalize has a detailed page dedicated to information only about that business. At the bottom of each review, there's a link labeled “Share", from which you'll be able to share a link to this review via: 

• Facebook
• Twitter
• LinkedIn

We are a 100% crowdsourced app and rely on people like you to suggest businesses for everyone to support. We don't upload businesses from arbitrary lists and databases. Every business listed here was personally suggested by someone who knew them and believed in their story.

At the top of every page is a link to “Suggest A Business", from which you'll be provided a form to fill out:

• Name – your first and last name
• Email – your email 
• Business Name – of the business you are suggesting
• City – location of the business (to help us if their name does not obviously identify them)

You can suggest up to five businesses on this form.

Alternatively, for your convenience, you can instead upload a picture of the business as long as it has enough information to identify them (e.g. their storefront, logo, restaurant menu, ad, news story etc.).

If you are not already registered on Karmalize, we will create a new account and email your user credential to you. These user credentials are needed only when you wish to write a review for a business.