How Baby2Baby Leveraged Its Celebrity Connections to Become a Powerhouse L.A. Organization
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Several factors dictate social capital in L.A.; for new moms in town, the most important is being involved with Baby2Baby, a nonprofit that supplies diapers and essentials to children living in poverty. Since 2011 the organization has been led by co-CEOs Kelly Sawyer Patricof and Norah Weinstein, who have cannily leveraged their celebrity friendships—Patricof is a former model and the wife of Hollywood producer Jamie Patricof; Weinstein is a former lawyer married to Brian Weinstein, president of Bad Robot Productions—to grow Baby2Baby from a grassroots endeavor to one of the city’s starriest nonprofits.
Its list of board members and ambassadors reads like a who’s who of cool moms: Jessica Alba, Drew Barrymore, Nicole Richie, Julie Bowen, Kerry Washington, Kate Hudson, Mindy Kaling, Jennifer Meyer, Amy Adams, and Whitney Wolfe Herd. And though a simple Instagram plug from any of these individuals can be hugely influential, they do more than just lend a name. “They host events for major donations, spend time with the families we serve, weave Baby2Baby into the DNA of their own companies, and give millions of items and dollars year after year,” Weinstein says. “At the end of the day, they are all moms and have a natural connection to our mission.”
Ten years ago Baby2Baby was a three-person team—its co-CEOs and an intern worked out of a tiny L.A. warehouse. Today it’s a national organization that has distributed 175 million diapers and other basic necessities to more than a million children in 100 cities. The duo lobbied the state of California to eliminate sales tax on diapers; the change took effect January 2020. “One out of three moms in this country struggles to afford diapers, and diapers have always been and continue to be our biggest need,” Weinstein says.
Then came their greatest test yet: Covid-19. “We feel the last nine years prepared us for this very moment,” Patricof says. Last March diaper requests rose by 350 percent, and Baby2Baby had the infrastructure in place to meet that need immediately, providing 25 million diapers to countless parents who were resorting to using newspapers and towels. In April 2020, FEMA relied on the nonprofit to alleviate the national formula shortage. And, like many other organizations around the world, Baby2Baby quickly pivoted to supplying hand sanitizer, masks, soap, and emergency kits to children living in shelters where social distancing wasn’t possible. Since the pandemic began, Baby2Baby has donated 85 million essential items. But Patricof and Weinstein aren’t celebrating just yet. “The country is opening up for so many, but the families we serve continue to be devastated by the aftermath of the pandemic, so we have our work cut out for us for years to come,” Patricof says.
When natural disaster strikes, Baby2Baby is there too. Earlier this year, when a spate of severe winter storms created a vast blackout in Texas, leaving millions of residents without heat, power, food, or shelter, the charity sent more than 1 million necessities, such as diapers, water, coats, socks, and blankets. And they managed to do it all in just five days. How? By mobilizing their celebrity ambassadors and launching a social media campaign, of course.
This story appears in the Summer 2021 issue of Town & Country.
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