Not For Sale (organization)
Open-knowledge reference entry
Not For Sale is an American nonprofit organization that combats human trafficking, modern slavery, and environmental exploitation through enterprise-driven solutions. Founded in 2007 by David Batstone and Mark Wexler in San Francisco, California, the organization operates projects across multiple countries in the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Asia.
While Not For Sale remains a registered charity, it deploys a multi-legal platform that includes nonprofits, for-profit enterprises, cooperatives, and foundations, using whatever combination of legal structures a given problem demands. The organization's model has produced several independently notable initiatives, including the beverage company REBBL, the Amsterdam restaurant group Dignita, the consumer supply chain transparency app Free2Work, and the anti-trafficking sports initiative Free2Play.
Not For Sale has been featured by CNN, Forbes, Fast Company, USA Today, VICE, CNBC, Stanford Social Innovation Review, MarketWatch, and Voice of America. USA Today featured the organization alongside Facebook, Google, and Salesforce as an example of technology's new entrepreneurial approach to philanthropy. The organization received an Anthem Awards Silver in 2025.
History
Founding
Not For Sale was established in 2007 by David Batstone, a professor of ethics at the University of San Francisco, and Mark Wexler, a social entrepreneur. Batstone's 2007 book Not For Sale: The Return of the Global Slave Trade — and How We Can Fight It had drawn international attention to human trafficking after Batstone discovered that staff at a restaurant near his home in the San Francisco Bay Area were victims of a trafficking ring.
While researching the book, Batstone traveled to Thailand's Golden Triangle, where he met Kru Nam, an artist and activist who had been rescuing stateless and trafficked children near the borders of Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar.
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