Calanthe Grouville FCC/AOS
from the OrchidMania permanent collection

ABOUT ORCHIDMANIA

last updated: April 29, 2004

• Our Mission Statement
  
• The OrchidMania Story
  
• Board of Directors
  
• Board of Advisors
  
• How to contact us
  
• OrchidMania's Greenhouse (contains directions to our greenhouse)
  
• The HIV/AIDS organizations we have helped
  
• Our Efforts to Save Endangered Orchid Species
  
• OrchidMania South Florida

Our Mission

OrchidMania’s primary mission is to provide financial and moral support to grassroots AIDS prevention and relief organizations in the United States, Central America and Southeast Asia. Moreover, it is our goal to encourage interest and enthusiasm for orchid cultivation, conservation and appreciation, and to provide a comfortable and positive vehicle for people of all kinds to give their time and talents to AIDS relief.

Our Story in a Nutshell

OrchidMania is one of the world's most unusual HIV prevention and AIDS relief fundraising organizations. OrchidMania is a 501(3)(c) Nonprofit California Corporation.

Every year, amateur and commercial orchid growers around the world give us thousands of live orchid plants, which we sell at the "World's Largest Orchid Garage Sale" and other events. Proceeds from our sales help support grassroots AIDS organizations in the United States, Central America and Southeast Asia.

OrchidMania is an all-volunteer organization with no paid staff. We operate a 1500 square foot commercial greenhouse in San Francisco, where we grow an incredibly diverse collection of orchid plants fromaround the world.

Of our almost-fifty volunteers, approximately half participate in our horticulture program and gain hands-on experience with orchid cultivation, propagation, laboratory work and crop management. Following completion of the next phase of our greenhouse construction we hope to offer vocational training to at-risk urban young people.

Our greenhouse also houses our "red tag collection," a conservation-oriented permanent collection of rare and endangered orchids. OrchidMania is happy to accept donations of unusual orchid species for inclusion in our conservation-through-cultivation program.

When our rare and endangered plants grow large enough to be divided, these divisions are disseminated to other conservation-oriented programs or offered to breeders who will produce further offspring from these plants.

The OrchidMania idea is gradually catching on in other parts of the world. We helped organize OrchidMania South Florida in 1998. We hope to form OrchidMania groups in Southern California, Michigan, Costa Rica, and Australia in the future. Volunteers are always welcome -- visit us at one of our events to learn more about OrchidMania.