The AKU Society has signed up to AmazonSmile. AmazonSmile is an affiliate marketing service for the online shopping service Amazon. Affiliate marketing is when a company gives some money to a third party for driving web traffic towards its website. In the case of AmazonSmile, the money goes to a charity of the customer’s choice.

Through AmazonSmile, Amazon donates 0.5% of the net purchase price of eligible products (excluding  VAT, returns and shipping fees) to the chosen charity. You get to donate to charity without giving away any of your own money – and you do it by buying Amazon products, which many people do anyway.AmazonSmile was launched in the United States in 2013. Since then, it has raised over $69 million for charities. It was introduced in the UK in November 2017 but restricted to a select group of 11 major charities, including Cancer Research UK, the British Red Cross and the Royal British Legion. It was such a success, however, that it has recently been offered to all UK registered charities.

Supporting us on AmazonSmile as a customer is really easy. You don’t even need to set up a new Amazon account. Just go to smile.amazon.co.uk and (logging into your existing Amazon account (if you haven’t already done so) use the toolbar to search for The Alkaptonuria Society͛. When you have found us, click Select. You then get on to the AmazonSmile website. When you shop there, AmazonSmile donates to the AKU Society automatically. The system also ͚remembers͛ the AKU Society for the next time you log on – just make sure that you go to smile.amazon.co.uk and not www.amazon.co.uk. Importantly, AmazonSmile gives you access to the full range of Amazon products, so you are not missing out on anything!

Between June 15th and June 29th, Amazon have very generously agreed to triple their donations through AmazonSmile. This means that 1.5% of the net purchase price will be donated to the AKU Society if you do your shopping during this period. We would be very grateful for your support.By the way, did you know that the AKU Society was already registered with 

easyfundraising and 

Give as You Live? By registering an account with either of these two websites and selecting the AKU Society, you can also raise money for us by shopping at a number of websites including John Lewis, Expedia and Marks and Spencer.