By Steve Jalsevac
May 7, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Twelve years ago three young men not long out of university decided to channel part of their strong pro-life convictions to support and improve the Culture of Life through telecommunications. They saw a need for such a service given that almost all the major companies in the field were in some way tied to abortion or anti-family organizations. And so in 1996 they founded what is now called the Sienna Group, a Cincinnati, Ohio based company offering a wide variety of competitively priced and quality telephone, mobile phone and Internet services.
David Condit spoke to LifeSiteNews about the unique company. Condit related that he and current president Timothy Bischel are two of the three founders still active in Sienna. They are strongly Catholic and have always been pro-life. That was their upbringing, he says.
Condit says that the founders saw forming Sienna as “an opportunity to merge two things that we like to do together as opposed to just being in business or just continuing on as pro-life volunteers.” He did a lot of volunteering for pro-life and his father and brother, both attorneys, represented pro-lifers free of charge at the time when there were numerous protests on the 1980s. “It gave us a lot of exposure to the injustice of the legal system on those issues.”
Sienna offers services of comparable quality and price to end users who in turn designate a pro-Life or Catholic charity or cause of their choice. LifeSiteNews, for instance, as part of its fundraising efforts, is encouraging readers who sign up for Sienna services to make LifeSiteNews their designated charity. Other charities would likewise promote Sienna to their membership in order to gain continuing funds from the Sienna program.
Sienna then sends a percentage (depending on services and plans chosen) of each user’s paid monthly bill to their designated charity. This money comes out of Sienna’s profits as opposed to increasing the price to the customer.
Condit says Sienna has sent contributions over its 12 year history of close to $1 million to over 2,000 organizations. He said there have been several companies who tried to run a similar but slightly different operation over the years, but they floundered whereas Sienna has experienced steady growth in each year of its existence.
The quality of Sienna’s services is comparable if not identical in many instances to the major carriers because they use the same networks as the major carriers. Condit says Sienna focuses more on residential and small business markets and their customer care/support staff are in the U.S allowing the service to be more friendly and personal.
The services provided are: mobile Service (Voice/Text/Picture Messaging/Data/Web), 1 + Long Distance, Toll Free Service, Conference Calling (On Demand 24/7), Travel Cards and soon they will offer Nationwide DSL via Aircard.
“In summary”, Condit says, “we offer quality, commonly used services to customers who can designate a Pro-Life, Pro-Family organization to receive much needed funds from their usage on a monthly basis. We tell people, “don’t change your habits, simply change providers.”
See the Sienna Group website https://www.sienna-group.com/