Ange Crocker (Bird in a Cage)

Ange Crocker is a busy mum of two, who together with her husband Carl, pastors Life Church with three campuses in Christchurch, and two partner churches in Bangkok. She’s also the chairperson of La Vida Youth Trust, a community youth trust in Upper Riccarton. And, she’s the creator of ‘Bird in a Cage’, a company raising awareness of human trafficking.

Ange first heard about human trafficking at a Hillsong conference in 2012. She explains, “It was confronting and I came back absolutely shocked just thinking about it.”

A particularly inspiring moment for Ange happened during the conference. As part of a presentation on human trafficking, money tins were handed out and each person was asked to put into the tin, their change or whatever coins they had on them. The audience was then asked to pass their tin to the person to their right. Everyone ended up with someone else’s tin, and a mission, as the speaker, Christine Cain, told the audience, “you’re now responsible for that investment”.

Ange took her tin home to serve as a reminder that she had to do something about trafficking. But she had no idea what to do or where to start.

The following year Hagar contacted her church office asking if anyone would like to meet to learn more about what is being done in the area of human trafficking. Ang met with Hagar representatives, and was taken through a presentation about the work Hagar was doing in its various regions. As Ange walked away from that meeting she felt God spoke to her clearer than what she’d ever heard him before saying, “Now that I’ve opened your eyes to this, you won’t be able to close them.”

Ange could see that Hagar were doing great things but she still wondered how she would be able to support us while still working in a busy role as a Pastor.

For the first few years, Ange would invite Hagar to come speak at her events, but then she started feeling frustrated at her limited resources, with no extra money to give or much time to volunteer, but still feeling passionate about the need to do something.

The idea for Bird in a Cage came to her one day while on holiday as she sat on a beach in the Marlborough Sounds watching all the birds flying around; tuis, bellbirds, and seagulls. Ange looked at them thinking, “birds are so beautiful and free and that’s how they were designed, but we confine them and keep them as pets and put them in a cage.” The realisation came to her… “that’s what trafficked women and children are. They’re designed for freedom, yet people have taken them for their own pleasure and have caged them,” she says. And so, the concept of Bird in a Cage was born.

From there, Ange began to wonder what she could do that related to this concept. She came up with the idea for a range of jewellery with a friend in London helping with designs.

With absolutely no money to get her idea off the ground Ange created a ‘Pledge me’ funding page to help her achieve her goal, hoping that other people would see the value in her idea. For three months she did fundraisers and awareness raising for her goal of $10,000 to invest in design, company formation, and initial stock. The day before the deadline, she reached the goal amount. Ange thought, “now I have to do something”. She was reminded of that tin can and realised that metaphorically, the coins in the tin were increasing.

Ange sourced silver for her jewellery range from Thailand while on a ministry trip. She was able to tour the factory to check everything was “all above board”, then got the first order of jewellery under way.

Five years later, Ange’s ‘Bird in a Cage’ range includes jewellery, candles, soaps, scarves, and various gift products. Each item comes beautifully packaged, with a card explaining how the product contributes to human trafficking prevention, meaning that every product becomes an opportunity for a story to be shared, and a potential talking point for others to find out about the important cause behind it.

To find out more about Ange’s “Bird in a Cage” products, click here.