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Love Your Melon is an American hat and apparel company that donates 50% of its profits to benefit children with pediatric cancer in the US. It was founded in October 2012 by Zach Quinn and Brian Keller, two students in an entrepreneurship class at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota.
The venture began with a "buy one, give one" model. Quinn and Keller set up their first "Love Your Melon Beanie Stand" outside one of the restaurants owned by Quinn's family. It was stocked with 400 beanies manufactured with loans from friends and family. For every hat they sold, one would be donated to a local child suffering from pediatric cancer. The company took off and eventually they sold so many hats that were more hats to give away than there were children with cancer.
In addition to distributing the free hats, the company now donates 50% of its net profits to various charitable initiatives which benefit children with cancer or support medical research into childhood cancer. The product line has expanded from the original knitted beanies made by Minnesota Knitting Mills to include T-shirts, sweatshirts, and other leisure apparel. By December 2016 the company had grown to 11 employees and brought in $21 million in revenue.