After her younger sister Elizabeth "Liz" Ann Overturf died of breast cancer in 2006 at age 28, Ramona Russell started a charity Web site in her memory. 

Uptown Liz debuted on July 17, 2007, what would have been Liz’s 30th birthday, out of Russell’s home.  The Web site is a retail referral site, a site with links to retail products, that are owned by charities or give a percentage of their proceeds to charity.

Russell toyed with various names for the Web site, looking for something that would describe her sister’s personality.

“I came up with the idea when I was running one day,” Russell said.  “(Liz) was very stylish, a real fashionista, and she wanted to own a boutique one day.”

Uptown Liz started with 80 charitable products and has grown to include more than 600. 

Russell said word of mouth and positive press has helped the site grow.

“People from various circles, in business and philanthropy, seem to have heard of the company or me,” Russell said,  “which I am always surprised by.”

Uptown Liz received national coverage within three weeks of its launch when Daryn Kagan, former CNN anchor, featured it on a video slideshow on her Web site.  And in the past couple of years, Russell has received media coverage from more than 45 outlets, including Sacramento Magazine and FOX News. She said the publicity comes from the site being different.

“What makes it unique and that no one else has done, is you can shop in the cause category that you care about or the product category that you care about,” Russell said. “And it was designed very clean and organized, so it would be easy to shop through it.”

Uptown Liz supports 60 causes, including breast cancer, leukemia and Parkinson’s disease, and is linked to more than 200 retailers.  The Web site gets 250,00 to 300,000 hits per month.  

For more information or to shop for your cause, visit www.uptownliz.com.