Like many high school seniors, Owen Singer is busy applying to colleges and deciding whether to major in business, economics or finance. But unlike many of his peers, he’s also running an enterprise that has raised more than $10,000 for breast cancer research.
Singer founded Cancer Kicks in 2023 after witnessing his mom’s multiple bouts against the disease. The name is a nod to the pink Converse sneakers she wore to her chemo sessions at VHC Health. He donates every penny of sales to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation.
“I just wanted to give back to the community that helped save my mom,” says the Langley High School student, whose charity sells custom designed shoes, sandals, blankets and apparel to provide comfort and hope to patients and their loved ones.
Singer parlayed his past experience reselling clothes online into the cause. He built a website, contracted with product manufacturers and created the designs that now adorn Cancer Kicks products: pink ribbons with a heart, pink boxing gloves, and sayings like “stronger every day” and “fight like a girl.”
In 2024, he decided to make the site an official 501(c)(3) nonprofit, enlisting with pro bono legal help to understand nonprofit law. “Everything that you’re looking at I’ve built,” he says.
His maternal grandmother—also a breast cancer survivor—was his first customer.
“Find the Bright Spots”
Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women, according to the American Cancer Society, and Sue Singer has battled it twice. The first time was in 2019, when she was 44. The diagnosis was stage 0 ductal carcinoma in situ—abnormal cells inside the lining of a milk duct that had not spread to surrounding tissue.
“It was my second mammogram ever,” she says. She underwent a lumpectomy and four weeks of radiation.
“When the pathology came back from the lumpectomy, there wasn’t any cancer in the lump that they took out because the biopsy took all of it,” she says. “That’s how small it was.”
Afterward, she went for screenings every six months for five years, alternating between mammograms and MRI scans.
“It was my last MRI that they found something,” she says. “This time it had left the milk duct, and so that means it’s stage 1. It was still a small tumor. It was still early. But unfortunately, it came back [from testing] triple positive, which is one of the more aggressive breast cancers.”
Triple positive breast cancer is a type of cancer fueled by estrogen, progesterone and the HER2 protein, according to BreastCancer.org. To treat it, Sue opted for a double mastectomy, 12 weeks of chemotherapy and about 10 months of immunotherapy, which stimulates a patient’s immune system to identify and destroy cancer cells.
For her chemo sessions, she decked herself out in pink: pink blanket, pink hair and pink Converse sneakers. The latter would become the inspiration for her son’s nonprofit venture.
“I’m going into this situation with beige walls and beige blankets [and thought], what can I bring with me to have fun?” says the local mom, who also has a 14-year-old son, Liam. “I did all kinds of things just to control what I could control. I try to teach my kids [to find] the bright spots you can do in your life.”
From Idea to Impact
Sue Singer says she was touched when her son told her about his plan for the online shop. But she never expected it to grow the way it has.
“I was like, ‘This will be a fun, cute two-week project,'” she says. “I think [Owen] likes to solve problems. He sees a problem, he’s like, ‘OK, what are different ways I can understand a system to solve it?'”
Early on, the website sold customizable canvas sneakers, but today it offers some 90 products. Bestsellers include T-shirts, travel mugs, blankets and shoes, he says. So far, he’s sold more than 1,000 items.
“I use AI to help design some of this stuff, and then [I tweak] it from there,” he explains. “Once I like something, then I say, ‘OK, is this viable for a T-shirt, or do I need to adjust it?'”
Not everything is branded for breast cancer. Today, the site also allows customers to customize the products as they choose. Titan Farms, the largest peach farm on the East Coast, became the first corporate customer when it ordered 200 custom shirts in 2025. Another corporate customer recently ordered 200 coolers with its logo for a company picnic.
“If there’s a specific design someone wants, [they] reach out to us directly and we figure it out from there,” Singer says. “That’s what the corporate [clientele] mostly is, because a lot of them they want their logo.”
The nonprofit’s marketing has mainly been through email blasts to friends and family, and by word of mouth. Buyers place orders through Cancer Kicks, and the manufacturer ships their goods directly. Where it comes from depends on the product, Singer says.
Future Fundraising
Singer plans to continue running the nonprofit while he’s in college. His outreach efforts ebb and flow, depending on how much schoolwork is on his plate. “When there’s less school stuff going on, I do put more time into outreach, but the orders don’t just go unfulfilled,” he says.
Sales typically spike during Breast Cancer Awareness Month, he says. “But it doesn’t just go dormant in the other parts of the year. Not everything needs to be connected to a special event. Cancer is a year-round issue.”
