Novica is an e-commerce website that enables artisans to sell their handcrafted goods to customers worldwide.
[2] The idea behind Novica came to a group of co-founders at Stanford University in 1995 who collectively felt there must be a better way for artisans in developing nations to sell their goods to customers around the world.
In 1995, Roberto Milk, went to Mina Olivera and her mother, Armenia Nercessian de Oliveira,[3] a human rights officer with the United Nations Commission on Human Rights who was later featured in Elizabeth Gilbert’s novel Eat, Pray, Love.
In 1999, supported by Michael Burns and other seed investors, they took up an office in Santa Monica, CA and launched the NOVICA.com website.
[5][6] By the end of 1999, they opened their first six regional centers located in Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Indonesia, Thailand and Ghana.