It was her idea to donate a brand new teddy bear to the shelter after hearing that she could be helping a little boy or girl badly in need of a friend, and a cuddle. Since we visited the shelter’s office last year, she asks me a lot about when we can go back or if we can visit the women and children in the shelter. While I have to tell her that we won’t go into their living space, we can think of new and creative ways to help, and new and creative gifts to donate. She gave me an idea.
What if we could find out what this shelter, and other shelters were most in need of, and put together a holiday stocking filled with those items? I thought this was an incredible idea, so I turned straight to Google, as well as to a friend who manages a particular organization. Scarlet and I wrote out our shopping list, went to Walmart, and used our brains and hearts to fill stockings for those most in need of the items we hand-picked. It was a hard task for me, because I tend to over-think everything and want to DO everything, but Scarlet gently reminded me of our task at hand. It’s important.
This year, I’m excited that the tradition will continue, although this year we know about period poverty, and we never had before. We learned that 1 in 4 women have struggled to purchase period supplies/products in the past year due to lack of income. And have learned that U by Kotex® is proud to be the founding sponsor of The Alliance for Period Supplies.
This is a new national organization, founded in May of this year, that helps ensure that individuals in need have access to essential period products required to participate fully in daily life. Their mission is to raise awareness of the millions of women living in poverty who miss out on daily life because they lack access to period supplies. The Alliance for Period Supplies also supports the nationwide development and expansion of community-based period supply initiatives capable of providing a reliable supply of period products to individuals in need. They also distribute period supplies and funding to community partners as well as to community-based period supply initiatives.
Not only that, they advocate for legislative changes to make period supplies more accessible and affordable, regardless of income. Remember the October buy, give program? They will be thanking participants for participating in that for the entire month of November. They want to recap the donation made by UbK and Walmart – 5 million period products to women in need! And Walmart donated $25K to the Alliance of Period Supplies. For every purchase of U by Kotex – U by Kotex will donate 2 products.
I get my U by Kotex at Walmart! You can use grocery pickup or walk into the store. Either way, it’s a great time of year to start helping with the donation. Remember, For every purchase of U by Kotex – U by Kotex will donate 2 products!
Have you heard of the buy to give donation?
