Footwear companies offer aid after Hawaii disaster

Many organisations, including some footwear and fashion companies, took steps to offer practical assistance.

As people on the Hawaiian island of Maui tried to cope with the devastating wildfires which brought such suffering to many thousands of residents and visitors, many organisations, including a number of footwear and fashion companies, took steps to offer practical assistance. With busloads of survivors reportedly arriving at Maui’s hospitals and shelters with nothing on their feet, it was obvious that they needed footwear as well as other items to bring back some form of normality to their shattered lives.

The Soles4Souls footwear charity mobilised its efforts, working with established partners on the ground in Hawaii to assess the need and determine how best to help. At the height of the disaster, Patagonia’s global movement organisation ‘1% for the Planet’ issued a statement urging the fashion industry to see the wildfires as a ‘wakeup’ call, and shared a list of Hawaii-based groups that it had vetted for donations.

Meanwhile, footwear producer Skechers announced that it would donate USD 250,000 to the Hawai’i Community Foundation Maui Strong Fund, which was created to provide disaster response and recovery resources to Maui communities. It also aimed to distribute around 20,000 pairs of Skechers shoes and a similar number of clothing items, in addition to employee contributions of blankets, toiletries, towels and undergarments.

Publishing Data

This article was originally published on page 2 of the September 2023 issue of SATRA Bulletin.

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