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NASCAR® Driver Tony Stewart and the Office Depot Foundation Team up to Donate 3,000 Sackpacks to Northern Kentucky KidsFLORENCE, Ky. --(Business Wire)-- Office Depot (NYSE: ODP), celebrating 25 years as a leading global provider of office supplies and services, and the Office Depot Foundation today announced that Tony Stewart, driver of the No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevrolet Impala in the NASCAR® Sprint (News - Alert) Cup Series™, will join the Foundation to kick off the back-to-school season by donating 3,000 new sackpacks to non-profit organizations and schools in Northern Kentucky. The Office Depot Foundation will present the sackpacks, which contain essential school supplies, during a special "Back-to-School Celebration" beginning at 4 p.m. local time on Wednesday, July 6 at the Office Depot store located at 6825 Burlington Pike in Florence, Kentucky. In addition to Stewart, special guests scheduled to attend include Florence Mayor Diane E. Whalen; Boone County Schools Superintendent Randy Poe; Covington Independent Schools Superintendent Lynda Jackson; Newport Independent School District Interim Superintendent Dan Sullivan and others. Stewart is partnering with the Office Depot Foundation for the third consecutive year to support the Foundation's National Backpack Program, helping to donate 350,000 sackpacks throughout the 2011 back-to-school season, which is the most sackpacks given out in a single year since the program started in 2001. "I am proud to team up with the Office Depot Foundation again to help so many children in need," Stewart said. "I can't wait to see the children's excitement when they get a new sackpack - it's such a rewarding feeling to know the positive impact a donation like this has on their life. I've always believed that no matter what career path you choose in life, education is the foundation to success, and every kid deserves to head back to school with the tools they need to succeed." The non-profit organizations, schools and agencies scheduled to receive sackpacks during the back-to-school event on July 6 include:
The Office Depot Foundation will donate sackpacks to peedway Children's Charities in conjunction with the back-to-school event. Fans can also purchase school supplies inside the Florence Office Depot store and donate them to charity by dropping off the supplies at Feed The Children's special Office Depot/Office Depot Foundation tractor-trailer that will be onsite during the event. Additionally, Stewart's No. 14 Office Depot Chevy will feature a special back-to-school paint scheme during Saturday night's NASCAR Sprint Cup Series™ Quaker State 400 race at Kentucky Speedway (Saturday, July 9, 7:30 p.m. EDT, TNT). The colorful paint scheme will incorporate a variety of school supplies essential for kids to achieve success in the classroom, including pencils, pens, crayons, glue, calculators and more. "We always get excited about sporting a new back-to-school paint scheme on our No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 Chevy," Stewart said. "As parents begin thinking about the start of a new school year, this paint scheme is a fun way to remind them that Office Depot provides one-stop, back-to-school shopping for their children's school supplies." National Backpack Program Through the National Backpack Program, which is now in its 11th year, the Office Depot Foundation will help deserving children prepare for school by donating specially designed sackpacks across the United States and internationally. The sackpacks, which come in five colorful designs, reflect and respond to changes in the ways that children are taking their materials to school. "In keeping with our mission - Listen Learn Care - we've created these fun and exciting sackpacks in response to what kids have told us they like," says Foundation President Mary Wong. "We are thrilled to donate these very cool sackpacks to more children in a single year than ever before. By the end of 2011, Office Depot and the Office Depot Foundation will have made a difference to more than 2.5 million children through this award-winning initiative!" To provide its sackpacks to children in 2011, the Office Depot Foundation is hosting 25 "Back-to-School Celebrations" in cities across the U.S. and in Puerto Rico - five of which will include Stewart. Thousands of sackpacks also are being donated through Office Depot stores in hundreds of local communities and in collaboration with Office Depot's Business Solutions Division in select cities. Thousands more are being given to kids through the Office Depot Foundation's partnerships with the Tony Stewart Foundation, the National Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) Association, Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America (CADCA), Feed The Children, the Kids In Need Foundation, Zach Bonner's Little Red Wagon Foundation, the National Foundation for Women Legislators and a new partner, Samaritan's Feet International, which will distribute sackpacks both nationally and overseas. For the fourth consecutive year, donations will be made to children of the Navajo Nation in Arizona. More information about the National Backpack Program can be found on the Office Depot Foundation's Facebook (News - Alert) page at www.facebook.com/officedepotfoundation. For information on the Office Depot Foundation and its initiatives, go to www.officedepotfoundation.org/. You can also follow the Foundation on Twitter (News - Alert) at www.twitter.com/officedepotfndn. About the Office Depot Foundation The Office Depot Foundation is an independent foundation (tax exempt under IRC Sec. 501(c)(3)) that serves as the independent charitable giving arm of Office Depot, Inc. In keeping with its mission, Listen Learn Care®, the Foundation supports a variety of programs that help children succeed in school and in life; enable civil society (non-profit) organizations to become more efficient and effective; help people and businesses prepare for disasters, then recover and rebuild afterwards; strengthen local communities through grants, product donations and volunteerism; and encourage community development through entrepreneurship and economic innovation. For more information, visit www.officedepotfoundation.org. About Office Depot Celebrating 25 years as a leading global provider of office supplies and services, Office Depot is Taking Care of Business for millions of customers around the globe. For the local corner store as well as Fortune 500 companies, Office Depot provides supplies and services to its customers through 1,641 worldwide retail stores, a dedicated sales force, top-rated catalogs and global e-commerce operations. Office Depot has annual sales of approximately $11.6 billion, and employs about 40,000 associates around the world. The Company provides more office supplies and services to more customers in more countries than any other company, and currently sells to customers directly or through affiliates in 55 countries. Office Depot's common stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol ODP. Additional press information can be found at: http://mediarelations.officedepot.com and http://socialpress.officedepot.com/. Note to media: These sackpacks are not available to the general public. They are being donated only to the designated recipients named above. |
