Wednesday, Jan. 27, 2010

Sending shoes to Haiti's poor

Since earthquake, donations soar

Most days, Jennifer Pierce arrives at her Cameron Village office to a ringing phone, adding more calls to at least a dozen her voice mail racks up overnight.

Every caller has shoes to donate to Pierce's charity: Shoes-4-Souls, which she started 18 months ago to provide shoes to needy people of all ages.

Most callers don't have just one or two or even a dozen pairs to give away, but hundreds.

Jim Micheels, owner of Raleigh Running Outfitters, had 150 pairs of shoes for Pierce.

Dena Floyd, assistant women's soccer coach at N.C. State University, who is leading a campus- wide shoe drive, could not count the number donated.

"One collection container I do know about is the one by my office door, and it is completely full," she said.

Pierce is overwhelmed.

Although her normal collection efforts have provided shoes for hundreds of people in the Triangle, a fresh drive to collect shoes for the victims of the Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti has resulted in a tidal wave of footwear.

"This is way bigger than me now," Pierce said.

A petite woman standing just over 5 feet tall, Pierce, 31, is literally dwarfed by shoes, which overflow out of cardboard boxes, laundry baskets, and plastic bins in the shadow of a mountain of black trash bags stuffed to capacity.

Less than a week after the earthquake, Pierce had collected more than 30,000 pairs of shoes, with thousands more pledged.

"Our goal is to collect 150,000 pairs of shoes for Haiti," she said.

In June 2008, Pierce learned of a family in her neighborhood desperately needing shoes for their young daughter. Efforts to find shoes for the girl led to the discovery that no one in the family had adequate footwear.

The mother's shoes were held together by duct tape, and the father's shoes fit so badly that every step hurt.

She distributed flyers throughout her neighborhood seeking people to donate shoes, and by the time she had filled her neighbors' needs, word had spread. Other needy families came forward seeking shoes, and still other people wanted to give their shoes away.

By the time the earthquake struck Haiti, Pierce had turned her grassroots efforts into a full-fledged, tax-exempt, nonprofit organization.

Pierce seeks sports shoes, and the athletic community has jumped in with both feet.

Micheels is glad to have a local place to donate used running shoes from his customers, many of whom are marathon runners who go through several pairs a year.

"The people in Haiti were needy before the earthquake," Micheels said. "They really need help now."

Micheels, who sponsors the annual City of Oaks Marathon, also donated hundreds of new, leftover race shirts to Pierce's Haiti collections.

Floyd had faith the Wolfpack community would embrace the opportunity to help.

"I know the kind of people I work with here at N.C. State, and know they would want to help," she said.

NCAA rules prohibit athletes from donating their official uniform shoes, but Floyd knows that athletes have plenty of personal shoes they can give to the cause.

"We will keep collecting as long as there is a need," she said.

Pierce, whose career in marketing for mortgage companies plummeted with the economy, has already gone through her savings.

A single mother, she is surviving on a shoestring and the kindness of her church and other local organizations that help her pay household bills.

Despite hardship, she doesn't miss the tough world of mortgage lending.

"In my old job, I dealt with a lot of angry people," she said. "But now I work with people who are happy to give, and needy people who are grateful to simply receive a pair of shoes."

Most charities are asking people to donate money and not materials to earthquake victims because of the difficulty in getting goods to Haiti. That's a challenge, but Pierce is working through it.

A local warehouse donated space and heavy duty packing materials. Local Girl Scouts have volunteered to sort and pack shoes.

Pierce is on the hunt for large shipping containers and transportation assistance.

"When I started this, I knew I was onto something - I knew it could be big," Pierce said. "And now, even though my salary is a fraction of what I used to make, it's worth it. I am at peace with what I am doing."