Bears on Patrol is my new charity to provide free teddy bears to police officers to use in calls where small children are involved.
I was talking with someone yesterday about doing something for kids who want to help out. They mentioned that the kids might like donating bears better than money, because it feels like they’re helping more directly. The only problem with that is that I need to make sure that the bears I use can fit into the custom shirts I make for them.
I thought about a system where they could “adopt” a bear, giving it a name, and maybe some other things. Then the website would have a feature where they could log in and see the profiles of the bears they’ve adopted, including where (city, state, police department) their bears ended up.
What do you think about this idea? I think it could work except that the younger kids wouldn’t really know enough to create a login to view their bears. Any suggestions? Would this be difficult or expensive to pay someone to create with PHP? If anyone here can do this and is willing to donate the project (hopefully we will be an official nonprofit soon), you will be given permanent credit on the site with a link.
The Bears on Patrol program is about to make one small step for a bear, and one giant leap for the program with the anticipated departure of Joey Bear to the Bremen Police Department in Bremen, Georgia. Joey will be going out tomorrow to my former employer, Stitch America until they contact a friend of theirs at the police department to see if they are interested in working with the bears.
“Change.” “Yes We Can!”. A few months ago, if someone asked you what came to mind when they said, “Change”, what would your answer have been? Different? Coins? A chemical reaction? What would your answer be now? I would be surprised if it were not something involving Obama, his campaign, or ideas.
Barack Obama teaches us a good lesson about branding your business. Take a simple word or phrase, attach personal meaning that your audience can relate to, spread the word about these words or phrases, and you’ve built yourself a brand. Think of the wide impact of Obama’s branding efforts. Let’s pull some headlines from a few of the major news sites. (color added for emphasis)
When the news media picks up on your branding and begins using it in their headlines, it becomes that much more effective, and you know you’re doing well. What are your thoughts on this?
I’m looking for anyone to help support this new cause I’ve started, either financially or by spreading the word.
Bears on Patrol (BOPS) provides police officers and departments with teddy bears free of charge to help distract and comfort small children in police calls where they are involved.
I have sent an email to someone at the Carroll County Sheriff’s Office to see if they are interested, so this is just being tested locally at the moment, if they want to give it a try. I’m hoping to launch this on a wider scale, maybe nationally.
You can see my web pages for this at http://www.blakesdesigns.com/bears.
You can also see a better picture of one of the demo bears in this Flickr photoset here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/n4bwr/sets/72157608599501378/
Thanks to anyone who is willing to help out.
Forgot to mention, if you are on Facebook, I have a page set up here.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/Bears-on-Patrol/43667589605?ref=mf
