Dis-Chem helping to make winter warmer

A large retail pharmacy in President Square opened their hearts to the Cradle of Hope again recently when they donated hundreds of blankets to be handed out to those in need.

Roger Brown from the Dis-Chem President Square branch told the News that last year they donated 300 blankets to the Cradle of Hope but this year they wished to give more and donated 500 blankets to the organisation.

Dis-Chem Foundation collects all the blankets from the people who make them for us. We donate a whole lot to various organisations and we realise that the Cradle of Hope does a lot of work for the community, hence we have allocated 200 more than last year. We believe that it is for a good cause,” he said.

He added that they donate blankets not only because is it the start of winter but they also know that many people
do not have the money to keep themselves warm.

Dima Tomotomo from the Cradle of Hope said they were very grateful for the donation and that it was going to a worthy cause.

“Somehow we have a shortage of donations of blankets, especially this year. It is not the same as last year when companies and individuals brought us blankets, so these 500 blankets are going to help a lot,” she said.

When asked if this would be a harsh winter for their beneficiaries, Dima said if the donations do not come in it will be difficult. She added that they were already busy with various blanket drives, and recently started another feeding scheme to assist about 700 people.

So we are hoping that we will get more, but this at least meets some of the needs. We did the stats a month ago and the numbers came up to over 2 000 people that we feed a week,” Dima said.

“We thank the Cradle of Hope for their great work, and we as Dis-Chem Krugersdorp and a Foundation are privileged to be able to make donations because it comes from our benefit programme where we have the opportunity to support organisations like this,” Roger added.