Kellogg employees, consumers make a difference in the fight against hunger

In an effort truly fitting of W.K. Kellogg's legacy of supporting his community, Kellogg employees, retirees and consumers across the U.S. have united together to help fight the growing hunger epidemic impacting the nation.

Coordinating our campaign Coordinating our campaign to fight hunger was no easy task. This program was the result of a collective effort by many employees from various functions, including Morning Foods Marketing & Promotions, Corporate Social Responsibility, Corporate Communications, Logistics Services, E-business, Digital Marketing, Remarketing, Legal and Consumer Affairs.  The food drives required volunteers from our offices, plants and distribution centers across the U.S. Our employee resource groups also played a vital role in filling volunteer slots during the food drives. In fact, in Battle Creek, all volunteer slots were filled by our employee resources groups within one hour. Our donation of an entire day's worth of cereal production also required extra effort by our Remarketing and Logistics teams, as well as employees at our cereal plants and distribution centers, to coordinate distribution of product and ensure no disruption to our normal production cycle. A big thank-you to the many Kellogg employees who helped to make our campaign a success!

Facebook Causes

In addition to our KelloggCares Facebook page, Kellogg also sponsored a special, one-day promotion to raise funds for Feeding America through the Facebook Causes page. The Causes page allows Facebook users to leverage their network of real friends to effect positive change. Our partnership with Facebook Causes dramatically increased the number of friends on this page from 2,595 to 21,427, while also boosting donations to Feeding America by $4,562. Facebook provided a 15 percent donation match for any donations made to Feeding America through their site that day.

Donate Online Click here to make an online donation to Feeding America.

With the demand for food at food banks across the U.S. at an all-time high, our company in April launched a multi-phased campaign to raise awareness and funds to fight hunger.

Following our donation of an entire day's worth of cereal production to Feeding America, the nation's leading hunger relief organization, U.S. Kellogg employees and returees were encouraged to participate in food drives during the week of June 15.

As employees and retirees participated in food drives, consumers were also asked to help support our efforts through donations to Feeding America via www.kelloggs.com/feedingamerica.

As thousands of Kellogg employees, retirees and consumers came together to fight hunger in their communities, the results of our campaign have been outstanding.

Employee Food Drives

Employees at 34 Kellogg locations throughout the U.S. participated in food drives, collecting 47,000 pounds of food.

Combined with the 3.5 million pounds of cereal we donated to Feeding America, the total pounds of food donated by Kellogg and its employees is roughly equal to the weight of 44 18-wheeler trucks.

And speaking of trucks, it took over 190 trucks to transport our cereal donation to local food banks, not including trucks used to transport food collected during employee food drives.

Many locations also sold special "Kellogg Feeding America" T-shirts, with 100 percent of the proceeds – a total of more than $9,200 – benefiting The Food Bank of South Central Michigan.

"Participation in our food drives was fantastic," says Tim Knowlton, Vice President, Corporate Social Responsibility. "All the food donated by our company and employees will benefit hungry children and families in the communities where we live and work. Together, we are making a difference in the fight against hunger."

Consumer engagement

While boxes of cereal, canned goods and other food items piled up at Kellogg locations throughout the U.S., several celebrities joined our campaign to spread the word to consumers about our efforts to fight hunger.

Samantha Harris – correspondent for CBS-TV's "The Insider" – encouraged consumers to donate online to Feeding America at www.kelloggs.com/feedingamerica. She served as our spokesperson on several local and national television and radio programs, such as "ABC News Now," as well as in print and online publications.

To date, thousands of dollars have been raised for Feeding America through the site.

We also partnered with Katalyst Media – a studio for social media co-founded by actor Ashton Kutcher and film and TV producer Jason Goldberg – to spotlight the issue of hunger through an online video, directed by Ashton's wife and fellow actor Demi Moore.

The video features user-generated content submitted by consumers moved to end hunger following requests that Ashton and Demi posted on their Twitter feed and Facebook pages. It can be found on our KelloggCares Facebook Page, which was designed to spread the word about this campaign as well as our company's other corporate responsibility efforts. The KelloggCares page has already gained more than 100,000 fans in less than two weeks – an amazing response.

Thousands of those fans posted comments to our KelloggCares Facebook page such as, "Really great video – gave me goosebumps in certain parts. Thanks for being such an amazing partner in the fight against hunger, Kellogg."

The overall online response to our efforts has been tremendously positive, including numerous blog postings and over 700 Twitter posts about our campaign and the video.

Numerous celebrities – including Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher, Ryan Seacrest, Marlee Matlin and Soleil Moon Frye – along with Newark, N.J. Mayor Cory Booker have "Tweeted" about our campaign online and provided links to our KelloggCares page.

"Join the Facebook page Kellogg Cares," tweeted Demi Moore. "Please help get the word out," Soleil Moon Frye tweeted, while Ryan Seacrest Tweeted, "Need for food is up 30 percent this year. Thirty-six million Americans are at risk of hunger. Join a community that cares."

The fight continues

The fight against hunger isn't over – and neither is our campaign.

Over 100,000 people have become fans of the KelloggCares Facebook page, have you?

Employees and retirees are asked to continue spreading the word about our campaign through the KelloggCares page to all of their Facebook friends using their home computer (since Facebook is not accessible from work computers).

In addition, employees, retirees and consumers can still donate to Feeding America by visiting www.kelloggs.com/feedingamerica . Those making a donation of $5 or more will receive Kellogg's cereal coupons worth a total of $5.