I was looking through the news today and the stories were all sad and some were downright angry…until I found this one.
Carrie Jernigan and her kids brightened up the day!
She and her three kids were shopping at a Payless that was going out of business. Her daughter, Harper, found a pair of Avenger shoes that made her think of a classmate who didn’t have money to buy new shoes. She asked if they could figure out what size he might wear and buy them for him.
Carrie jokingly asked the clerk how much it would cost to buy the rest of the shoes that were left in the store. The next thing she knew the clerk was on the phone with the regional manager and before she knew it she was making a deal for the remaining 400 shoes.
When the returned the next day to pick up the shoes, there was a new delivery with 100s of more pairs of shoes to the closing store. Her kids said they couldn’t leave those shoes too!
“12 hours, 95 big boxes, a huge trailer and approximately 1500 pairs of shoes later these 3 excited kids got to buy out the store.”
They are now on a mission to give the shoes away before school starts. They are actively partnering with towns, churches and local businesses to match the shoes with kids. Kibler Baptist Church has offered to donate time and money and is accepting donations if you want to get involved (100% of the money donated will go straight to helping kids): Text the word “kickstart” and the amount given to 479-316-3245.
Expecting it to stop there, she set to work with the help of her community and then she got a call from MSN. They wanted to do a video and article about her “crazy idea” to buy all the shoes. She credits her community for the inspiration behind the action.
But it hasn’t stopped there. Multiple news networks and media have picked up the story of the Payless Shoe store buy-out for charity. It looks like there are a lot of people out there who are tired of sad and mad stories on the news.
What an inspiring story! Love when moms take action when they see a need.
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