Brighton's Shoe Drive a Success

Southwest Florida residents donated 2,542 pairs of shoes to Coconut Point’s Brighton Collectibles during its annual campaign to provide footwear for the needy. The amount shoes collected at the Estero store was more than any other of Brighton Collectibles’ 125 stores across the country.

Twelve other Brighton stores collected more than 1,000 pairs for shoes. Company-wide, Brighton Collectibles received 73,163 pairs of shoes.

“We’re ecstatic,” said store manager Amanda Hodge. “When we kicked this off we had just under 200 pairs of shoes. Then the article ran in The News-Press and people started donating shoes from all over Southwest Florida. I never knew so many people read The News-Press."

“We had one gentleman from a local church who put a notice in his church’s bulletin,” Hodge said. “This past Sunday, he dropped off 179 pairs of shoes.”

Throughout the month of May, the women’s boutique collected footwear as a way to bring attention to the 300 million children in the world who have never owned a pair of shoes. The store teamed up with Soles4Souls for the footwear fundraiser.

Brighton Collectibles’ goal was to collect 50,000 pairs of shoes company-wide, Hodge said.

“We’ve been getting a lot of congratulatory emails this morning,” Hodge said.

The footwear collected during the Brighton event will be sent to Soles4Souls primary distribution center in Roanoke, Ala., where it will be inspected, sorted by gender and size, packaged and then shipped. The footwear will await distribution to the first qualified charity or regional partner that expresses a need.