Office Depot Foundation Helps Kids Get Ready for School by Donating 300,000 Backpacks across the U.S. and Canada

DELRAY BEACH, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--With the new school year just around the corner, the Office Depot Foundation - the independent foundation serving as the primary charitable giving arm of Office Depot (NYSE:ODP) - is donating 300,000 backpacks to deserving children to help them get ready for school.

The backpacks are being provided to scores of non-profit organizations and schools across the U.S. and Canada through the 2008 Office Depot Foundation National Backpack Program. The recipients, in turn, will give the backpacks to children they serve in classrooms and through social service programs. In the eight years of this program, Office Depot has donated nearly 1.8 million backpacks.

“By placing backpacks containing essential school supplies into the hands of children, we are giving them important tools they need to start school with confidence – and to succeed throughout the year,” says Mary Wong, president of the Office Depot Foundation. “The National Backpack Program is one of the key ways in which we seek to accomplish the Foundation’s mission – Listen Learn Care™ - and to achieve our strategic priority of helping children get ready for life and work.”

To distribute the backpacks, the Foundation is hosting 25 “Backpack Donation Day” events across the United States and Canada. Presentations are scheduled for four South Florida cities on August 6 – Delray Beach, West Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale and Miami - and will be followed by events in other cities from coast to coast.

The Miami event will feature Carl Edwards, driver of the No. 99 Office Depot Ford in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and a former substitute teacher in his hometown of Columbia, Mo. Edwards has already hosted events in Chicago and Indianapolis. For the first time this year, a backpack donation will be made to children of the Navajo Nation in Arizona.

Thousands of backpacks also are being donated by Office Depot stores in hundreds of local communities and in collaboration with the Office Depot Business Solutions Division in selected cities. Thousands more will be distributed through the Office Depot Foundation’s partnerships with eight national non-profit organizations – including the National Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) Association, City Year, Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America, Feed The Children, the Kids In Need Foundation, Nourish America, Teach for America and the National Foundation for Women Legislators (NFWL). In another first for the program, NFWL members in all 50 states will donate backpacks to children in their districts and communities.

The 2008 backpacks come in five different color schemes, blending orange, blue, red, purple, green and – for the first time – pink. Designed primarily to meet the needs of students in grades K-5, the backpacks feature two front pockets and wide, padded straps. Each backpack contains a pencil pouch containing essential back-to-school items - a ruler, four crayons, a glue stick, a pen, a pencil, a pencil sharpener and an eraser.

Fun Facts about the 2008 Office Depot Foundation National Backpack Program

• If the nearly 1.8 million backpacks donated since the inception of the program in 2001 were stacked on top of each other, they would be taller than 267 Washington Monuments!
• If all 300,000 Office Depot Foundation backpacks were placed end-to-end, they would cover a distance of 80.5 miles.
• The 300,000 backpacks fill 12,000 boxes weighing 372,000 pounds – the approximate weight of 31 African elephants.
• The backpacks contain enough crayons for every resident of Vermont and the District of Columbia.
• If every child who receives a backpack from the Office Depot Foundation in 2008 came together at one time to watch a professional football game, they would fill nearly every seat in Lambeau Field, the Louisiana Superdome, Soldier Field in Chicago, Dolphin Stadium and Fawcett Stadium at the NFL Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

Source: Office Depot Foundation, www.officedepotfoundation.org

About the Office Depot Foundation

The Office Depot Foundation is an independent foundation that serves as the primary charitable giving arm of Office Depot. In keeping with its mission, Listen Learn Care™, the Foundation strives to make a positive impact on communities around the world. The Foundation supports programs that enhance the quality of life for children, strengthen communities, encourage local and global economic growth, and empower schools and non-profit organizations. It also provides support when disasters strike - doing what it can not only to speed the process of rebuilding, but also to mitigate the impact of future disasters. For more information visit www.officedepotfoundation.org.