Céline, Okaïdi Marketing Coordinator for Canada, explains how the team was able to organise this special donation for newborns at Montreal’s Centre hospitalier universitaire Sainte-Justine.
Celine, how’d you come up with this idea?
While I was reading in ÏDKIDS TODAY that the neonatal unit at the Necker Hospital had asked Jacadi for help, I figured hospitals here probably had the same needs! Plus, with all the clothing stores closed, I heard from several parents’ groups on Facebook that it was difficult for certain mums with limited resources to clothe their newborns.
With Timothée’s approval, we contacted the maternity ward at the Centre hospitalier universitaire Sainte-Justine in Montréal via Facebook. They gave us the number of the person in charge, and the next day we got permission from the shopping centre to go to the store to pick up clothing from an Okaïdi shop. Then, we set up a meeting with the hospital department to be able to drop off the donation as quickly as possible.
What items did you donate?
We donated about 100 items of clothing, mainly Obaïbi clothing for the newborn babies, but also a few things for their siblings. We also slipped in a few red noses, dominoes and balloons in the clothing bags to bring a little fun into these care units. 😉
What will the clothing be used for?
The priority will be the neonatal unit, which takes care of mothers in urgent medical situations, which are more serious than you might think: when a baby is born early, getting everything you need from one day to the next can be very challenging for some!
What will you take away from this experience?
Personally, being at home all the time, just with my own family, just on WhatsApp, the computer, also means… never seeing what’s going on outside! I ask myself everyday: what can we do to help others, here and how?
Maybe Okaïdi is a foreign brand, but we have a responsibility to our community of parents/customers!
We have brought our WE ACT FOR KIDS commitment to Canada. It’s in Okaïdi’s DNA, so we said “Let’s go!”
