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Safari Ltd.® Let Imaginations Swim TDmonthly's "2012: A Year of Charity" 2nd 1/4 Roundup, Part IFounded in 1980, Safari Ltd.® is a family-owned business now in its third generation. "From the very beginning, the founders' mission was to educate children and adults alike about our fragile ecosystem and its inhabitants," explained CEO Ramona Pariente, who joined the company in 1985 and took over in 2003. Charity has also been part of the company's mission. In 2011, Safari Ltd.® donated more than $140,000 worth of detailed, hand-painted animal and fantasy figurines to the Kids Wish Network of Holiday, Fla., which reaches out to tens of thousands of children at hospitals and shelters across the country. This year, they joined TDmonthly's "2012: A Year of Charity" promotion and gave away 50 Wild Safari® Sealife Flippers, Fins & Fun gift sets and 50 Frontier Land Safari River Ranch gift sets to three winning specialty toy retailers, who then donated them to their local charities. "The children opened them and played with them immediately," Diana Nelson of Kazoo Toys in Denver reported. She carries Safari Ltd.® at her store and thinks they make wonderful playthings for kids. Her charities were Starlight Kids and Ronald McDonald House, Denver. "All of the toys were great quality toys with an educational bent." Sari Powazek of Doll House and Toy Store in Scottsdale, Ariz. said that her charities — The Crisis Center and Devereaux House — loved that the giveaway contained a mixture of products that could be used for a number of children, over and over, such as the pianos and kitchen sets, and also toys that could be used as individual rewards. "Both of the charities we worked with are going to use the Safari Ltd.® gift sets as a prize to give to individual children who achieved a level of success or goal, such as: sitting doing homework on own, sitting in classroom to not disrupt," explained Sari. "The Safari Ltd.® gift sets were a lot of fun," enthused Dan Driver of Jake's Toy Box in Arvada, Colo. To showcase the Flippers, Fins & Fun set, he and his staff emptied out the fish tank-type canisters that hold mini-erasers, filled them with water and added the Safari figurines. "The River Ranch set was really cool, too," he added. "Yesterday, when we did our last charity toy drop with The Family Tree, Channel 8 videotaped it. The Safari Ltd.® and smaller toys really got a focus." "We are very excited about the donation and hopefully the media attention this will bring to Jake’s Toy Box," said Dana Juniel, director of PR and marketing for The Family Tree. Dan's charities were Stride, Hope House and Family Tree. He was especially thankful for all the joy the giveaways brought because he wife Jill is suffering from a brain tumor that was diagnosed just before they won the contest. The children's excitement was all the more gratifying because the Drivers had opened Jake's Toy Box as homage to their son Jake, who'd passed away from a rare disease at age 4. The charities that Safari Ltd.® helped out with TDmonthly's "2012: A Year of Charity" were: Ronald McDonald House of Denver, Starlight Kids, Devereaux House, The Crisis Center, Stride, Hope House of Colorado and The Family Tree. The winning retailers, who were able to stage events at their stores and pick their favorite charities were Diana Nelson of Kazoo Toys in Denver, Dan & Jill Driver of Jake's Toy Box in Arvada, Colo., and Sari Powazek of Doll House & Toy Store in Scottsdale, Ariz. Read more about Safari Ltd.® here. Specialty toy store owners: Enter to win the latest round of TDmonthly’s "2012: A Year of Charity" and get the chance to give away 100s of educational products to your local schools and children’s charities! Find out how here.
Writer's Bio: ALISON MAREK is an award-winning writer, director and cartoonist whose work has been published by Fairchild Publications and DC Comics (Piranha Press), broadcast on Showtime and other cable networks, and viewed worldwide in film festivals. See her short films and print work on www.alisonmarek.com. Watch her nefarious villains in the web series www.MuggsMovers.com. Get inspired by her cartoons "Daily ARFFirmations to Unleash Your Inner Fido" at www.ARFFirmations.com. Phew! And then ... Read more articles by this author
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