Cause Marketing/Corporate Partnerships

USANA Health Sciences announced that it will donate $10 for every ace served at WTA events throughout the 2011 season, beginning with The Championships at Wimbledon. The Women's Tennis Association (WTA) will support USANA's contribution with a $25,000 donation. All proceeds from the "Ace Out Hunger" program will benefit Children's Hunger Fund (CHF), a global nonprofit organization fighting hunger in impoverished regions around the world.

A recent charitable giving report found that corporate America stepped up to the plate to give in larger numbers last year, up 8.8% after inflation from the year before.

But not every corporation is writing checks these days.

For instance, this year, in honor of its 100-year anniversary, IBM asked its employees around the world to commit to a day of service on June 15, and more than 300,000 took the call. According to the company, close to three-quarters of its global workforce volunteered in more than 5,000 projects in 120 countries.

The public didn't just open their hearts to Prince William and Kate Middleton this spring. They opened their wallets — to the tune of $1.7 million raised for charity by the Royal Wedding Charitable Gift Fund.

William and Kate set up the fund so that anyone who wished to send them a wedding gift could instead donate to the couple's chosen charities. In the end, the fund took in a grand total of $1,706,828 according to St. James's Palace.

Walmart and the Walmart Foundation announced a $25 million giving campaign aimed at filling the gaps created when schools close for the summer. Funding to more than 350 local nonprofit organizations will help expand nutrition, learning and employment services for elementary, middle and high school students throughout the 2011 summer months. According to the National Summer Learning Association, the achievement gap between higher- and lower-income youth can largely be attributed to unequal access to summer learning opportunities and critical needs like healthy meals.

Pirate’s Booty, manufacturer of all-natural snacks, is pleased to announce its participation with Diana Taurasi of the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury in Hoop Heroes, a fundraising initiative that benefits After-School All-Stars (ASAS), a 501(c)3 charity that provides free after-school programs to disadvantaged youth across the nation.  Pirate’s Booty will donate $10 for every point WNBA Taurasi scores during the 2011 WNBA season. Taurasi is a two-time WNBA champion, two-time Olympic Gold Medalist, and named to the All-WNBA First Team six years in a row. She is the first WNBA player to become a Hoop Hero.

Recoup, a new philanthropic social engine that brings together cause-oriented businesses, consumers and nonprofits, unveils its pre-beta demonstration site, www.recoup.com. Visitors can sign up, view prototype offers, explore the site’s functionality and preview some of its featured nonprofit partners.

NHL Green, the National Hockey League’s sustainability initiative, unveiled the NHL Water Restoration Project, an unprecedented commitment to balancing the League’s water footprint that will make the 2011 Stanley Cup Final the first ever water-neutral series in League history.

Through the project, the NHL has pledged to restore at least one million gallons of water to Oregon’s Deschutes River, replenishing an important resource in a critically dewatered ecosystem. Total water used throughout Rogers Arena and TD Garden, from the faucets to the ice surface, will be tracked and its equivalent restored through Bonneville Environmental Foundation’s Water Restoration Certificates.

The NASCAR Foundation announced that Office Depot, the official office products partner of NASCAR(R) and co-primary sponsor of Tony Stewart and the No. 14 Office Depot/Mobil 1 team in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, will offer new NASCAR Unites wristbands at more than 1,100 Office Depot stores nationwide.

Advanced Remarketing Services Inc., provider of car donation programs for nonprofit organizations, reinforces its commitment to supporting the humanitarian relief effort for children by partnering with the U.S. Fund for UNICEF. The U.S. Fund for UNICEF helps provide children with health care, clean water, nutrition, education, emergency relief and more. UNICEF’s relief work has saved more lives than any other humanitarian organization in the world.

Tributes Inc., an online resource for local and national obituary news, and FirstGiving, an online peer-to-peer fundraising tools provider, announced that they have formed a strategic partnership. Tributes.com has integrated FirstGiving’s Global Charity API Platform throughout the obituary classified destination site to help facilitate memorial giving to major charities in line with the final wishes of those who have passed away and are permanently memorialized in the Tributes.com database.