In what is the KnitWell Group’s first collective effort to support the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, the multibrand conglomerate aims to raise more than $10 million.
Through its “Sisterhood of Strength” program, which is running through the end of next month, KnitWell has enlisted 20 influencers to appear in a new ad campaign. Over the past 20 years, Ann Taylor and Loft have raised more than $62 million for BCRF. Last year Lane Bryant, Talbots and Haven Well Within teamed with Ann Taylor and Loft to drum up $5 million in support, bringing the grand total for all five brands to $67 million.
Now that Chicos FAS, which includes Chicos, Soma and White House Black Market, have joined the fold of the KnitWell Group and is joining in on this fall’s BCRF effort, KnitWell is trying to double last year’s total of $5 million. To get the word out, each of the 20 influencers are suited up in clothing from one of KnitWell’s eight brands.
The campaign, which was shot by Mei Tao, will be featured on social media, on the brands’ digital sites and in-store messaging. Video footage was handled by Merciful Thieves. It features “strivers” — all of whom are breast cancer survivors, including influencers Tiffany Dietz and Tegan Higgins, as well as wellness advocates Sarrah Strimel Bentley, Aisha Patterson, and Allyn Rose.
To try to reach that $10 million goal, each of the KnitWell Group’s eight labels are offering a brand-specific Cares Card, which earmarks a percentage of the purchase price of each card to benefit the BCRF and shoppers will be eligible for discounts in stores. In addition, select brands such as Talbots are offering products that will benefit the BCRF. Consumers can also donate directly to the BCRF in the KnitWell Group’s stores, save for Haven Well Within, which does not currently have freestanding locations. Select labels will host a Shop for a Cause event in stores and online on Oct. 5, which is known as “Pink Day.” A percentage of the designated day’s sales will be donated directly to BCRF, and matching donations will be made.
KnitWell is drawing from a sizable in-house and customer base with 45,000 associates, nearly 3,000 retail locations and 20 million-plus customers. The multibrand entity is BCRF’s largest retail partner and the Sisterhood of Strength campaign is the first of its kind to connect eight labels.
Coordinating the two-day photo shoot in its studio at 7 Times Square in July was no small feat, but it is the KnitWell Group’s first joint campaign and a purpose-driven one at that.
The KnitWell Group’s executive chair and chief executive officer Lizanne Kindler said that her aunt Hanne Merriman, former president of Garfinckel’s department stores in Washington, D.C., had inspired her to seek a career in fashion and move to the U.S. from Denmark. Having lost Merriman to breast cancer in 2003 at the age of 61, Kindler said that she “cannot help but think how things may have been different had she been diagnosed today. That’s how quickly breakthroughs are happening, and the treatments are evolving.”
Kindler noted that a woman is diagnosed with breast cancer every 14 seconds globally and one in eight women in the United States will be diagnosed with breast cancer. “We have 20 million customers. That means more than 2.5 million of our customers have been or will be diagnosed with breast cancer,” said Kindler, adding that she is hopeful that a cure will be found in her lifetime.
Bentley said that “brands have so much power to use their reach for good in this world.” Grateful to “not only be alive and thriving, but to be a trusted voice in the breast cancer community and beyond,” she said, “We call it the ‘worst club with the best members.’ If even one woman sees my story and is inspired to find joy on the hardest of roads, then I know I have done something right.”
