It started with a search for shoes.
It ended with thousands of dollars that will buy shoes - and much more.
Dick’s Sporting Goods on Tuesday awarded Sto-Rox Athletics with a $3,000 grant from its Sports Matter Community Grant Program.
Back in April, Athletic Director Steve Bressler was trying to buy sorely-needed equipment for Sto-Rox sports teams. The track team had no track spikes to speak of. That’s where Dick’s, including Community Marketing Manager Jim Famularo, came in.
“We gathered up from some of the vendors about…$5,800 worth of baseballs, battling gloves, track shoes. As much as we could, different sizes,” he said. “It’s hard to send shoes when you don’t know sizes, but we picked out as many different sizes as we could.”
Bressler was grateful. But little did he know, Dick’s wasn’t done. Bressler said, when he went to pick up the equipment he was told, ‘You have to fill out another application, we want to give you $3,000!’
It turns out, the initial donation experience had motivated Famularo and his colleagues.
“We look for schools that are disadvantaged that we could try to help,” he said. “I talked to the store manager here…and we gave them an additional $3,000 that they can use however they see fit.”
Fast-forward to Tuesday, at the Dick’s Sporting Goods store in Robinson Township. Famularo formally presented a $3,000 check to Bressler and several Sto-Rox student-athletes. It’s part of Dick’s commitment to school and community organizations, not only in Allegheny County, but across the country. Of course, with Dick’s being headquartered just down the road in Coraopolis…
“That’s key,” said Famularo. “The corporate office being here, we like to try to help out as many schools as we can. The grant program is mainly to help out the (sports) programs that we don’t have sponsorship with.”
It’s a healthy donation that will surely help Sto-Rox Athletics improve its equipment and results.
Student-athletes also took home two baseballs autographed by Pittsburgh Pirates players Kevin Newman and Bryan Reynolds, along with an autographed photo of American Olympian Carl Lewis and some additional sports gear.
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From Dick’s Sporting Goods: In 2014, Dick’s and Dick’s Sporting Goods Foundation launched the Sports Matter Program to help underfunded sports programs, and has committed more than $150 million to giving back to sports. Launched in 2018, the Sports Matter Community Grant Program enabled Dick’s stores across the country to select local sports organizations in need to receive a Dick’s Foundation Sports Matter grant.
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