20,000 People Touched: One of USA's Largest Thanksgiving Volunteer Events - BIG SUNDAY's 13th Annual Thanksgiving STUFFING Event - Over 2,000 Volunteers From Every Walk of Life Uniting to Help Thousands This Holiday Season on Wednesday, November 27, 2024, 9 AM - 12 PM at Radford Studio Center in Los Angeles; Many Recipients Will Themselves Volunteer to Give as Well as Receive. It's a Festival of Gratitude!

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Nov 20, 2024, 09:27 ET

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 20, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Big Sunday, one of the USA's foremost organizations connecting people through helping and volunteering opportunities of all kinds will host its 13th Annual BIG Thanksgiving Stuffing Event – a Festival of Gratitude on Wednesday, November 27th from 9 AM – 12 Noon at Radford Studio Center, 4024 Radford Ave, Studio City, CA 91604. On the day before Thanksgiving, more than 2,000 volunteers of all ages, races, ethnicities, religions, genders, abilities, socio-economic backgrounds and political affiliations from across Southern California will unite to enjoy each other's company while working to sort food, and stuffing and handing out over 4,000 bags of food to kick off the holiday season, as well as many other helping activities. Many of the participants helping will also be receiving assistance underscoring Big Sunday's belief that the world isn't divided into the "haves" and the "have nots". Rather, the world is full of the "haves" and the "have mores" – everyone, regardless of personal circumstance, has some way in which they can help someone else, everyone has some time that they need help, and we all have to look out for one another. The event will take place on "Residential Street," part of the iconic film and television studio lot and namesake of Studio City, owned and operated by Hackman Capital Partners. This section of the Radford lot is home to outdoor sets used in Leave it to Beaver, Seinfeld, Will & Grace, and many of America's favorite television shows.

In 2022, US Vice President Kamala Harris & second gentleman Douglas Emhoff participated in Big Sunday's 11th Annual BIG Thanksgiving Stuffing Event, helping to stuff bags of food along with all the other Big Sunday participants. More than 100 schools and nonprofits will receive bags, helping a host of underserved people across the community. The bags will feed 16,000 people, and this one event will engage, touch & connect over 20,000 people of all ages and backgrounds. Photo credit: Bill Devlin

Big Sunday participants hard at work at the organization's 2023 Annual Thanksgiving Stuffing event. This year, over 2,000 Volunteers from every walk of life and of every background will unite to help thousands this Holiday Season on the day before Thanksgiving, Wednesday, 11/27 in Los Angeles at one of USA's Largest Thanksgiving Volunteer Events - BIG SUNDAY's 13th Annual Thanksgiving STUFFING Event. Photo Credit: Bill Devlin https://bigsunday.org/

Each bag of food serves a family of 4, and the bags will be distributed to more than 100 schools and nonprofits throughout Southern California, helping working poor families, homeless people, veterans, seniors, ailing people, victims of domestic violence, people with special needs, runaway youth and a host of other people across the community. The bags will feed 16,000 people, but between recipients, volunteers, collectors, sponsors, donors and vendors, this one event will engage, touch and connect more than 20,000 people of all ages and backgrounds. The event is an opportunity to celebrate our dissimilarities while enjoying what we all share – a key message during these times.

This year's event has drawn a remarkable response. "This has been such an emotional time. And whether one is delighted or devastated by this month's election, I think most people are looking forward to sharing a day where we celebrate our differences while uniting for a common goal," said David Levinson, Big Sunday's founder and executive director, and author of Everyone Helps, Everyone Wins, How Absolutely Anyone Can Pitch In. Help Out. and Give Back. to Make the World a Better Place. Levinson, considered an expert in the field of volunteerism, is consulted widely by cities, nonprofits, corporations and other volunteer organizations. Several individuals and groups, including schools, religious institutions, businesses, non-profits and families from across Southern California are already participating. They are hosting collections and dropping off hundreds of pounds of food at the Big Sunday headquarters, sponsoring the event, purchasing food items for the bags from the online food registery, sponsoring individual bags of food via the Big Sunday website, making cards to be included with each bag, signing up to volunteer at the event and collecting hundreds of dollars to be put toward food in preparation for the event. Every one of the bags will include a generous supply of delicious fresh produce, thanks to a very generous donation from Food Forward. Big Sunday and Food Forward have enjoyed a long and fruitful partnership.

Big Sunday (www.bigsunday.org) has been connecting people with opportunities to help, volunteer and to do good works together since 1999. Founded in Los Angeles 25 years ago by David Levinson with just 300 volunteers, Big Sunday has touched over a 1 million lives, engaging, empowering and uniting people of every imaginable background all over California, from San Diego to San Francisco, and in more than 25 different states as well as Australia, Asia and Europe. Big Sunday has completed in excess of 1.75 million volunteer man-hours and the organization has collected and distributed hundreds of thousands of items of clothing, food, toiletries, school supplies, furniture, appliances and other essentials. The organization functions as an efficient and impactful clearing-house of volunteerism, giving and community engagement. Big Sunday produces, promotes or sponsors over 2000 unique helping opportunities every year, which engage, empower, and unite people of every age, background and means to work together to support the huge variety of causes that they care about. Big Sunday's mission is to connect people through helping. Big Sunday builds community driven by the belief that absolutely everyone has some way that they can help someone else. Big Sunday was named by the Points of Light Foundation as one of "10 national nonprofits that are making a tremendous impact on our country's most critical challenges by mobilizing volunteers…These organizations also demonstrate a collaborative spirit through partnerships with other organizations to help strengthen communities across the nation."

Media RSVP and Talent Inquiries: Rachel Schwartz/PR AdvantEDGE, Inc.

The BIG Thanksgiving Stuffing Event is a great way to kick-off the Holiday Season! Opportunities available for wonderful visuals and interviews with a cross section of people discussing what we share in common as a community and how and why they want to help others this Holiday Season.

For more information, to sign up, or to help in other ways, please visit Big Sunday's 13th Annual Thanksgiving Stuffing Event page.

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13th Annual Thanksgiving Stuffing Event's Generous Sponsors:

Albertsons

Richard & Shari Foos
Hackman Capital Partners/Radford Studio Center

CBS
Food Forward
Lisa Z. & Joshua L. Greer
The John & Marilyn Wells Family Foundation
Los Angeles CD4/Councilperson Nithya Raman
The Rosenthal Family Foundation
Sugar Foods Corporation

Endeavor
The Goldberg & Hennelly Family
Second District LA County/Supervisor Holly Mitchell
Wilshire Rotary Club

Simon K. Anderson
Fifth Season
First Media
Aliza & Michael Lesser
The Meyer Levy Foundation
Stephen & Jesse Nathan
The Rich Eisen Show
STURDY.
Sarah Timberman & Ed Redlich
Nicole Yorkin & Tim Shaheen