MLK Day: Big New Clothing Drive Back In-Person: Hundreds of Volunteers of Every Stripe to Gather at Big Sunday, One of USA's Foremost Organizations Connecting People with Helping Opportunities, on Monday, January 17, 2022 from 10 AM - 1 PM in Los Angeles to Collect, Assemble and Donate 2,022 Cold Weather Kits; Opportunities to Participate from Home, Too

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 12, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Big Sunday, one of the USA's foremost organizations connecting people through helping and opportunities to volunteer, now in its 22^nd year, will host its 10th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day New Clothing Collection & Community Breakfast on Monday, January 17, 2022 at the Big Sunday headquarters at 6111 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90038, from 10 AM until 1 PM.  Big Sunday is thrilled to be safely back in-person this year for its very popular and meaningful annual event.  This year, to be COVID-safe, the crowd will be kept significantly smaller. However, like always, it will be a wonderful block party with volunteers of all ages, races, religions, backgrounds and ethnicities having fun working together to collect, assemble and donate 2,022 new cold-weather clothing kits.  Kits will include sweatshirts, hats, scarves, and other warm clothing.  New socks and underwear will also be collected and donated.  To be COVID-safe, Big Sunday is only accepting new clothes.  Items will be collected in-person, via Big Sunday's Amazon registry or via sponsoring kits, which are $25 each.  The new clothing will be provided to dozens of organizations, helping thousands of underserved and grateful people.  Big Sunday will also host a community breakfast for all participants.  Everyone attending will be invited to take part in Big Sunday's memorable "Something in Common" photo project, where one and all are asked to meet someone new, and find something – anything! – that they have in common, and then have their picture taken together. This beloved Big Sunday project exemplifies a key focus of the organization -- working to find common ground.  Big Sunday likes to think that "Something in Common" is in the spirit of Dr. King's ideals and something he might have enjoyed.  This event will be 100% outside, everyone will be asked to wear a mask, and all attendees 5 and up must be vaccinated and will be asked to provide proof of vaccination.  There will also be ways for people of all ages to participate at-home.

The day's celebration will also include fun arts & craft projects to benefit local nonprofits, Big Sunday's growing staff-curated Civil Rights Exhibit, and entertainment provided by the Blue Breeze Band.  This year, Big Sunday is also introducing the Big Sunday MLK Day Marketplace, spotlighting minority-owned businesses and featuring a diverse array of items for purchase.

"We debated long and hard about whether to be back in person this year – but we are mindful that while some folks are skittish about being with people, others are longing for the connection. And during these very trying and divisive times, this seems more important than ever," 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 and other volunteer groups. 

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 22 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 20 different states as well as Australia and the UK.  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 and build community via helping and is 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."

For more information, to sign up to attend, to help in other ways or to sponsor the event (sponsorships begin at $500), please visit Big Sunday's 10th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Clothing Collection & Community Breakfast page. 

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

Many thanks to Big Sunday's Martin Luther King Jr. Day Clothing Collection & Community Breakfast Sponsors:

Ina Coleman

CD13/Councilman Mitch O'Farrell
Hillside Memorial Park

Artist Partner Group (APG)
CD4/Councilmember Nithya Raman
Endeavor
The Home Depot
Parsons
Tichenor & Thorp Architects, Inc.

Union Bank

Aliza & Mike Lesser

Contact: Rachel Schwartz/PR AdvantEDGE Inc.
310.990.2764
[email protected]

SOURCE Big Sunday