Big Boy Restaurants, Detroit Area and Clinton Valley Councils of the Boy Scouts of America and WXYZ-TV to Kick Off the 30th Annual Operation Can Do Fo

By: Big Boy Restaurants | 7 Shares 379 Reads

October 12, 2007 // Franchising.com // (Warren, Mich.) — Big Boy Restaurants is teaming up with WXYZ-TV and the Detroit Area and Clinton Valley Councils of the Boy Scouts of America for the 30th annual Operation Can Do food drive to help fight hunger in Michigan. Reports show that one in ten Michigan families receive food assistance from emergency food bank networks each year. Seventy percent of those users have incomes at or below the poverty rate.

Local Boy Scouts will kick off Operation Can Do with their Scouting for Food event on Saturday, November 3-Tuesday, November 6. During those four days, hundreds of Boy Scouts will go door-to-door in metro Detroit handing out empty Operation Can Do collection bags. Residents are urged to fill these bags with non-perishable food in canned, boxed or plastic containers.

The Boy Scouts will retrieve the bags of donated food on the following Saturday, November 10, from 8 to 10 a.m. Residents are asked to leave the filled bags on their doorsteps by 8 a.m. that morning. All that is collected will be distributed to food providers around the state to help feed those in need.

The public can continue donating food to Operation Can Do after November 10 by dropping off any non-perishable food items at any local Big Boy restaurant until December 31.

Last year Big Boy restaurants collected 225 tons of food contributed by generous donors. Since the beginning of Operation Can Do in 1978, over nine million pounds of food have been donated. The need remains urgent as thousands of Michigan residents are considered to be food insecure.

"We are ever grateful to the Detroit Area and Clinton Valley Councils of the Boy Scouts for the significant role they play in kicking off Operation Can Do with their Scouting for Food event. The Boy Scouts' effort contribute a major portion of the total tonnage collected during the Operation Can Do food drive," said Tony Michaels, CEO of Big Boy Restaurants International LLC. "We are asking metro Detroit residents to look in their hearts once again to help provide food for those who are in need."

"We have had great success with Operation Can Do and we're counting on the continued generosity of the public who has consistently made this food drive a success for 30 years." Michaels added.

Operation Can Do food is donated to food banks and emergency food providers in Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Livingston, St. Clair and Washtenaw counties.

Since frozen and perishable goods cannot be accepted due to shipping and storage restrictions, Operation Can Do asks that donations are limited to items in original canned, boxed or plastic packages.

Operation Can Do is sponsored by Big Boy Restaurants International LLC, WXYZ-TV, and the Detroit Area and Clinton Valley Councils of the Boy Scouts with major support from Reinhart FoodService. Operation Can Do will continue through the entire holiday season, ending on December 31.

Headquartered in Warren, Mich., Big Boy Restaurants International LLC is the exclusive worldwide franchiser of more than 455 Big Boy Restaurants in the United States and Japan. Visit us at www.bigboy.com.