MINNEAPOLIS — Yoplait kicks off this year’s Save Lids to Save Lives® campaign celebrating incredible women fighting breast cancer right next door. Women like Karie Wellenbach and her husband Ben, who supported their best friend’s battle against the disease by starting their own fundraiser. Survivors like Victoria Terenzi, who, after fighting breast cancer herself, teamed up with her daughter to help other women fighting it in New York. Yoplait is sharing stories like these on Yoplait.com, Facebook, and through additional media efforts and events. The Save Lids to Save Lives campaign will culminate with one major event, symbolizing local efforts to support women impacted by breast cancer right in our communities.
“One in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime,” says Hyun Mee Graves of Yoplait. “We’ve heard that statistic so many times; I think we can forget the gravity of it. That ‘one’ is our girlfriend, our daughter, our wife. Through Save Lids to Save Lives, people can help generate funding for their local breast cancer programs, to help the women who mean so much to them and their communities.”
With new Save Lids to Save Lives program extensions – including online lid redemption, zip code donation tracking, and an increased maximum donation goal – it’s easier than ever to start a lid collection effort and make a difference right in your community. Extensions include:
1. Helping to fund local breast cancer programs: This year, people can generate funds for their community’s breast cancer programs, directly supporting women in their area, simply by redeeming their pink Yoplait lids. Each pink Yoplait lid redeemed will be tracked by zip code, so that funds generated through local lid collection go back to fund breast cancer programs in the same community.
2. Online and mail-in redemption: For the first time, people can now redeem pink lids from Yoplait cups in two ways: via mail and online, by entering the codes featured on pink lids at Yoplait.com.
3. Largest donation ever: Yoplait has increased its potential maximum donation to Susan G. Komen for the Cure® by 20%, making a commitment to donate up to $2 million this year through Save Lids to Save Lives.
4. Dedicate a lid: Throughout the year, people can dedicate their lids to someone who means something in their life at Yoplait.com. In select cities, people can also tell their stories at the local Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure® event, at the Yoplait tent. Visit Yoplait.com for a list of these cities.
Dr. Kristi Funk – The Pink Lotus Breast Center
Yoplait’s Save Lids to Save Lives and related breast cancer campaigns aim to educate and encourage women of all ages to put their breast health first. To arm women with important information about breast cancer, Yoplait is again teaming up with celebrity breast cancer surgeon Dr. Kristi Funk, founder of the Pink Lotus Breast Center in Los Angeles, to share her expert tips on healthy living and breast cancer risk reduction at Yoplait.com.
“I want women to know that breast cancer is not a death sentence,” says Dr. Kristi Funk of the Pink Lotus Breast Center. “With no cure, women must understand what they can do to help reduce their risk and the importance of early detection and fundraising in the fight against the disease. I’m thrilled to be teaming up with Yoplait to help spread this message.”
History of Save Lids to Save Lives
For the 13th year this fall, Yoplait cups and lids will turn pink in support of the fight against breast cancer. Yoplait will donate ten cents to Susan G. Komen for the Cure® for each pink lid redeemed online at Yoplait.com and via mail by December 31, 2011, up to $2 million. During the past 13 years, Yoplait has donated more than $30 million to the breast cancer cause through Save Lids to Save Lives and related donation initiatives.
“I am grateful for the ingenuity and tenacity of corporate partners like Yoplait who are fundamentally necessary in supporting our mission to raise awareness of breast cancer,” said Nancy Brinker, founder and CEO of Susan G. Komen for the Cure. “Programs such as Save Lids to Save Lives are working. More than 2.5 million breast cancer survivors are alive in the U.S. today because of an increase in awareness and early detection.”
Look for pink lids and pink cups on all participating Yoplait® products, including all 6-ounce yogurt cups – Original, Light, Thick & Creamy, Light Thick & Creamy, Whips!®, Yoplait Greek, Yoplait Delights® and Yoplait Fiber One® yogurt, as well as all Large Size Yoplait yogurts . All Yoplait products are made with milk from cows not treated with rBST/rBGH.* Visit www.Yoplait.com to redeem and dedicate up to 25 lids per day.
*No significant difference has been shown between milk from rBST/rBGH treated and non- rBST/rBGH treated cows
About General Mills
One of the world's leading food companies, General Mills operates in more than 100 countries and markets more than 100 consumer brands, including Cheerios, Häagen-Dazs, Nature Valley, Betty Crocker, Pillsbury, Green Giant, Old El Paso, Progresso, Yoplait, Cascadian Farm, Muir Glen, and more. Headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, General Mills had fiscal 2010 global net sales of US$16 billion, including the company’s $1.2 billion proportionate share of joint venture net sales.
About Susan G. Komen for the Cure®
Nancy G. Brinker promised her dying sister, Susan G. Komen, she would do everything in her power to end breast cancer forever. In 1982, that promise became Susan G. Komen for the Cure, which is now the world’s largest breast cancer organization and the largest source of nonprofit funds dedicated to the fight against breast cancer with more than $1.9 billion invested to date. For more information about Susan G. Komen for the Cure, breast health or breast cancer, visit www.komen.org or call 1-877 GO KOMEN.
Source: General Mills