By Sarrah Peters, News Editor
Last year, Gadsden Public Library Director Craig Scott filled out an application to become a “giving partner” with Bombas socks, where the company would send socks for the homeless to the library for distribution.
“They said it might take a while, so I had almost forgotten about it,” said Scott.
On Friday, March 22, the library received 14 boxes weighing over 400 pounds and containing 3,500 pairs of socks.
But these aren’t just any socks.
Bombas donates “a sock to specifically meet the needs of people who don’t have the luxury of putting on a clean pair of socks every day.” The socks get “an anti-microbial treatment which ensures they do not need to be washed as often, and feature reinforced seams and darker colors that give them greater durability with less visible wear.”
Scott said that the library is a point of contact for homeless populations because the library “sees the homeless every day.”
In addition to making the socks available at the library, Scott plans to distribute many of the socks to organizations that serve the homeless in the community, including the Love Center, the Salvation Army, the Gadsden-Etowah County Emergency Management Agency, the Red Cross, Quality of Life and the Boys and Girls Club.
Socks are one of the most requested items among homeless shelters. Bombas donates a pair of socks for every pair purchased. So far, the company said it has donated over 18 million pairs of socks through 1,700 giving partners.
For more information, visit bombas.com.