Tim Hortons announced that its Orange Sprinkle Donut fundraising campaign is returning on September 30.
Last year, more than one million Orange Sprinkle Donuts were sold across Canada, raising over $1.6 million for the Orange Shirt Society and the Indian Residential School Survivors Society.
This year, in Saskatchewan, the campaign will put half its proceeds from the province’s 105 locations to the James Smith Cree Nation Trust Fund. The other half will be donated to the Indian Residential School Survivors and the Orange Shirt Society.
After consulting with several Indigenous leaders, a group of Indigenous Tim Hortons restaurant owners developed the concept for the Orange Sprinkle Donut fundraising campaign. The idea for the Orange Sprinkle Donut campaign originated last year after discovering unmarked graves on the grounds of the former residential school in Kamloops, B.C.
Orange Shirt Day has been observed on September 30 since 2013, when Phyllis Webstad told her story of her first day of residential school. She was six years old in 1973, excited to wear her new clothes and go to school for the first time, only to have her shiny new orange shirt ripped away and learn that she didn’t matter.
Her organization, the Orange Shirt Society, and the Every Child Matters movement she created continue to raise awareness about Canada’s history of residential schools, along with honouring the survivors and their families and the children who never returned home.
“Tim Hortons is helping to start important conversations with the Orange Sprinkle Donut,” said Webstad. “We cannot heal what we don’t talk about, and I hope the Orange Sprinkle Donut will help bring about lots of conversation across Canada on September 30.”
The Indian Residential School Survivors Society has a more than 20-year history of providing services to residential school survivors, their families, and those dealing with intergenerational traumas.
Rick Aleck, Co-Chair of the Indian Residential School Survivor Society, said one of the Society’s goals is to continually expand support to partner organizations and maximize access to culturally sensitive, emotional, mental, physical and spiritual care.
“The Orange Sprinkle Donut campaign helps us provide better services to communities where it’s very much needed. The support from Canadians last year was incredible; we had never received such a big donation from any organization.”
