Samaritan’s Feet

Cintas provides support to hundreds of organizations on a corporate level, as well as at a local level, including hospitals, foster children programs, homeless shelters, workplace development and emergency agencies to name a few. Matthew 25: Ministries, the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, the American Heart Association and INROADS are examples of the many organizations we support.

"We are overwhelmed by the generosity of Cintas, its employees, executive team, customers and board of directors," said Manny Ohonme. "Many families are choosing between food and clothing and Cintas is making those decisions easier for them to make. The ripples of Cintas’ generosity will continue to be felt throughout the world for many years to come".

Samaritan’s Feet is a 501c (3), humanitarian aid organization that shares a message of hope and love through the distribution of new shoes to impoverished children around the world. Our leadership and volunteer team of ambassadors demonstrate an act of humility and servant leadership by washing the feet of our shoe recipients prior to personally placing new socks and shoes on their feet. More importantly, this method of distribution allows each one of our 60,000 volunteers to engage each recipient in a very profound way that potentially will have a longer lasting effect than the shoes themselves.

This mission was founded in 2003 by a Nigerian born man, Manny Ohonme, who grew up very poor and did not have a pair of shoes to call his own until a missionary from America gave him his first pair at the age of nine. This simple act of kindness and the time the missionary spent with Manny teaching him the game of basketball, planted a seed of hope and encouragement in Manny’s spirit. This seed was the catalyst that propelled Manny to receive a college basketball scholarship to the United States where he competed and earned his bachelor and masters.

It is estimated that more than 300,000,000 children around the world, including the United States, wake up each morning without a pair of shoes. Most likely these figures are much higher as the average pair of shoes costs $10.00, and the majority of families in third-world nations live on less than $2.50 per day. Not having shoes is a way of life because the choice simply does not exist; as well, every 15 seconds someone dies as a result of foot-borne illnesses because they have no choice.

Since 2003, Samaritan’s Feet has distributed nearly 3,000,000 pairs of shoes to impoverished children and families in over 50 countries, including many efforts in the United States. We partner with businesses, community organization, churches, schools, and individual who want to make a difference and help those in need by leading shoe drives, awareness campaigns, distributions and fund raising efforts to meet this basic need.

Cintas Corporation is helping Samaritan’s Feet reach its goal of putting 10 million shoes on the feet of 10 million children in 10 years by collecting shoes during its’ annual Clothe the Kids drive and providing towels for its Shoes of Hope shoe distributions. Through these efforts, Cintas delivers a powerful message of leadership and servitude to its employee-partners, customers, shareholders, vendors and communities in which we do business throughout the world.And with partnerships such as proposed to Cintas, we believe that that goal is well within reach.