On Thursday, February 12 Steve Davies Managing Director of the Bata Shoe Company presented Mr Allan Turner – CEO of the Zaidee Foundation a cheque for $10,260.00.

This is as a result of the sales during our Back to School period of the “Zaidee” school shoe, for which we contribute $2.00 for each pair sold.

In mid 2005, Allan and Kim Turner on "Enough Rope" with Andrew Denton were discussing the death and subsequent donation of their daughter Zaidee's organs. During the interview Allan said that as a lasting legacy to Zaidee he wanted to start a foundation, and the “signature” of the foundation would be the rainbow lace that Zaidee loved to wear. Allan asked the viewers if anyone could help him source the rainbow laces.

We contacted Allan shortly after and discussed his requirements. We then contacted our sources in China , and requested samples. We then gave Allan an introduction to our source and Alan launched the rainbow lace in February of 2006.

During our discussions with Allan, we enquired as to the possibility of naming a shoe after Zaidee, and including a pair of rainbow shoelaces with each pair. We would then donate $2.00 to the foundation for every pair sold. Allan agreed. We then developed high visibility in-store promotional material to support the campaign. We launched the range to our customers at the Australian Shoe Fair in August 2006. The feedback from this project has been extremely positive and the sales have increased by 60% over the Xavier shoe which was Zaidee's predecessor.