BMW Donating $1 Million For Sandy Relief Effort

BMW of North America, whose manufacturing operations are headquartered in Greer, will give $1 million to the American Red Cross for disaster relief in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. 

“This donation will help the Red Cross give aid to the many who are in need in the affected areas,” said Ludwig Willisch, CEO and President, BMW of North America.  “We support those who are working so hard on the recovery effort and we are encouraging our employees across North America to volunteer their time and money to the work underway.  Our dealers already are active in their communities and we thank them for stepping up to meet the needs in their local areas.”

Ann Wright, Chief Executive Officer for the American Red Cross Western Carolinas said,  “We are so grateful for the generous donation of all those who are contributing to the Red Cross disaster relief effort, but we are especially grateful to BMW of North America for their corporate gift of $1 million. The need is great, the suffering is immense, but this gift will go a long way toward purchasing the life-saving supplies the victims of Hurricane Sandy need in order to recover from damage caused by Hurricane Sandy.”

The American Red Cross has deployed 12 mobile kitchens capable of making 198,000 meals a day and shipped more than 852,000 ready-to-eat meals to the affected areas. Almost 215,000 meals have been served so far.  Some 6,800 people spent Thursday night in almost 100 Red Cross shelters in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Maryland, West Virginia and Ohio. More than 3,800 Red Cross disaster workers are deployed to this recovery effort.