Students of OCU have a new charity opportunity.
Erin Knott, co-owner of Thairapy Lounge Salon, is collecting bras to donate to those in need in honor of breast cancer awareness.
Knott said she has clients who attend OCU and thought it would be smart to reach out to the campus. She tagged the university in a post about her donation.
“I tagged the school because I thought maybe some people would see it then and some of the girls would donate,” Knott said.
Knott said she was inspired to donate to Bras Recycled And Shared (BRAS) after seeing Lacie Lowry, local anchor for News 9, post about it on Facebook.
“I just went through having a breast explant surgery, and obviously I had a bunch of bras that I wasn’t going to be able to wear anymore, and so I wanted to find somewhere to donate them,” Knott said. “I originally just saw her post on Facebook, and she was just bringing awareness to the community about the organization.”
Knott said Thairapy Lounge Salon is always working to better the community.
“Every month my salon and spa has a promotion that we do. For September and October our focus is always breast cancer awareness,” she said. “This year with the pandemic and the hardships that people are going through, I really wanted to donate to a local organization. I thought just to go along with breast cancer awareness, I decided to just take bra donations. I could start it off with the ones I have and just see how many we could collect over a two-month period.”
Knott said she will be accepting donations of gently used and new bras on behalf of BRAS until the end of October.
“I just thought it was a really cool organization. They take donations and repurpose them for girls and women. They take training bras, nursing bras, sports bras, any type of a bra,” she said. “There’s women of all kinds in the community who might be in need.”
Katie Allsup, music theater senior, goes to the Thairapy Lounge Salon and said she respects the work Knott is doing.
“They have hearts of gold at Thairapy Lounge, with a desire to give back to their community. Erin and the entire Thairapy Lounge team have demonstrated the power of lending a helping hand and coming together to help others. They are women helping women, and it’s inspiring.”
Sammye Cravens, founder of BRAS, started collecting bras in 2018.
“The reason we started is because my sister lives in Little Rock, and she has been collecting bras since 2016. I was sending her boxes of bras so she could add them to her stack, and she could distribute them. She told me I should start my own in Oklahoma City,” Cravens said. “We would all collect bras and sort them by size and different bunches to take to the various distribution outlets.”
Cravens said the organization has collected 4,000 bras in under two years.
“We take all sizes and all types. We get everything from preteen bras to sports bras to lactation bras, and then we also work to get very large bras as well,” she said. “It’s a non-stop deal. Last year in the fall we had a child care facility collect during October for breast cancer awareness. We get a lot in the spring and a lot in the fall because people are cleaning.”
Cravens said BRAS does not take cash donations and solely focuses on distributing bras to organizations like YWCA Passageways, Sanctuary Women’s Development Center, City Rescue Mission, Pivot- A Turning Point for Youth, Sisu Youth Services, and many others.
“We don’t donate to anyone who is going to sell them. It’s just a matter of seeing a need and helping out ladies,” she said.
Knott said doing good for the community is a necessity.
“I think it’s important as a community in this time that we are all supporting each other and looking out for each other,” Knott said.
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