Clarion Partners Builds 500 Chemo Care Kits Across Three Cities
Three offices. One call. 500 Chemo Care Kits for cancer warriors close to home.
On October 20, 35 Clarion Partners volunteers in New York, Dallas and Los Angeles joined one Zoom call and built 500 Chemo Care Kits together for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Each office then delivered its kits to cancer warriors at a cancer center in its own city.
A few days later, Leah Aronova, Vice President of Talent Development at Clarion Partners, sent us a note:
“All 3 of our offices had such a great time and are still talking about it!”
A volunteer event everyone could join
Clarion Partners’ women’s employee group is known for doing things that matter. This year the group opened its events to every employee, and Leah wanted a project that would bring everyone in, men and allies included. She also wanted to tie it to Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
The year before, the three largest offices had built hygiene kits together over Zoom without leaving their desks. Leah wanted to do that again with more meaning behind it. She went looking for chemo kit ideas and found Beyond Basic Needs.
Beyond Basic Needs ordered every supply for 500 kits and shipped it all to Clarion’s New York office, along with hand-sewn port pillows. Clarion’s mailroom then split the supplies and sent the shares to Dallas and Los Angeles. When the day came, all three offices logged on to the same call. Our founder, Rachel Minion, joined them live to share her story and why Beyond Basic Needs exists. Then the teams got to work.
Built in three cities, delivered close to home
New York
200 kits to SBH Health System in the Bronx.
Los Angeles
Delivered to UCLA Health Cancer Care.
Dallas
Delivered to Baylor Sammons Cancer Center.
Every kit stays in the community where it was built.
What’s in a Chemo Care Kit?
Every item is there to make a long day of treatment a little easier.
- Hand-sewn port pillow
- Cozy grip socks
- Body lotion
- Lip balm
- Ginger chews
- Herbal tea
- Body wipes
- Soft eye mask
- Back scratcher
- Nail clippers
- Journal and pen
The port pillow is the heart of the kit. It cushions the chemo port from seat belts and bag straps. Leah had planned to buy pillows on Etsy until she found out that ours are sewn and donated by sewists across the United States, so every Clarion kit has one.
Cancer is more than a diagnosis
When our founder, Rachel Minion, was diagnosed with cancer, her phone went from ringing nonstop to silent. People thought they were giving her space to heal. What she needed was the opposite: someone to reach out and stay close.
That’s the story Rachel shared with the three Clarion offices, along with simple, practical ways to show up for someone in treatment. As Leah put it on our first call, almost everyone has someone in their family who has been touched by cancer. A Build Day gives people something real to do about it.
Gratitude beyond words. Thank you, Leah, to the co-chairs of the Clarion Partners women’s group, and to every volunteer in New York, Dallas and Los Angeles. Thank you to SBH Health System, UCLA Health Cancer Care, and Baylor Sammons Cancer Center for welcoming these kits. And thank you to our sewists, whose port pillows made every one of these kits complete.
Your team doesn’t have to be in one room
Clarion Partners showed that a Build Day works across cities. Thirty-five people in three offices built 500 kits in one afternoon. We order and ship every supply, send the hand-sewn port pillows, and connect each of your offices with a cancer center nearby. Our founder can join your call live. You bring the people, wherever they are.