General Mills Foundation Marks 50th Anniversary

The General Mills Foundation celebrated its 50th anniversary at its annual Report to the Community on October 5 in Minneapolis. Nonprofit community leaders, General Mills employees, foundation trustees and others were on hand to learn about community initiatives around the country as well as help the foundation celebrate 50 years of giving. Since 1954, the General Mills Foundation has invested more than $330 million in cities across the nation.

In 2004, the foundation introduced the $500,000 Communities of Color grants, which will serve more than 28,000 people in the Minneapolis and St. Paul area. The final round of grant recipients will be announced later this fall. Grants of $10,000 each are being awarded to 50 nonprofit groups serving the Twin Cities' growing communities of color, including new immigrant communities. The first 25 grants were awarded last spring (see MCF's News Archives).

This year the company also launched the new General Mills Leadership Forum, where nonprofit leaders attend a half-day training session led by nationally known consultants who are at General Mills teaching leadership development programs for employees. The foundation will offer a total of four seminars by the end of the year on topics such as improving leadership, personal productivity and communication skills.

On the national level, General Mills recently helped with hurricane relief in Florida and the Caribbean. The foundation contributed $20,000 to send a team of Americorps Vista members from Minnesota to Florida to help with recovery efforts. In addition, General Mills donated 20,000 cases of food product through America's Second Harvest to Orlando and Fort Meyers as well as $25,000 to the American Red Cross for the 2004 Caribbean Hurricane Relief Fund.

The year 2004 also saw the foundation begin the third year of the Champions Program to improve youth nutrition and fitness. A partnership with the American Dietetic Association Foundation and the President's Challenge, the program gives $500,000 to 50 community-based groups around the country with innovative programs that help young people eat healthy and stay fit.

General Mills Foundation president Chris Shea reported that overall, General Mills awarded $86 million to communities across the country in fiscal year 2004 - representing more than 5 percent of the company's pre-tax profits. Of that amount, the foundation contributed more than $20 million in grants in the targeted areas of youth nutrition and fitness, social services, education, and arts and culture. The dollars are leveraged by employees and retirees who are in the community volunteering every day.

The foundation continues to build on its long-term relationship in north Minneapolis. For example, The GMI Promotion Department and Community Action sponsored another Hawthorne Family Day at Nellie Stone Johnson Community School. The event pairs the school's parent/teacher conferences with a sit-down family dinner with children and a community fair featuring neighborhood nonprofit agencies. The Hawthorne Huddle, now in its seventh year and the subject of a Harvard case study, continues to bring community leaders, neighbors, teachers, police officers, clergy and others together each month to discuss important community issues.

For its work in communities nationwide, General Mills received the Summit Award for Social Impact from The Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado at Boulder. In 2003, "Business Week" ranked the company No. 6 in the "most generous cash givers" category and No. 10 in the "most generous in-kind givers."

Other community highlights for General Mills in 2004 include:

• General Mills donated more than $22 million in products to America's Second Harvest, the nation's largest domestic hunger relief organization.
     
• The company is completing another United Way campaign with the goal of becoming one of the first companies in the Twin Cities to raise $6 million, including the foundation's dollar-for-dollar match of all employee and retiree contributions. The company received two Summit Awards from the United Way of America earlier this year.
     
• Through brand partnerships, or strategic philanthropy, General Mills brands are providing financial support and helping to increase awareness of causes that are important to most Americans. Healthy BET is a new initiative that teams Honey Nut Cheerios, Chex Cereals and the General Mills Foundation with the BET Foundation (Black Entertainment Television) to help African American women eat healthy and stay physically active. Meanwhile, programs such as Box Tops for Education, Save Lids to Save Lives and Spoonfuls of Cheerios have donated millions of dollars for schools, breast cancer research and childhood literacy.
     
• Volunteerism remains a high priority among General Mills employees and retirees, with 70 percent of Twin Cities employees sharing their time, business skills and talents to help others in the community.

To download the General Mills 2004 Corporate Social Responsibility Report (PDF, 41 pages), click here.

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