Philanthropic Printers — The Gift of Giving

Helping Hands, Heart of Gold

You might recognize her face. Eileen Rogers was written up in the August issue of Printing Impressions. She’s affectionately known as “The Diaper Lady” because of the very visible Annual Baby Diaper Drive (www.babydrive.org) that she founded and spearheads.

Rogers, president of the Allegra Print & Imaging franchise in Scottsdale, AZ, started the annual diaper and baby goods collection for Homeward Bound, a transitional housing program for homeless families and families who have experienced domestic violence. Since the conception of the program in 1999, she has collected more than a half million diapers and $250,000 in donations.

However, Rogers’ heart goes out to children around the world, not only those in her local community in need of Pampers. In fact, she does a lot of other interesting social-impact work, including her humanitarian efforts with the Foundation for Global Leadership (FGL), which was founded in 2002 to better ensure sustainable leadership development and democracy.

“I have led four delegations to international destinations in the last four years—three trips to different areas in Africa and one to Cambodia,” she says. “I love to travel, and this allows me to combine that love with my passion for making a difference in the world.

“They are life-changing trips for many people,” Rogers claims. “My most recent trip (August ’07) was to Kenya and Uganda. We spent three days visiting with non-profit organizations and then three days on safari in the Maasai Mara.”

During her trip, Rogers met with the women members of the Kenyan Parliament, as well as the top women CEOs in that country. She visited Kibura—the largest slum outside of Nairobi (population 750,000), then chartered a plane to Kakcuma, which is a refugee camp in Northwest Kenya where the “Lost Boys of Sudan” live. Rogers also visited Girls’ Empowerment Clubs that are part of The Girl Child Network and visited Ashoke Entrepreneurial Fellow projects.