Thursday, October 27th 2016, 11:20 pm
Memorial football head coach Ryan Reed founded a clothing company called Gracious Tree, ensuring that with each purchase of a jacket one will be donated to a child.
On Thursday, his mission reached a turning point.
Reed tries to get his Chargers to win on the football field; but off the field, his focus is giving back.
"Never been happy being bored and I felt so strong about this cause that I wanted to make it a priority,” he said. “We want kids to feel warm, feel loved and feel accomplished. But the more we got into this, man, there's just a lot of kids that need coats."
His efforts of buying a jacket and donating a jacket finally came to fruition Thursday after starting the company just over a year ago.
One-hundred jackets were given to students at Burroughs Elementary at the Assistance League of Tulsa, a trend Reed hopes to continue.
"The saying is ‘warm the world,’ so if we can see ourselves going to other places of the country, and I mean who doesn't need love, who doesn't need warmth and who doesn't need a sense of accomplishment," Reed stated.
And the act of kindness was the start of fulfilling a plan of keeping children warm.
"It's selfish to say that feeling like giving makes you feel good," he added. "But to see those kids faces with their new coats and see how they react to them, it's what's it's all about."
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