Knights of Columbus gives out 270 coats in 2 hours
Norwich — The hottest Black Friday deal in Norwich drew lines an hour before the scheduled opening and merchandise was nearly gone by 10:30 a.m.
The fourth annual statewide K of C Coats for Kids sent 276 new children's winter coats to the Taftvillle Knights of Columbus hall for a planned three-hour distribution from 9 a.m. to noon.
But like the scenes at many malls and big box stores throughout the region Friday morning, the lines started at the Knights of Columbus hall at 47 S. Second Ave. an hour early.
“We were here setting up,” said Dennis Lisee, program director for Knights of Columbus in Connecticut. “All of a sudden, the people started coming. We didn't want to turn anyone away, so we started.”
This was the first year the coat distribution has been held at the Council 34 Taftville Knights of Columbus hall, so members advertised heavily the old fashioned way with fliers posted everywhere, Lisee said.
That worked for Beth Ann Higgins, who was babysitting her 5-year-old nephew Kyle Batts Friday. A friend on Facebook took a picture of one of the fliers and sent it to her.
“He needed a coat,” Higgins said. “Nothing from last year fit.”
Kyle had slim pickings, but quickly hit on a black coat with purple highlights and a fake-fur lined hood.
“Purple is his favorite color,” his aunt said.
“Thank you,” Kyle said to the Knights of Columbus volunteers, putting on the coat despite the nearly 60-degree weather outside.
All that remained on the table after he left were three lavender-colored girls' coats.
The statewide K of C Coats for Kids distribution started in 2012 in Bridgeport, having grown out of a local event in that city that started three years earlier. The state Supreme Headquarters in New Haven purchases the new coats for distribution at six sites annually, this year in Norwich, Bridgeport, Hartford, New Haven, Stamford and Waterbury.
The Taftville council received 45 boxes of 12 coats each, and immediately sent 22 boxes to the Knights of Columbus in Brooklyn to distribute to Windham County youths.
Lisee said the event is spreading, as local Knights councils, including his council in Waterford, have been purchasing coats on their own to distribute in their local areas.
More than 2,000 coats were distributed statewide last Black Friday by the Knights of Columbus.
“While society pushes us to buy things on Black Friday, the Knights of Columbus wants to remember those who don’t have basic necessities that most of us take for granted,” Knights of Columbus Supreme Knight Carl Anderson said in a press release on the event. “Our members are making sure that children have something essential, a coat, to help them stay warm during winter — which, as we were reminded last year, can be especially cold in Connecticut.”
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