Famous Footwear Teams Up With The Salvation Army for Back to School

With the back-to-school season in full swing, Famous Footwear is focusing on families in need in the New York City area by providing more than 100 pairs of the season's hottest shoe styles for kids through The Salvation Army - Greater New York Division. The footwear retailer and local-area bloggers will also raise additional in-kind donations this month that the charity will use to support children and families with more free footwear for fall.

The Salvation Army will host shoe clinics for families by appointment in their community center located at 2121 Washington Ave. in Bronx, NY the week of Aug. 26. Children will have the opportunity to try on and take home new shoes for the school year for free.

The retailer is also hosting shoe crazy shopping events with three local-area bloggers: Mom Confessionals, Yo Don Bleek Raps and Dancing Hotdogs in the three new Famous Footwear stores located in Selden, White Plains and the Bronx. Each blogger will compete to grab as many shoes as he or she can in 30 seconds in one of the new stores, and the retailer will donate the dollar amount of the shoes to The Salvation Army - Greater New York Division via gift cards, which the charity will use to provide additional new shoes to children and families.

"Providing local-area children with new shoes for the school year is a tremendous help for the inner-city families we support," said Captain Gerardo Balmori, commanding officer for The Salvation Army Greater New York Division's Bronx Tremont Community Center. "We support scores of families every year during the back-to-school season, and this will add something special for the children who come to shop with us next week."

The company is focused on families who are shopping for back-to-school shoes across the U.S. by providing a buy one, get one half-off promotion through Sept. 18.

Famous Footwear is a leading, easy-to-shop footwear destination, featuring merchandise for women, men and children, making it a one-stop-shop for the entire family. Shoppers can access Famous Footwear's loyalty rewards program and vast style selection in-store to meet their family's footwear needs. Famous Footwear has more than 1,000 stores nationwide as well as e-commerce site Famous.com. For more information, go to www.Famous.com or www.Facebook.com/FamousFootwear.

About Brown Shoe Company and Famous Footwear

Brown Shoe Company (NYSE: BWS) is a $2.6 billion, global footwear company whose shoes are worn by people of all ages, from all walks of life. Our products are available virtually everywhere - in the nearly 1,300 Famous Footwear and Naturalizer retail stores we operate, in hundreds of major department and specialty stores, on 14 branded ecommerce sites, and on many additional third-party retail websites. Through our broad range of products, we serve three key market segments. Our Family brands - Famous Footwear, Famous.com, and shoes.com - are one-stop-shopping destinations for high quality, affordable styles for a family's every occasion. Active people who want comfort, style and performance can look to our Healthy Living brands - Naturalizer, Dr. Scholl's Shoes, LifeStride and Ryka. Our Contemporary Fashion brands - Via Spiga, Vince, Sam Edelman, Franco Sarto, Carlos Santana and Fergie Footwear - keep fashionistas in step with the latest trends. At Brown Shoe Company, we inspire people to feel good and live better... feet first!

About The Salvation Army

The Salvation Army, an evangelical part of the universal Christian church established in London in 1865, has been supporting those in need in His name without discrimination for more than 130 years in the United States. Nearly 30 million Americans receive assistance from The Salvation Army each year through a broad array of social services that range from providing food for the hungry, relief for disaster victims, assistance for the disabled, outreach to the elderly and ill, clothing and shelter to the homeless and opportunities for underprivileged children. 82 cents of every dollar The Salvation Army spends is used to support those services in 5,000 communities nationwide. For more information, go to www.salvationarmyusa.org.