By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
In the midst of a historic blood shortage, the American Red Cross is hoping that a popular holiday promotion will bring donors out.
Red Cross spokesman Joe Zydlo says that the annual exclusive holiday long sleeved shirt will be available starting today. Zydlo says he's been receiving calls for some time now about when the shirts will be available, adding that with the popularity they are even extending the time you can get them this year.
"They seem to really respond to it," Zydlo tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. "Typically we might run a promotion with this long sleeve shirt, in the past, it may only last maybe a week to 10 days, this time we're extending it longer, from December 17th through January 2nd into the beginning of the year for people to get it, so it's while supplies last, so make an appointment."
Zydlo says this years long sleeved shirt has a beautiful design on the front and is dark blue.
Zydlo says that incentives such as these shirts or the Amazon gift cards are popular with some donors, but at the end of the day giving blood should be about the goodness in your heart
"It's not going to be this big incentive, you're not getting multiple dollars or whatever to donate things, it's more so you're doing it because of the goodness in your heart to donate with the Red Cross," Zydlo says. "We have some of those incentives, we're grateful for Amazon.com, working with the NFL on some of these partnerships."
The Red Cross partnered last year with the NFL to send a lucky donor to the Super Bowl, and Zydlo says that is in the works again this year as an incentive come January.
Zydlo says the Red Cross is constantly working at coming up with new incentives to bring donors out, because they see some donors respond well to them.
"You know we try to come up with these different incentives, and there are people that respond with it," Zydlo says. "I will tell you, throughout the region, throughout Missouri and being based in St. Louis, I work with the Cardinals and the Blues on blood drives every year, and there are people specifically, that donate once or twice a year because they are a die hard Cardinal fan, or a die hard Blues fan, and they want that t-shirt."
And Zydlo says that they are not afraid to tell him whether they like that shirt or not, so he works hard with the design team to come up with a good product that donors will want.
To find out more about this years holiday shirt as well as find where you can donate blood, you can click HERE.