By Martin Vedris
CHICAGO: Groupe SEB chairman and chief executive, Thierry de La Tour d’Artaise, has been named as this year’s Lifetime Humanitarian by the Housewares Charity Foundation, in recognition of charity programmes he conducted through the Groupe SEB Foundation.
The Groupe SEB Foundation is funded by a five-year budget of three million Euros (US$4.5 million). The aim of the organisation is to help people return to employment, improve their living conditions at home and provide access to education and training.
“We strive to mobilise our company’s human and financial resources, in partnership with such organizations as Envie, The Second Chance Foundation, Habitat and Humanisme and No to Waste,” said de La Tour d’Artaise.
“Our foundation’s priority is to contribute towards the social integration of the greatest possible number of people. It is a great honor for us, said de La Tour d’Artaise, to be recognised for our efforts by the Housewares Charity Foundation.”
The Housewares Charity Foundation honoured Thierry de La Tour d’Artaise at its 11th annual Gala held in Chicago on March 17 at the Sheraton Hotel & Towers in conjunction with the International Home and Housewares Show.
The Chicago-area International Housewares Association (IHA), is a founding member of the Housewares Charity Foundation which consists of a group of dedicated manufacturers, retailers and industry partners who publicly declared a collective vision of improving communities and lives around the world through their charities.
Since 1998, the Housewares Charity Foundation has raised more than US$13 million for various charities. Its Legacy Charity is the Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF), the global non-profit organisation dedicated to funding innovative clinical and genetic research that promises to help lead to breast cancer prevention and a cure in our lifetime. The BCRF facilitates research grants to leading scientists around the world.