News
57 Main Street-South African Wine Importer-Joins Rutgers to Ship School Supplies to the Cape Region in Emptied Wine Containers
06/01/04
Garden City, NY, June 2004 – “57 Main Street” Wine Co., a leading importer of South African wines and spirits in the United States, has found an inspiring new use for their empty wine containers. Rather than sitting empty on U.S. docks, the containers are being filled with school supplies, such as books, crayons, rulers, markers, paper and pencils destined for school children in South Africa’s Cape winelands.
The program is the inspiration of Peter Morales, President of 57 Main Street, and the head of a new charitable giving project, Vision 57. It is also the latest in a series of educational initiatives 57 Main Street has launched with Rutgers University Graduate School of Education (GSE). Together, 57 Main Street and Rutgers are in their third year of a unique partnership that merges wine and education in an unprecedented way.
For the third consecutive year Rutgers’ GSE and 57 Main Street will participate in an annual Study Tour to South Africa, including a visit to three schools which both organizations have adopted in the Cape winelands. Two of the schools–Groote Post Primary and Bergendal Primary–are located on the Groote Post and Seidelberg wine estates represented by 57 Main Street. This year, for the first time, a second tour of Fulbright Fellows will also visit the winelands funded by a $65,000 national grant to help pay for 15 New Jersey teachers and educational leaders to travel to South Africa for the seminar, “Let’s Look Back: 10th Anniversary of the End of Apartheid in South Africa” a four-week immersion from June 28 to July 25.
According to Mr. Morales, “We are always looking for creative ways to support the education of our Cape wine partners; sending books and school supplies in our emptied wine containers has been a great solution. Under the Vision 57 banner we have also adopted three schools and recently announced that 7% of the proceeds of sales from our wines in the U.S. would benefit the Wine Industry Trust, a multi-million dollar investment towards revitalizing the communities in the Cape wine region. Working with Rutgers we have expanded our commitment even further, and are honored to support this inter-cultural exchange between Rutgers’ Graduate School of Education and their contemporaries in South Africa.”
Mr. Morales will be presenting South African wines, as well as leading a discussion about Vision 57 on June 11, 2004 with Rutgers’ Graduate School of Education (GSE) to kick-off their 2004 Study Tours. Editors are invited to attend. To learn more about the event and Vision 57, or to schedule an interview with Mr. Morales please contact Helen Gregory, HG Marketing at (718) 403-0097 or e-mail Helen.gregory@mindspring.com.