One purple coat.

The Story of the Purple Coat

In the early 2000’s, Marie Bouchard McClung, co-founder of Clothes To Kids, Inc., volunteered each week in her sister Terry’s elementary school classroom. She knew every child by name and loved helping wherever she was needed.

One unusually cold Florida morning, Terry called Marie with a simple but urgent request: one of her students couldn’t go outside because she was wearing a sundress (which she wore quite often) and didn’t have a jacket. Without hesitation, Marie hopped in her car, stopped at a local store, and found a purple coat in just the right size.

When Marie delivered the coat, the little girl’s face lit up. She put it on, hugged Marie tightly, and beamed with joy. Terry later laughed that she could hardly get the coat off her student at the end of the day.

This moment stayed with both sisters. Later Marie shared with Jode Frisbie Eye, co-founder what she experienced, “I felt like she was telling me the story of many of my students,” Jode said. After many planning sessions at Jode’s kitchen table, the co-founders incorporated and started collecting clothing in 2002. Their idea was to provide a cheerful store environment where families and children could actually shop with dignity and respect and receive school clothing free of charge.

Jode and Marie had a vision to provide school children with new and quality used clothing in a fun shopping environment and they wanted all of the clothing to be free of charge. To date, Clothes To Kids, Inc. has distributed more than 223,000 wardrobes to kids in Greater Tampa Bay.