Retailers Give Back with Charity Promotions

More and more retailers are making social responsibility a key component of their standard business practices.

It's hip to be red, but it is no longer unique to be pink --

and that is a good thing. The sale of "pink" merchandise to benefit breast cancer research has become familiar to shoppers in a Pavlovian kind of way: Consumers see the now ubiquitous pink products and their brains immediately associate the branding with the Susan G. Komen for the Cure global breast cancer movement.

Likewise, big-box retailers such as Gap, Apple Computers, and Hallmark make their customers see red. Make that (Red), as in (Product) Red, a movement dedicated to eliminating AIDS in Africa. At Gap, half the profits from sales of Gap (Product) Red merchandise go to the Global Fund to help finance AIDS treatment and prevention programs on that continent.