College of Business Administration

GROUP MEMBERS:

Victor Anderson
Kim Hammond
Doris Schillinger

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

According to the San Diego Blood Bank, in the United States, every two seconds, someone needs blood. On any given day, in San Diego, there is a need for four-hundred units of red blood cells. Sixty percent of the population is eligible to donate blood; however, fewer than five percent of healthy adults in Southern California actually donate each year.

There are many ethical reasons for donating blood. Some of the most relevant theories would include Ethic-of-Care, Social-Contract theory and Utilitarianism. Since there is no substitute for human blood, donating demonstrates our care and compassion for one another. There is an understanding that we must donate blood to ensure that others will have the blood they need when they need it. At the same time, we expect that the blood will be available for us if there is ever that type of need, personally. The cost of donating is practically nil. One hour of our time and a pint of our blood—which replenishes itself is the total amount expended. The benefit, one pint can be used for up to three different patients, potentially saves a person’s life.

Our group endeavored to increase the number of blood donations in Southern California. We started out by contacting Jennifer Bradley, one of the area blood donor coordinators for the San Diego Blood Bank. We determined that Doris was able to secure tickets to a race at the Cajon Speedway and Victor was able to provide free oil change coupons from Midas for potential donors. Both the Cajon Speedway and Midas were willing to host a blood drive at their business locations. Jennifer thought that we could have a very successful drive with the incentives that were available to donors. She also agreed that with the Cajon Speedway and 13 Midas locations to choose from, there is a great potential for a mutually beneficial long term relationship. After our group’s consultation with Jennifer it was decided the drive would be held at the Point Loma Midas location on Friday, April 11, 2003 from 12:30 PM to 5:30 PM.

Jennifer provided a Blood Bank Guide identifying how to conduct a successful blood drive. The guide explained what each individual party’s responsibilities were. The Blood Bank provided the Mobile Blood station (a converted bus), nurses and bus staff, complimentary t-shirts, as well as the flyers and posters announcing the event. Of the 3,000 flyers printed the Blood bank mailed 2,143 to the zip codes surrounding the Point Loma Midas location. Our group used the remainder of the flyers as handouts at all of the San Diego Midas locations and at San Diego State University. Doris, Kim and Victor also met with and hand delivered flyers to businesses within the general vicinity of where the Midas blood drive was to be held. We also decided on and laid out the area for the bus and made sure there was ample parking and seating area for the donors.

On March 20 Kim met with Lynn Stedd, the Director of Public Relations at the San Diego Blood Bank and developed a radio and television media list that would be appropriate for Public Service Announcements (PSA’s) for our event. Doris obtained a commitment from the Dave, Shelly and Chainsaw show on KGB and announcements were made on Thursday and Friday morning. Victor managed to secure Public Service Announcements on “Car Talk” with Dave Stall on the Saturday and Sunday prior to the event. Victor was also interviewed live as a caller on Dave Stall’s Saturday broadcast giving details and answering questions regarding the event. We also sent e-mails directly to many of the local television weather people in an attempt to ensure more public service announcements the day of the event.

Our efforts were successful. The blood drive on April 11 attracted 41 donors. Twelve people were deferred, nine due to low levels of iron, with an actual 29 units of blood collected, which equates into 87 potential recipients. Several reasons were cited for the success of our event. Not the least of which was the incentives of a free oil change, and tickets to the Cajon Speedway. On April 24, 2003 our group met with Jennifer to review the results. A review of the drive indicated we attracted 14 of our donors from the mailers and/or the SDBB web site, 10 donors were friends and employees, 6 were from San Diego State, 4 passers by, 1 each from KGB radio and Car Talk radio PSA’s and 3 Midas customers and 2 employees from local business. Although the hope was for 60 potential donors we believe some confusion regarding the Camino del Rio location might have affected attendance. Jennfier still deemed our drive a great success and said that she was very impressed with the extra efforts we made with regard to publicity for our blood drive.

The costs of our project include the time involved to set-up and conduct the drive, the cost of the oil changes and speedway tickets, and money spent on pizza and donuts. The benefits far outweighed the costs, however. First and foremost, since there is no substitute for human blood, facilitating blood donations means that someone who would have died without this precious fluid is still alive. We all benefited in the experience we received in conducting this social change project. There was also tremendous value in the results relating to new contacts with potential customers and the goodwill shown to the community as well as the increase in awareness of the need to donate blood. With the success of our drive the San Diego Blood bank asked that Midas participate in another drive on May 9th, 2003 and consider additional drives in the future at other their other San Diego locations, which they agreed to do.