BATON ROUGE - A local fast-food chain that's gained international attention is making a significant donation to a capital area nonprofit.

During the first week of 2021, Raising Cane’s announced that it will honor “National Mentoring Month” by making a $100,000 commitment to a local nonprofit that mentors Baton Rouge area children called the Big Buddy Program.

As a longtime partner of the organization, Raising Cane’s will donate $10,000 a year for ten years to support Big Buddy and its mentoring initiatives.

“The Big Buddy Program is one of the first community organizations that Raising Cane’s supported. At the time, I didn’t have a lot of money to give, but I was able to donate my time, mentoring a little buddy, says founder and CEO, Todd Graves.

“Decades later, I still value that experience and I’m proud of our longstanding relationship with the program and their positive impact on the lives of so many in our community. For more than 20 years, I’ve had the privileged of working with Gay Mack and I have so much respect for her leadership of the program. I’m looking forward to what she and the Big Buddy Program will do in the years to come.”

The donation was announced at Big Buddy Program’s “Dancing for Big Buddy” virtual event in December. Graves – a 2009 “Star Dancer” alumni – kicked off the online event with a video announcement of the donation.

The nonprofit's executive director, Gaylynne Mack, said, “From the early days when Todd served as a Mentor, Raising Cane’s has supported many of our initiatives including Dancing with Big Buddy, Crawfish King Cook-Off, Day of the Mentor, Lemonade Day and more. This support has meant so much to our programs and our community. Now more than ever, our youth need positive role models in their life.” 

Click here for more information on how you can support the Big Buddy Program.