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 The Chicago Bears have a longstanding tradition of supporting numerous charities and assisting those in need. Bears Care was incorporated in 2005 as a 501 (c) 3 organization committed to improving the quality of life for people in the Chicagoland community, especially disadvantaged children and their families, through targeted programs supporting education, youth athletics, and medical research and health awareness programs focusing on breast and ovarian cancer. Since that time Bears Care has issued grants totaling over $3 million to over forty qualifying agencies. If you are interested in making a donation, please make checks payable to Bears Care and mail to the address below:Bears Care 1000 Football Drive Lake Forest, IL 60045
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| Bear Appetit |
 Bears Care, the charitable beneficiary of the Chicago Bears, will host an exciting new event, Bear Appétit, at Wildfire Chicago on Monday, November 16. The event will showcase specialties from various Lettuce Entertain You restaurants and samplings of fine wines, with appearances by current and former Chicago Bears players including Jay Cutler, Greg Olsen, Charles Tillman, and Richard Dent among others. The event will also feature the unveiling of the 2010 Munro Campagna Calendar, This Is Our House highlighting the Bears themed works of twelve award winning artists who will also be in attendance. Proceeds benefit Bears Care which is committed to fighting hunger by supporting organizations such as the Greater Chicago Food Depository. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit www.events.org/bearapp. |
| Making Holiday Wishes Come True |
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The Barnes & Noble Holiday Book Drive, running November 1st through January 1st, is an annual program that provides customers the opportunity to purchase a book for donation and give it to a child from a store-selected community program. This year, Barnes & Noble in Arlington Heights has chosen Bears Care, the charitable beneficiary of the Chicago Bears Football Club, as one of the recipient organizations. |
| 2009 Bears Care Gala Highlights |
 The fourteenth annual Bears Care Gala was held on May 9, 2009 at the United Club at Soldier Field. The event was a great success with nearly 800 people in attendance including Bears coaches, players, and front office personnel. The evening featured live and silent auctions, dinner, dancing to the music of “Indigo”, and a Super Prize drawing. Jeff Joniak, play-by-play announcer for the Bears games on WBBM Radio served as the evenings emcee. The 2009 Gala was co-chaired by Lissa Christman and Ginny Hiteshew, with Sharon Ashley and Tricia Schultz serving as Auction Co-Chairs. Bears Care was proud to continue its partnership with Motorola, the Gala’s lead corporate sponsor and United Airlines, which served as the official airline of the 2009 event.Proceeds from the 2009 Gala will enable Bears Care to distribute funds to support breast and ovarian cancer research and treatment programs in Chicago. Bears Care has worked closely with the finest medical institutions in Chicago to identify a wide range of initiatives that battle these diseases on a variety of fronts, ranging from early detection to the development of drug therapies and study of metastatic disease. The Galas have raised nearly $8 million in support of these initiatives. The success was truly a collaborative effort, achieved through the generosity of all of the guests, donors and area businesses that participated, and the Chicago Bears players, coaches and staff who gave of their time to make it all such a spectacular night. |
| Real Bears Fans Wear Pink |
 Thank you for your help kicking off Breast Cancer Awareness month by supporting the “Real Bears Fans Wear Pink” t-shirt campaign. All proceeds will benefit Bears Care, the charitable beneficiary of the Chicago Bears. Bears Care will distribute the proceeds to organizations in the Chicagoland area that provide care, assistance and support services to breast cancer patients and their families. Thank you for teaming up with Bears fans across the country to make a difference.View Real Bears Wear Pink photo gallery |
| Bears Care Supports Back-to-School Fair at Training Camp |
 On August 1, Bears Care, Catholic Charities – Diocese of Joliet, and TeamSmile hosted a Back-to-School Fair on the campus of Olivet Nazrene University for nearly 1,000 deserving students from the Kankakee area. Over forty area social service agencies participated and provided information and free services such as vision testing, diabetes screening and haircuts to those in attendance. Dr. Bill Busch and Team Smile offered free dental health education, digital x-rays and screening, and provided a wide array of state-of-the-art dental treatments onsite to the kids free of charge, including fillings, extractions and root canals. A DJ provided music and videos to entertain the crowd, and prize giveaways, face painters and games added to the festive mood. The Fair also featured visits from Head Coach Lovie Smith and several Chicago Bears players including, Anthony Adams, Jason Davis, Dusty Dvoracek, Israel Idonije, Tommie Harris, Brad Maynard, Adewale Ogunleye, Adrian Peterson, and Matt Toeaina. As the children departed they each received a box containing all of their school supplies for their upcoming year and a healthy lunch! In addition to Catholic Charities and TeamSmile, support was also provided by Gallup and Midwest Dairy Association. |
| Gameday GRRReetings |
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All message requests must be submitted online. Requests must be received by noon, six business days prior to the game you are requesting, e.g. requests for the 9/20/09 game must be received by 9/11/09. Requests will be considered in the order they are received. Once your request is received you will be contacted via e-mail to arrange for payment, or to be notified that spaces for the game you requested are no longer available. A $250 donation to Bears Care is suggested for each message request, and is payable by Visa or MasterCard only. Payment must be received by the Tuesday prior to the selected game and is non-refundable. Once the request is received, no changes may be made to the text of the message. Bears Care reserves the right to reject any inappropriate messages. The text of the message shall be in good taste, in conformance with community standards of decency and is subject to approval by Bears Care. Messages shall not include any offensive or foul language, may not refer to any other National Football League organization, and should be of a non-commercial nature. |
| LAZ Parking |
 Once again this season, Bears fans have an easy way to give back on game day. The Millennium Garages, operated by LAZ Parking, will donate a portion of each parking fee to Bears Care for every car that parks in the garages during any of the Chicago Bears ten 2009 season home games. The Millennium Garages include Grant Park North, Grant Park South, Millennium Park Garage or East Monroe Garage, and offer a free shuttle to and from Soldier Field, starting three hours before kickoff. The Millennium Garages offer some of the most convenient and most affordable, game day parking rates available, and with more than 9,000 spaces in the four garages, there will always be a spot for you!For more information on Millennium Garage’s partnership with Bears Care, or directions to the garages, please visit www.millenniumgarages.com. |
Bears Care, the charitable beneficiary of the Chicago Bears, would like to offer fans the unique opportunity to send special greetings to a friend or loved one on the LED ribbon panels at Bears home games this season. Your message may contain up to 90 characters (including spaces and punctuation) and will run once at the end of half-time on the panels on both the east and west sides of Soldier Field.
