Panera Bread bakery-cafes in Cranston, Warwick and East Greenwich recently donated $626.50 to Kent Hospital in Warwick as a result of its Pink Ribbon Bagel campaign to help increase breast cancer awareness. All 20 Panera Bread bakery-cafes owned and operated by Howley Bread Group and located in Connecticut, Massachusetts and Rhode Island participated in the Pink Ribbon Bagel campaign and donated more than $3,500 to area hospitals, health centers and foundations. Panera Bread also brought a complimentary Via Panera catered meal to each hospital to further celebrate the respective check presentations.

The money was raised thanks to the participating bakery-cafes’ customers joining the fight against breast cancer and choosing to eat a Pink Ribbon Bagel for breakfast, lunch or dinner during national Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October. Twenty-five cents from each Pink Ribbon Bagel sold at the three bakery-cafes went to the cause.

The Panera Pink Ribbon Bagel project follows the tradition of “thinking pink” during the month of October in the quest to eradicate breast cancer disease. Sue Stees, one of Panera Bread’s first franchisees and a breast cancer survivor, developed the idea for the Pink Ribbon Bagel in 2001 as a way to help support the cause. Today, the program is employed in all of Panera Bread’s more than 1,275 bakery-cafes across the country.