Advisory: Please note that this post is about the Pulse nightclub massacre on June 12, 2016. It contains sensitive and difficult to read content.
Macy’s was involved in a variety of ways after the Pulse Nightclub shooting on June 12 2016.
Lee O’Rourke who is the district vice president for Macy’s in North Florida found out through an individual who works for the Metropolitan Business Association, which is an LGBT chamber, that Macy’s was not involved with the Orlando Come Out with Pride Parade. Macy’s is involved in Pride parades across the country so it made sense to become involved in Orlando. Starting in 2009 Macy’s became a participating sponsor.
Kevin Tweed is the district director of visual merchandising and he became involved in creating visuals for Pride. Since June 12, the company has become even more involved with the LGBT community. Macy’s does give back to the community, it is one of their core values. $25,000 was donated to Gay Pride.
Gay days happened the weekend before the Pulse Nightclub shooting. Macy’s had been at the many events at hotels and theme parks. It was an amazing fun week leading up to June 12. From the high of that week they were hit like a freight train with the massacre.
Lee woke up about 5:30am and turned on the news. The Pulse shooting dominated the news. The count at that time was about 10. She immediately texted Kevin. He will never forget that text he got at 7:08am, it changed everything. They started texting back and forth wondering what to do. Then they wondered if somebody they knew might be there. After the initial shock they went into battle mode and started calling and texting to find out if everyone was OK.
That first day was an emotional roller coaster. A Macy’s manager was at Pulse that night and left at 11:20pm and saw another staff member enter as he left. They could not find this one person for most of the first day.
At first there is shock and then the need to get busy and do something. On Monday morning Kevin started calling food banks and blood banks and the local centers to see if there was anything that Macy’s could do to help out. The company immediately started doing matching funds.
Lee got permission from the company to do whatever they needed to do. A volunteer at the Center reached out and explained that a victim did not live in Orlando, so they did not have any proper outfit to bury him in. His family arrived from Puerto Rico with no notice and had nothing with them, so Macy’s arranged for a personal shopper to dress them prior to the funeral.
The ubiquitous Macy’s blue tee shirts could be seen at the vigils and events all of that first week as staff handed out water and fans to anyone who wanted them.