Across the nation, beekeepers have seen hive after hive succumb to Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). Researchers at Penn State are seeking answers to the decline of the nation's honeybees, which are critical to the production of an estimated $15 billion worth of crops in the United States.

After reading about CCD and Penn State's research into its cause, a representative from Whole Foods stores contacted the Office of Corporate and Foundation Relations with the hopes of creating checkout counter display coupons to raise money from Whole Foods customers for Penn State's research efforts.

"We were delighted that Whole Foods was interested in helping support the University's research efforts," says CFR associate director Katie Novak who worked with Whole Foods representative Bonnie Frechette who developed the idea. "It is a real, grass-roots effort started by one person who wanted to help."

With Penn State's support, Whole Foods created the counter displays shown at the right. These point-of-sale pieces are on display in New England and the initiative will hopefully be picked up by Whole Foods stores around the nation.

"Whole Foods has gotten so much positive feedback on this already," says Bonnie. "It is so exciting to see this project unfold and hear such positive feedback from our customers who want to help support this effort."

The support from Whole Foods comes on the heels of Haagen-Dazs, who announced a a gift of $150,000 toward honeybee-related programs in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences in February 2008.

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