Dick Hayne Donates $200K to Drexel's Baiada Center

During his acceptance speech for receiving the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce 2012 Edward Powell Award, the founder, president and CEO of Urban Outfitters Inc. Dick Hayne announced he will donate the $100,000 prize and a matching gift to Drexel University’s Laurence A. Baiada Center for Entrepreneurship.

“Dick’s generosity will have a big impact on the Baiada Center’s ability to develop entrepreneurs and foster technology ventures from the Drexel community,” said Drexel President John A. Fry. “Just at the moment that Drexel is beginning to talk about our role in regional economic development, Dick has made a powerful statement about his belief that we can create businesses and jobs.”

The $200,000 gift to Drexel’s Baiada Center will help fund seed projects at the Center. According to Mark Loschiavo, the Center’s executive director, the gift will help commercialize projects stemming from Drexel’s Antoinette Westphal College of Media Arts & Design.

At the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce luncheon on February 6, Mayor Michael Nutter presented Hayne with the 2012 Edward Powell Award. The quadrennial award honors a business leader for significant contributions to the city’s economic prosperity. Hayne, a Drexel trustee, was chosen from more than 100 nominees for having founded Urban Outfitters—which includes the namesake retail chain, and the Anthropologie, Free People, Terrain and BHLDN brands—in Philadelphia and having kept it local as it grew into a global retailer over four decades.