In response to the terrible January 12 earthquake in Haiti, the Hudson Group has placed special collection boxes in each of its 580-plus stores, including Hudson News, Hudson Booksellers, cafes and specialty retail shops in

airports and transportation terminals across North America.

Signage on each box urges customers to donate their change. Hudson is matching these customer donations to made to the American Red Cross for the relief of people suffering in Haiti.

The company says that more than 1.4bn travellers a year visit airports, bus and rail terminals where Hudson does business and last year, Hudson Group stores completed over 90m separate customer transactions.

President and Ceo Joe DiDomizio said: ‘With that level of traffic, collecting and matching our customers' donations seems like a natural way for Hudson to contribute in a meaningful way to the worldwide effort to provide relief to the people of Haiti. A similar collection programme for Hurricane Katrina relief in 2005, resulted in $135,000 donated to the Red Cross.

‘Our goal this year is to keep the boxes on our counters until we have surpassed that figure. The need in Haiti is great, and we know we can once again count on the generosity of our customers, even in these difficult economic times.’