Pengins For Everyone

About Us

Four people are standing behind a hammock with four large stuffed penguins and a stuffed fish in it. One person is holding a cat.

From left, Kaitlyn, Joan, Ashar (with cat Mr. Bill) and Chris are some of the “human pengins” behind Pengins for Everyone. In front of them are large pengins Scoops, Hoogerheide, Fiona and Nixie, and Bubbles Fish. Pengins eat fishes, but they won’t eat Bubbles, they promised.

Who We Are

We are a family who loves pengins. Once we got up to about, oh, several dozen of them, we realized we had to stop acquiring more of our own — we felt like we were having trouble giving enough attention and love to the ones we had, so that was unfair to both them and any new ones.

But we like pengins a lot! So we decided to spread the love.

We give away pengins to people we know, people we’ll never meet (via the Salvation Army Angel Tree, for example), and people who just randomly come across this site. You might notice on our map of sent friends that some of the icons and photos are decidedly lacking in flippers. Sometimes specific requests come in for different animals, or (more often) we see someone who we’d like to give a friend to, but we don’t have a pengin handy. So we find the next best thing, FaceTime some of our pengins so that these new friends can be named honorary pengins, and then give them out. (And if you think we haven’t actually Facetimed stuffed animals, you are 100% mistaken.) Shut up, it totally counts.

And yes, we call them pengins. Go ahead, try it! Say “pengin.” Say it out loud. If it still seems weird, grab your nearest penguin and say, “Hello, pengin.” We guarantee you’ll never go back to the other way. We use pengin because it sounds warmer and friendlier – like a nickname for a beloved family member.

The Official Bits

We are a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit with the IRS, meaning any donations you give us are tax-deductible.

We promise that we use every dollar we get to send more pengins.

We are also listed on GuideStar with the Platinum Seal of Transparency, which means that we share all the information we have about our financials, our goals, our strategies and our progress. We’re very proud of this!

Board of Directors

  • President: Kaitlyn A.L. Concilio
  • Secretary/Treasurer: Joan S. Concilio
  • Director: JoAnne Herman
  • Director: Paul Herman
  • Director: Amanda Smith

Get Involved

Do you know someone who needs a pengin? Do you need a pengin? Let us know!

I know someone who needs a pengin!

Are you interested in supporting our cause? We accept (tax-deductible) donations to help us spread more pengins!

Learn more about donations