Author: admin

2026-09-30T07:31:00

(BPT) – The holidays are approaching, which means it’s time to start thinking about what you’ll give your loved ones. This year, go beyond traditional presents and give your friends and family a thoughtful gift with a lasting impact.

For over three decades, World Vision — a Christian humanitarian organization — has helped redefine what holiday giving looks like. Through its annual World Vision Gift Catalog, the organization offers meaningful gifts that help meet real needs and equip children, families and communities with resources to help lift themselves out of poverty.

From handcrafted gifts featured by celebrity supporters to donations that enable sustainable, community-led solutions, these creative gift ideas will make your loved ones smile and help others worldwide.

“Faithfully Woven” travel pouch by Melissa Joan Hart

This silk and leather travel pouch, featured by actor, director and producer Melissa Joan Hart, carries beauty and purpose wherever your journey leads. Each pouch’s intricate pattern is handwoven by fair-trade artisans in Guatemala.

“Called to Light” brass earrings by Alexa PenaVega

Featured by actor and producer Alexa PenaVega, these brass and cow horn earrings reflect the beautiful contrast of light and dark. Each gorgeous pair is handcrafted by fair-trade artisans in Kenya.

“Patchwork of Promise” Kitenge apron by Kel Mitchell

This vibrant African Kitenge apron, featured by actor, producer and author Kel Mitchell, brings beauty and purpose to everyday moments. Each apron is lovingly handcrafted by fair-trade artisans in Kenya and turns the work of your hands into an act of gratitude and joy.

Gifts That Multiply

When you give to one of World Vision’s Gifts That Multiply initiatives, your donation goes farther when combined with corporate product donations and public grants. For example, if you donate to the Lifesaving Healthcare Good initiative, your gift will have five times the impact thanks to public grants, ensuring that more kids get a healthy start and thrive in life. Other initiatives you can fund include hunger relief, disaster relief, food kits for refugees, clothing, school supplies and more.

Give a gift that grows

Some gifts grow over time and can help put a family on the road to self-sufficiency — like a goat! Gifting a goat can make a bigger impact than you may expect. In fact, one healthy dairy goat can provide up to 16 cups of milk a day, providing calcium, protein and other essential nutrients for growing children. Plus, goats are well suited for harsh climates and produce valuable fertilizer for crops and vegetable gardens. Your gift of a goat will be a much-celebrated blessing for a family in need and can even help them make lasting change in their community.

Give a gift with purpose

This year, give a gift that does more. To order from the World Vision Gift Catalog, visit WorldVisionGifts.org or call 1-855-WV-GIFTS (1-855-984-4387). Donate by Dec. 9 for delivery by Christmas.

2026-09-28T09:17:00

(BPT) – While many homeowners are eager to kick off a renovation with cosmetic upgrades, the less visible systems behind the walls typically deserve attention first. From plumbing and electrical systems to heating, cooling and water heating equipment, these essential components play an important role in a home’s comfort, efficiency and everyday performance.

Prioritizing home systems like heating, ventilation, air conditioning (HVAC), plumbing and electrical wiring before aesthetic updates can help homeowners avoid costly disruptions later. Behind every wall are systems hard at work to keep homes running smoothly.

Hidden systems: Air and water quietly shape everyday life.

Did you know that, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, water heating and HVAC systems account for roughly 65% of an average home’s energy usage?

These systems work together to support nearly every daily activity, even though homeowners may not think about them until a repair or upgrade is needed.

HVAC determines whether the house feels comfortable when you wake up, work, relax and sleep, while water heating supports showers, laundry, dishes and other everyday needs. Homeowners don’t necessarily see either system working, but they experience the difference they make every day.

Upgrade before remodeling.

Renovation planning is an ideal time to consider whether a home’s existing systems can support what’s changing. Expanding a living space could alter heating and cooling needs, while adding a bathroom or accommodating a growing family will likely increase hot-water demand. Evaluating these needs before construction begins can help homeowners choose equipment suited to how they’ll use their newly renovated space.

Additionally, it’s important to source equipment from a well-established, highly regarded manufacturer, such as Rheem^®, a leader in the HVAC and water heating industry for more than 100 years, when selecting heating, cooling and water heating solutions.

Air and water: Modern technology makes whole-home comfort and efficiency more connected.

Although heating, cooling and water heating perform different jobs, homeowners ultimately experience them as parts of the same thing: a comfortable, efficient home.

HVAC and water heating systems are getting smarter. Today’s connected HVAC and water heating systems can also give homeowners greater visibility into system performance, maintenance needs and energy use.

As the HVAC and plumbing industries continue to evolve, so do homeowner expectations. Homeowners increasingly want efficient, sustainable home systems that offer greater visibility and control. Rheem’s EcoNet^® Smart Monitoring System, for example, connects select heating, cooling and water heating equipment, allowing homeowners to manage support systems from one platform. At the same time, homeowners are looking for connected equipment that can fit seamlessly into their increasingly smart homes.

Before you remodel, ask yourself:

• Will my current systems support my renovation plans?
• Is my HVAC system keeping every room comfortable?
• Does my water heater consistently meet my household’s needs?
• Are my energy bills increasing?
• How might my household’s comfort or hot water needs change in the next few years?

Invest in how the home lives, not only how it looks.

A beautiful renovation can transform how a home looks, but investing in the systems behind the walls transforms how it feels. By prioritizing heating, cooling and water heating before cosmetic updates, homeowners can create a more comfortable, efficient and dependable home that’s built to perform no matter what comes next.

2026-09-28T09:01:00

(BPT) – Key takeaways:

• Enterprises are rapidly adopting AI agents for contract management. But when contract data lacks context, the answers AI produces can be difficult to trust.
• Contract data is often fragmented and disconnected from the commercial context teams need to make decisions. This creates contract blindness.
• Agents can deliver quickly, but incomplete contract knowledge can produce fast, confident and costly mistakes. The answer is contract awareness: connection contract data with the context behind it so teams and AI can with relevant context.
• Contract-aware enterprises don’t start from zero. They use the learnings, negotiations and commitments buried in the contract history to act with the right commercial context during the decisions that matter.
• To learn more about what it takes to become a contract-aware enterprise, visit https://www.sirion.ai/library/reports/contract-aware-enterprise/.

Enterprises are racing to integrate AI agents into their contract processes, with 42% of organizations already actively adopting or implementing AI within contracting processes.* However, in many organizations, contract data is scattered, incomplete and disconnected from the business context that gives it meaning. The information exists, but it isn’t always available to the teams that need it to make decisions. Imagine a major supplier renewal is due tomorrow, and multiple departments need information as soon as possible. Procurement needs price adjustment information, legal needs contract terms, finance needs the budget and forecasting, and operations needs performance metrics.

The answers may all exist somewhere in the enterprise. The challenge is bringing that information together and understanding it in the context of the business relationship.

This condition is best recognized as contract blindness.

A contract-blind organization has the terms, obligations and leverage negotiated, but no person, system or AI agent can contextualize or reliably use them when decision time arrives. Over time, that gap translates into value leakage, slower decisions and weaker control over risk and performance. WorldCC highlights that poor contract management can cost an enterprise 9% of its annual revenue.

And the arrival of AI makes the problem harder to ignore.

Why contract blindness persists

Enterprises don’t necessarily lack contract data. They lack a connected view of it, because data is still siloed by function. Legal owns the language, procurement owns the supplier, finance sees spending and revenue, and business owners manage performance. In fact, contract data in a typical enterprise is often scattered across 24 systems.

Research highlights the scope of the fragmentation across global enterprises. Only 27% of organizations globally store all executed contracts exclusively in a contract lifecycle management (CLM) platform, with the majority operating in fragmented environments.*

And in any case, having a repository is not enough. Even with a CLM, contract data can remain fragmented and disconnected across systems, limiting data flow and deepening contract blindness. In fact, 54% of organizations report no automated data flow between systems and only 9% have bidirectional data flow where systems stay in sync.*

Disconnected data makes it harder for teams to bring together the information they need to make informed decisions. The emerging challenge is that same fragmentation can limit the context available to AI agents when they act. AI agents are designed to do more than retrieve information. They can review contracts, answer questions, recommend actions and initiate workflows. That makes the quality and context of the underlying contract data more important than ever, because AI will deliver the best outcome it can — based on the information it has access to.

Consider the supplier renewal.

An agent asked whether a supplier can raise its prices might find the relevant clause and confidently provide an answer. But what if an amendment changed the pricing mechanism? What if a negotiated exception applies to this supplier? What if the supplier agreed to a performance commitment in exchange for the increase?

The agent may have found the right clause. It may even have interpreted that clause correctly. But without the surrounding contract context, its answer could still lead the business in the wrong direction.

The problem isn’t that the AI cannot read the contract.

The problem is that it does not know what else it needs to read.

That distinction matters. AI can only create context from the information it can access. But when relevant contract data is fragmented across systems, an agent does not have enough information to understand the full commercial picture. An agent working from an incomplete contract record can produce an answer that sounds authoritative while missing the exception, obligation, negotiation or commercial condition that changes what the business should do.

The stakes change when AI moves from reading contracts to acting on them. The question is no longer whether AI can find the right clause, but whether it understands what that clause means for the business.

The goal is no longer just to find, summarize or draft contracts faster. It is to make the full story of a contract accessible, from its terms and obligations to the negotiations and relationships behind them.

Turning contract data into usable knowledge

A contract-aware enterprise treats its agreements as a connected business asset rather than a collection of documents. By making contract data continuously accessible, contextual and actionable across the business, leaders can perform analyses, surface real-time insights, build high-leverage agreements and instantly answer commercial questions that were previously impossible to ask.

So, what does contract awareness look like in practice?

In the supplier-renewal scenario above, procurement can see the price adjustment alongside previous negotiations, legal can identify exceptions and fallback language, finance can forecast the monetary impact, and operations can compare service with actual performance. Each team works from the same connected contract knowledge, allowing the enterprise as a whole to make informed decisions with its obligations and leverage intact.

Each team is working from connected contract knowledge rather than an isolated piece of the agreement. The result is not simply better visibility. It is better decision-making.

Creating contract awareness requires more than adding AI to an existing repository.

An AI-native CLM can create a connected contract intelligence layer by structuring agreement data around counterparties, deals, obligations and other contract elements while preserving the relationships and context between them.

This new approach enables AI agents to act on what you need, not on what you click. By combining context and intent, an agent can answer questions like, “Which suppliers have price increases without corresponding service improvements?” and “Which obligations are at risk of being missed?” The result: A workflow that can move from question to insight to action without losing the commercial context.

From contract knowledge to commercial action

The next phase of enterprise AI won’t be defined by access to powerful models. It will be defined by whether those models can act within the right business context.

By moving from contract blindness to contract awareness, enterprises can give both people and AI agents a more complete view of the agreements that shape their commercial relationships. To learn more about the contract-aware enterprise, visit https://www.sirion.ai/library/reports/contract-aware-enterprise/.

*Sirion and World Commerce & Contracting, “Trusted Contract Data: From Repository to System of Record,” 2026.

2026-09-24T10:31:00

(BPT) – For decades, hosting a football game meant the same thing: buffalo wings, a bowl of dip and a cooler of canned beer. But as the sport has evolved over the past 30 years, your Sunday spreads can evolve, too.

This season, Sequoia Grove Winery is bringing a fresh Napa Valley perspective to game day entertaining with “Game Day, Elevated,” a collection of chef-crafted recipes and wine pairings designed to make hosting feel special without making it complicated.

Developed by Sequoia Grove Executive Chef Bryce Palmer, the program brings together four elevated yet approachable dishes and three nationally distributed Sequoia Grove wines: the newly available 2025 Sauvignon Blanc, Napa Valley Chardonnay and Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. Designed with game day hosting in mind, the recipes can be prepared in advance, giving hosts the freedom to enjoy the food, wine and company from kickoff through the final whistle.

“Our goal was to create appetizers that feel special without requiring a professional kitchen. This is the kind of food that can largely be made ahead of time, so the host actually gets to watch the game,” said Palmer. “Each dish is paired with one of our wines, though they’re versatile enough to work with either a red or a white, depending on how you want to entertain.”

“Game Day, Elevated” coincides with a milestone for the winery, as Sequoia Grove recently made its 2025 Sauvignon Blanc available nationally for the first time in the brand’s almost 50-year history, joining the winery’s Napa Valley Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon as the three wines featured for game day pairings.

Instead of defaulting to expected game day menu items, elevate your spread with these chef-created appetizers, each paired with a Sequoia Grove wine:

• Rockfish Ceviche Tostadas with Mango, Avocado & Leche de Tigre; Paired with 2025 Sequoia Grove Sauvignon Blanc, Napa Valley
• Shrimp Rolls with Homemade Brioche Slider Buns, Garlic-Lemon Aioli & Fresh Herbs; Paired with Sequoia Grove Chardonnay, Napa Valley
• Duck Confit Tacos with House-Made Crème Fraîche, Pickled Shallots, Cilantro & Cotija; Paired with Sequoia Grove Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley
• Brioche Burger Buns with Chuck–Short Rib Patties, Pimento Cheese, Pickle Coins & Arugula; Paired with Sequoia Grove Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa Valley

Click HERE to view the recipes, pairings and images anchoring “Game Day, Elevated” this season.

Please drink responsibly. Learn more at Responsibility.org.

2026-09-24T11:31:00

(BPT) – Key takeaways:

• Disasterville, a mixed-reality experience, shows students how Army National Guard Soldiers respond to natural disasters in their home states.
• Students spend time inside three of the missions Guard Soldiers train for: containing a wildfire, rescuing flood survivors by boat and racing to free people from a collapsing train after an earthquake.
• Disasterville draws on the experiences of Soldiers like Capt. Carter Phung, who helped lead disaster response efforts after storms and flooding in his home state of South Carolina, to show students that the Soldiers who show up in a crisis may be their own neighbors, teachers or coaches.

When Capt. Carter Phung was handed the keys to a 50-vehicle convoy during Hurricane Florence in 2018, he had been an officer in the South Carolina Army National Guard for only a few weeks. Despite being new to this level of responsibility, he understood the stakes: The storm bearing down on the South Carolina coast was headed straight for his hometown of Conway — where his own family still lived.

“You don’t get to choose when disaster hits, and you don’t get to wait until you feel ready,” Phung said. Over the next month, he helped coordinate the movement of equipment that would become the “Great Wall of Conway,” a barrier made up of sandbags and plastic sheeting built to hold back rising floodwaters and protect critical local infrastructure and vital traffic access across the county.

Throughout this experience, he saw how communities can come together during times of crisis and uplift one another in need. Neighbors he’d grown up with brought coffee and home-cooked meals to Soldiers pulling 24-hour shifts, and a mother introduced her two young kids to the unit, telling them, “These are our Army people. They’re the reason we’re still here.”

Experience the Guard’s most common missions

Phung’s story is one of thousands playing out across the Army National Guard every year. Soldiers serve part-time — often in the towns they live in — and are called upon when disaster strikes to provide resources and support during a community’s most vulnerable time. Over the past several months, Army National Guard Soldiers have waded into flooded counties in Texas, flown rescue helicopters over rising water in West Virginia, and helped communities in Indiana and Wisconsin dig out after tornadoes. In Washington state, more than 200 Soldiers spent weeks fighting wildfires that eventually burned through over 200,000 acres.

Many young Americans are unaware of the Guard’s critical role in disaster response, which is why Disasterville, the Guard’s mixed-reality experience, is back for a second nationwide tour. Disasterville gives students the opportunity to experience this same impact by transforming high school gymnasiums into full-scale, mission-oriented disaster zones, showing them firsthand how National Guard Soldiers respond to natural disasters and emergencies. Students are guided through virtual missions, working together in teams to tackle three disaster zones — wildfire, flood zone and earthquake — the same way as the Guard, by combining communication, physical endurance and ingenuity to save lives, landscape and their communities.

“Natural disasters are not slowing down, and Army National Guard Soldiers are playing a critical role in response efforts across the country,” said Lt. Col. Sabrina Zowada, Chief of the National Guard Bureau’s Marketing and Advertising Branch. “Disasterville is a one-of-a-kind perspective for students to see how and when the Guard is showing up in their communities and experience the real skills and impact of these important missions.”

Lessons of disaster response for a new generation

Reflecting on his disaster response experience, Phung credits it with teaching him resilience, adaptability and confident leadership under pressure — qualities he hopes to convey to students through the program. “What I want kids walking through Disasterville to understand is that the person showing up to help isn’t some far-off Soldier — it’s their neighbor, their teacher, their coach,” he said. “That’s who the Guard actually is.”

2026-09-24T10:01:00

(BPT) – Most households underestimate two things about a public safety power shutoff: how long it typically lasts and how fast it can cost them a full refrigerator and freezer. When a utility company shuts off electricity to reduce wildfire risks, the interruption can stretch well beyond an afternoon. In California specifically, the average public safety power shutoff (PSPS) lasts almost two days, with some outages extending longer than six days.

If you’ve just gone grocery shopping, a single average-length shutoff is long enough to force you to throw out everything perishable in your fridge. In fact, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) advises discarding refrigerated perishables such as meat, poultry, fish, eggs and leftovers after just 4 hours without power. A full freezer is at risk of spoiling, too. According to the agency, a full freezer can only maintain a safe temperature for approximately 48 hours.

A potential shutoff doesn’t have to mean hundreds of dollars lost or days without power. The key is to know the facts and stay prepared. To make preparedness feel more manageable, Beau, Jackery’s in-house former licensed electrician, debunks the eight most common myths about energy shutoffs and offers practical advice on how to keep your fridge cool and your home running with home battery backup when the rest of the block goes dark.

Myth: I’ll find out I’m having a shutoff when the lights go out.

Reality: If conditions allow, the utility company actually notifies you in advance when your circuit’s being considered, usually a day or two out. That window is when you want to make sure your home battery backup is topped off so you’ll have power before a shutoff begins.

Myth: My phone and laptop batteries will get me through a shutoff.

Reality: Your phone and laptop batteries will only last a few hours, not a few days. Since shutoffs can run 24-48 hours (or longer), you’ll have to do without these important electronics. You’ll also have bigger things to worry about, like keeping your fridge, Wi-Fi router or anything else that needs to stay connected powered on.

Myth: If the power is shut off, I’ll just wait it out. It’s usually only a few hours.

Reality: This is sometimes true, but shutoffs are called based on wind and fire risk, not a fixed schedule, so they can run longer than expected. Just last October, due to fire weather concerns, Southern California Edison de-energized 1,215 customers across seven counties, leaving them without power for over a week. Having a home battery backup means you’re not gambling on a timeline you can’t control.

Myth: Backup batteries are only for people trying to go off-grid.

Reality: Most people adding home backup batteries are staying on the grid full time. By adding a home backup solution, they’re giving themselves peace of mind for days when the power’s out. It’s not a lifestyle change, it’s a spare tire. And once you have a portable power station to safeguard your necessities, you realize how many practical applications portable power at your fingertips can unlock: from outdoor entertaining, to road trips, to projects around the house.

Myth: If the power’s out, my only real option is a gas generator.

Reality: That may have been true at one point, but not anymore. Home battery backup solutions like Jackery’s portable power stations and solar generators can power the same essentials as a generator without the noise, fumes or trips to the gas station. All you have to do is charge them in advance. And there’s always the option to replenish them with solar power through Jackery’s portable solar panels.

Myth: A home backup battery can’t handle anything more than charging my phone.

Reality: People are often surprised by what a portable power station can handle. The right-sized unit can run a fridge, a Wi-Fi router, some lighting and charge devices all at once for a full day or more.

Myth: Setting this up is a big electrical project.

Reality: Portable solar power generators like Jackery’s are plug-and-play units that don’t require you to rewire your home but are ready right out of the box. You do have the option to connect a unit to specific circuits so they can switch over automatically or at the flip of a switch, and that’s a quick job for an electrician.

For example, the Jackery HomePower 3600 Plus and Explorer 5000 Plus can connect to home circuits via a Manual Transfer Switch and Smart Transfer Switch, respectively, for multiroom essential home backup. That said, plenty of people just plug in the electronics and appliances they need directly into the power station, so a solution like the HomePower 1000 Plus V2 is a lighter, more affordable option for smaller households or apartments to weather a shutoff.

Myth: If I have solar, my power never really goes out.

Reality: This is an incredibly common misconception. Federal interconnection safety standards require a standard grid-tied residential solar system to shut down when the grid does to protect utility line workers. That means if you have rooftop solar panels but no battery, the shutoff will hit your solar home exactly like every other home on the block without that energy stored somewhere.

A simple solution to this problem is to use portable solar panels. These panels aren’t tied to the grid, giving households with solar an independent way to actually use that power during a shutoff. Jackery’s portable solar panels work with all of our brand’s backup power solutions so that you can capture, store and use solar power during a shutoff or any time you want to create free, renewable energy.

When the power shuts off, you don’t need to shut down

When it comes to power shutoffs, it’s important to separate fact from fiction. To learn more about how to prepare for a potential shutoff and explore backup power solutions for your home, visit Jackery.com.