Blog: Marketing that Inspires

Community Outpouring in Support of Non-profits

  

 Email Article  

Tweet  

  

We had some great nominations this year for the Imagine Group Great Giveaway to non-profits. 189 people took the time to nominate 71 different non-profits to win signs or banners, photography or a vehicle wrap. Before I announce the winners later this week, I wanted to take the opportunity to share with you some of the things I learned from the nominations:

• A Northwest Youth Corps nominator noted that Oregon has the 3rd highest youth unemployment in the nation.
• Next Step is opening it's first Digital Literacy Training Center at Broadway and Oak as part of the ePower Our Community (ePOC) program, offering computer training and refurbished computers to 150 marginalized families.
• Skaters for Eugene Skateparks is half way through an ambitious fundraising campaign to build a world class skatepark under the Washington Jefferson bridge and attract high level national skateboarding competitions. Skateboarding is a sport, not just a fun way to get from here to there!
• The Assistance League of Eugene raises money through their Gently Used Thrift Shop on Willamette to provide free dental care to low income children.
• The Rainy Day Blues Society runs a monthly blues jam for kids, including free loaner instruments, providing "a place where kids can play the 12-bar blues without a bar".
• Volunteers in Medicine provides free primary medical care and mental health services to low income uninsured Lane County adults using donated time from health care professionals and the financial donations. They have over 450 volunteers and in the middle of an annual campaign to raise $1.6 million!
• The Eugene Ballet has a traveling ballet troupe and their performances reach 75,000 people in the region, often in places where their visit is the only ballet performance in the locality.
• A nominator of the Foster and Adoptive Parents Association of Lane County notes that there are approximately 1000 kids in foster care in Lane County alone.
• Springfield/Eugene Habitat for Humanity has just opened a ReStore, diverting building materials from the landfill to new houses.
• Looking Glass reaches over 7500 kids annually and just opened a new facility on River Road.
• MECCA prevented over 16,000 pounds of waste from entering the landfill by fostering creativity with the use of discarded materials. Over 5000 people take advantage of their Open Studio, gallery, community workshops and Recycled Art in the Schools each year.
• Oregon Track Club has over 50 years of history in this community and is now targeting recreational runners and walkers with new benefits and monthly runs/walks.
• Several people who nominated the American Diabetes Association noted that more people die each year from diabetes complications than breast cancer and AIDS combined!
• The School Garden Project supports school gardening curriculums in 15 school gardens in 4 area school districts. Isn't it great that there are that many school gardens?!
• Upstart Crow Studios puts on full scale Broadway productions with all-youth casts.
• He Kula Na Mea Hawaii (A School of Things Hawaiian) teaches language, history, dance and other aspects of Hawaiian culture locally to all who wish to learn.
• West Cascade Peace Corps Association will be celebrating 50 years of the Peace Corps "teaching people to fish, so they can eat for a lifetime" with a celebration downtown March 1st.
• Wilderness Volunteers (Flagstaff, AZ) organizes thousands of volunteers in national parks around the country with the use of only two paid staffers.

I am so grateful to live in a community where so many people care enough to work on behalf of the needs of others, to join together with their time and their resources to make the world a better place. It is an honor to be able to do what we do best (help our clients get their message out with exquisite photography, gorgeous graphics and fantastic vehicle wraps) to help organizations advance their mission.

Later this week, I will be ready to post the list of the 13 organizations chosen as winners in this year's Giveaway. Those who won last year are not eligible to win again until next year. But even taking those out of the pile, there were still many more worthy organizations than winning spots, so we tried to choose winners based on where we thought our gift could be most fully utilized and therefore have the most impact. Hopefully, even organizations who were not chosen will have benefit indirectly from the awareness generated by being nominated.

Thank you to everyone who participated. Your nominations matter.

Blessings to you all in this holiday season.