In August 2010 I quit my job as a coffee boy at Book-A-Million to volunteer full-time with the Red Cross. I thought hard about it, and it seemed like a risk worth taking. If it paid off, I’d gain valuable experience with a non-profit- one that provides disaster relief at that. In November the Public Relations Coordinator went on maternity leave, and I spent the next two months filling in the best I could.
Somehow- don’t ask me how, exactly- but somehow, I ended up working on the Annual Gumbo Cook-Off. I had a 75-year old mentor who reminded me often, “Honey, I’ve been doing this 56 years.” Thank God for that woman. About a third of the way through, she decided it was my turn to run things, and I ended up as the chair of our Cook-Off this year…
…about the same time the Red Cross brought me on as an AmeriCorps VISTA. So January 31st was my first day “on the job,” not as a volunteer. That meant I was not only working on the Gumbo Cook-Off, but also working to “build resilience in the community during times of disaster” through our Neighbor to Neighbor program. But enough about N2N and resilience- that’s another post.
Until this year I had never planned or run an event before. There’s a lot of work involved. Because of an email glitch, those emails we sent out in October didn’t arrive, so we started from scratch the first week of January. We needed teams and sponsors. We needed new trophies, aprons, t-shirts, and banners. We needed a killer kids’ area, great entertainment, and drink trailers. We needed posters and ticket distributors. We needed to upgrade our logo from clip art to something eye-catching. We needed a lot.
Most importantly, we needed to raise more money than ever. Last year our Cook-Off had 8 teams, 600 visitors, and raised about $3,500. With the help of last year’s event organizer (who made it back from maternity leave just in time to help us get things finalized) and Ann Coffee (my 75 year old extra-curricular grandmother), we nearly doubled the teams (some dropped out at the last minute), easily tripled the income, and probably had about 1,000 people show up to the event. It was a hit. And it blew my mind.
The Unofficial Estimated Stats: 13 teams, 800+ guests, ~$11,000 (net) raised for the Alabama Gulf Coast Chapter.
And we’ve already started planning for next year. The date is set: Saturday, March 31, 2012. You coming?
by Joe Kennedy
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