7th Annual Bull City Foodraiser!
Tax deductible
Help feed Durham NC schoolkids over the winter break!
Back in December 2015, Eastway Elementary School teacher Turquoise Parker had a problem: she wanted to make sure her class – students she'd affectionately dubbed Mrs. Parkers' Professors – had enough food to eat during their 2-week winter break.
So she reached out to a friend of a friend (me) on Facebook Messenger to see if I could help. These messages would unexpectedly become the start of the wildest multi-year philanthropy project in Durham
A couple days later, we had successfully raised over $500 and managed to pack a Hyundai Elantra with groceries!
Our slapdash impromptu food drive was such a hit that we had to try it again the next year...
...and the year after that...
...and the year after that...
...and the year after that!
Each year the community support for the Bull City Foodraiser continued to grow, from donations to volunteers, enabling us to help an ever-growing number of kids with winter groceries.
*****
And then 2020 happened.
*****
We were worried that a year of lockdowns, of things like having to add "novel coronavirus" and "social distancing" to everyone's lexicon, of all the loss and suffering that COVID created would make it harder for the Foodraiser to happen. But instead it was like adding kerosene to a fire! We had more support from more people than ever before -- and so many groceries that we needed Lowes Home Improvement to loan us a tractor trailer to get it moved and then loan us a forklift to get the truck unloaded!
We then had an army of volunteers who bagged over 3600 bags of groceries in just two days (roughly 5 bags per minute for 12 hours!)
The picture you see as the top of this page is from the school cafeteria we used as a staging ground for bagged groceries. We had even more in the hallway down the right-hand side of that photo, and more still in the gymnasium to the left:
We ended up with 3,632 bags of groceries in all, distributed to every student at *10* elementary schools.
And it all started in 2015 with that one class of Parkers' Professors!
*****
We're doing it again -- and we need your help!
*****
We're looking to make 2021 the best Bull City Foodraiser yet! We want to match last year's total without going too far over; it took a lot of people to make last year work, and we don't want to bite off more than we can chew. But if we can replicate last year just as well this year, we'll know we're in a good place to expand in the future.
Your support matters! 100% of every dollar we receive -- no matter how small or how large your donation is -- goes right back out the door to support the Foodraiser! We have -$0- overhead and are entirely volunteer-driven.
We're also 501c3-certified by the IRS so your donation is tax-deductible, and we're also listed on Benevity for employers that provide matching contributions!
PLUS: we have several people who've agreed to be "matchers" that kick in $2-per-donor for every single person who donates to the Foodraiser, so your donation goes even further!
Please consider joining the cause, telling a friend, and helping us feed some schoolkids this winter!
Back in December 2015, Eastway Elementary School teacher Turquoise Parker had a problem: she wanted to make sure her class – students she'd affectionately dubbed Mrs. Parkers' Professors – had enough food to eat during their 2-week winter break.
So she reached out to a friend of a friend (me) on Facebook Messenger to see if I could help. These messages would unexpectedly become the start of the wildest multi-year philanthropy project in Durham
A couple days later, we had successfully raised over $500 and managed to pack a Hyundai Elantra with groceries!
Our slapdash impromptu food drive was such a hit that we had to try it again the next year...
...and the year after that...
...and the year after that...
...and the year after that!
Each year the community support for the Bull City Foodraiser continued to grow, from donations to volunteers, enabling us to help an ever-growing number of kids with winter groceries.
*****
And then 2020 happened.
*****
We were worried that a year of lockdowns, of things like having to add "novel coronavirus" and "social distancing" to everyone's lexicon, of all the loss and suffering that COVID created would make it harder for the Foodraiser to happen. But instead it was like adding kerosene to a fire! We had more support from more people than ever before -- and so many groceries that we needed Lowes Home Improvement to loan us a tractor trailer to get it moved and then loan us a forklift to get the truck unloaded!
We then had an army of volunteers who bagged over 3600 bags of groceries in just two days (roughly 5 bags per minute for 12 hours!)
The picture you see as the top of this page is from the school cafeteria we used as a staging ground for bagged groceries. We had even more in the hallway down the right-hand side of that photo, and more still in the gymnasium to the left:
We ended up with 3,632 bags of groceries in all, distributed to every student at *10* elementary schools.
And it all started in 2015 with that one class of Parkers' Professors!
*****
We're doing it again -- and we need your help!
*****
We're looking to make 2021 the best Bull City Foodraiser yet! We want to match last year's total without going too far over; it took a lot of people to make last year work, and we don't want to bite off more than we can chew. But if we can replicate last year just as well this year, we'll know we're in a good place to expand in the future.
Your support matters! 100% of every dollar we receive -- no matter how small or how large your donation is -- goes right back out the door to support the Foodraiser! We have -$0- overhead and are entirely volunteer-driven.
We're also 501c3-certified by the IRS so your donation is tax-deductible, and we're also listed on Benevity for employers that provide matching contributions!
PLUS: we have several people who've agreed to be "matchers" that kick in $2-per-donor for every single person who donates to the Foodraiser, so your donation goes even further!
Please consider joining the cause, telling a friend, and helping us feed some schoolkids this winter!
Organizer
T Greg Doucette
Organizer
Durham, NC
T. Greg Doucette Foundation, Inc.
Beneficiary