By Tatiana Barr, Office Administrator, EXIT Realty Vision, Brokerage in Carleton Place, ON
The Lanark County Food Bank-The Hunger Stop is operated by a group of 130 dedicated volunteers and one paid, part-time employee. Their aim is to provide five days’ worth of safe and nutritional food, once a month to families and individuals across Lanark County. This includes the communities of Carleton Place, Mississippi Mills (Almonte, Clayton, Blakeney, Pakenham, Appleton & White Lake), Beckwith (Franktown & Ashton), and Innisville. They provide front line services to approximately 250 families. And the volunteers work tirelessly planting and keeping the food bank gardens producing fresh produce, collecting donations, and stocking the pantry shelves and delivering to families and individuals who cannot shop for themselves or don’t have access to transportation.
We chose this charity because, as members of this community and, in particular, as an agency that regularly brings new families into the community, we feel a strong sense of commitment to ensure that we are supporting the needs of those who already reside here. As a result we organized several hot chocolate “pop up” events in both Carleton Place and Almonte. We participated in the Carleton Place Santa Parade and the Almonte Christmas craft fair. At these events we served hot chocolate with ALL the toppings, cookies and candy canes. We had our EXIT Realty Vision tent set up and lit up, and a very cute hot chocolate stand. Our agents and their children were decked out in EXIT Santa hats and jerseys. Teal and white cups with the EXIT Realty logo could be seen all along the parade route.
These events were a great success and many of our customers were very excited to hear that their donations would be matched through the Spirit of EXIT Charitable Program. A portion of every transaction fee received by EXIT Realty Corp. International is applied to its charitable fund. Through the Spirit of EXIT Charitable Program, EXIT offices and associates can raise money for local, approved, registered charities and apply to EXIT’s head office to have those funds matched from the company’s pool of funds. The team at EXIT Realty Vision, Brokerage raised $791.50 which EXIT’s head office was proud to match, for a total donation of $1,583 to Lanark County Food Bank.
“We are so grateful for your efforts and your goal to match donations from your team and community supporters. We are excited to report that $791.50 was raised during your matching challenge, that equates to 633 meals for our clients! This is very impressive and so wonderful for our clients,” said Karen Lomas, BoD Chair, Lanark County Food Bank.
