ETC Cares Partners with Food4Kids Leading up to the Start of the New School Year

With school starting up this fall, the ETC Cares team thought it appropriate to assist local children in the Gainesville community by partnering with Food4Kids. This non-profit organization relies heavily on donations and volunteers to bring in food, package the food, and deliver it to corresponding schools in the area. The mission here is to end child hunger, something which specifically speaks to Katie Schantz.

“In college, my sorority's philanthropy focus was fighting hunger. So to have an opportunity to give back to my local community by packing food bags through both Food4Kids and Event Ticket Center, it felt extremely impactful and rewarding,” says Schantz. She continues on to say, “as an organization, I believe it is important to give back to your community in some way, shape, or form, which is why I'm so grateful for ETC Cares. It feels good to give and even better doing it through an organization that upholds the same values as you!”

Small Team Makes a Big Impact

At Event Tickets Center, we strive to help our communities and allow our employees opportunities to be part of our overall mission: the mission to give back. Celeste Aguinaldo says, “I’m grateful that ETC chooses organizations that are also impactful. Not only are we helping our community, but it is directly impacting the children of the city. And that gives me so much joy. No kid should ever go hungry, so I’m happy that our small team of volunteers were able to get through 100 bags of pre-packaged food for them.”

“Celeste said it perfectly, no kid should ever go hungry. I’m happy that the schools have a free and reduced lunch program, but I think we can do more for them. That’s why I’m so grateful that an organization like Food4Kids exists and that they do partner with some food companies who are able to send over boxes of non-perishable foods,” says Allye Clayton.

The organization is full of wonderful people, whom we all hope to work with again in the future. Ashley Tisher says, “It was great getting to volunteer with the wonderful people at the Food4Kids organization. Like Celeste and Allye said, there are many communities that suffer from hunger and getting to work with an organization that strives to eradicate this issue is so rewarding. I really felt like I was making a difference in a child's life when I was putting together bags of food. The organization members were so patient, helpful, and passionate when we showed up to volunteer that it became such a positive experience. We wanted to do even more after volunteering, so we took a donation bin back to our office so the rest of our coworkers could donate food as well. The mission of Food4Kids is so beneficial to our community and more should be done to spread awareness for their cause.”

Giving Back to the Community

Ms. Schantz even took it a step further and cleared out her home pantry to bring in food to the food drive box that was provided by Food4Kids. Our office is looking to fill this box with various treats and nutritious food to be brought back to their warehouse, and then distributed out to the children very soon!

At Event Tickets Center, we find great joy and purpose in giving back to the communities in which we work. Participating in volunteer efforts to build up our community is greatly beneficial to the charity organization, our team, and the community as a whole.