There’s More Than Breasts To Talk About
I’m sure most of you are quite aware that this October, Buckley’s Auto Care has been promoting a brake promotion to help raise awareness and funds for a breast cancer vaccine that claims a 100% success rate in the lab. I was made aware of this cause through another highly regarded and super shop owner, Amy Mattinat from Auto Craftsmen in Vermont. If you don’t know Amy than you don’t know energy. A dynamo and an actual breast cancer survivor with a tremendous story. For me and the company I help run, it was a no brainer to fall in love with the cause. So we began.
To date, we’ve had a great time with the promotion and to be honest, it’s been very successful on all fronts. Everybody is winning. My NAPA parts supplier, Adams Auto Parts agreed to special pricing for the event, Leigh Anne Best of Mighty Auto Pro’s in Ohio (she and Laura Frank – both shop owners and the lead shop in this promotion) had all of the advertising material in place and ready to go so all I had to do was get my printer, Print N’ Press to put it on paper and we enlisted Marge Cherico and her band of co-workers to make wonderful hand made magnets. This really has been a kind of rally around the cause situation and I’m extremely honored to have been asked by spark plug Amy.
But just the other day, one of our favorite and most nicest clients, Lulu Calbazana happened to stop in for service on her Toyota Prius. Now Lulu and her husband Alejandro, are blessed to have two wonderful little girls, Olivia and Gabriella. Olivia was diagnosed with Medulloblastoma and is in a constant state of recovery. I was made aware of this form of cancer from another beautiful family, the Quesenberry’s (Debbie, Andy, Aja and their cancer surviving dynamo, Pearce) who came to us from working with Joe McDonough and his B+ Foundation. Being in Delaware these connections are more common than you think….
Lulu couldn’t help to notice all of the decorations and promotional material that we had up on our walls, counters and waiting area. She was aware of Facebook page and all of the promoting Buckley’s has been doing for Breast Cancer. And although she knew that any way to fight cancer is a good one, no matter what the type is, she said, “I wish you could’ve done something for the kids..” Gulp. With just those few words, I thought to myself, “wow, you know, I don’t even think I knew or remembered about September and Kids Cancer Month”. I was actually quite upset with myself for not paying attention to the calendar or asking the two families that trust me to work on their vehicles what’s coming up and how can we (Buckley’s Auto Care) help. It was a moment that I won’t forget. Lulu’s words weren’t made out of disgust or envy, they were said because she is parent fighting for her daughter and looking for any help she can get. You and me would do the same in a heartbeat. Lulu was trying to tell me, “that kids get cancer too. Please don’t forget that.”
Needless to say, what Lulu said brought to light what a lot of small businesses face everyday. How do we help those that ask? What causes do we circle around that can mean the difference for a group, a family, a child or even stray pets that need rescuing? If you were to ask most owners of small businesses, we would like to have a never ending faucet coming from our buildings that could go to locally operated charitable groups. But we all know that it’s just not possible. We have to pick and chose and that really tears us up on the inside when we have to say “no”. It’s worse when we say “I forgot” or “I didn’t know”. And for me in particular, a twelve month calendar showing who’s doing what and when. I’ll admit; I fail miserably when trying to plan for these events so any assistance in getting the ball rolling helps me tremendously. But I have to keep trying to do the best I can and getting a little kick in the pants every once in a while can do some good.
Lulu, thank you for being open enough to say what you said. I would have done the same thing…
Sincerely, Greg