BBQ Spit Rotisseries - Changing the community one box at a time

Each year I like to take a few hours out of my very busy day to do something very dear to my heart and make up some food hampers to donate to local families who are struggling financially. As a busy business-women who would think nothing of working a 70 hour week, it would be much easier for me to simply donate the money I would have otherwise spent on creating these hampers, collect my good karma points and put the half a day saved to another use....but that would not give me the same level of satisfaction.

So again this year I went to the supermarket filling up a trolley full of breakfast cereals, pasta, sauces, crackers, chips, lollies, tinned fish, milk, tea coffee, condiments, bonbons, fruit mince pies, puddling, custard and anything Christmas related I could find. My shopping trolley was overflowing, fruit mince pies were sliding from the top of the mountain and onto the floor and I got a couple of strange looks from some fellow shoppers who probably thought I was shopping for my 7 kids! .....which by the way I do not have, just the one fur baby Donna, which we all call Donna Kebab! (yes, I know the spelling is incorrect)

At some point, I realised I had to stop, go through the checkout and go back in for round 2. I'm not quite sure how I managed to fit everything inside the Suzuki Swift, but I was able to squash it all in, shut all the doors and drive back to the warehouse safely without being about to see out my back window!

The Journey So Far......

From Humble beginnings in 2011 - 2 Boxes Donated

As some of you may remember from a previous post I shared back in December last year, my inspiration came from attending a personal development seminar back in 2011. While we started small with just donating 2 large boxes full of food, as the jingle goes "from little things, big things grow"..... and that's exactly what happened.

Year 2 (2012) - 3 Boxes

In the true nature of always wanting to improve, the next year I filled 3 large boxes and had one of our staff help me with all the packing.

Third 3 (2013) - The Explosion 4 Boxes (+ 200 indirectly)

In November 2013, a lady from the local church was door knocking all the businesses in the Seaford area asking for donations and/or produce to fill Christmas hampers. I told her that I had been donating boxes to St Vincent De Pauls for the past couple of years and that I'd be doing the same this year.

She instantly said, "you're the girl who started this".

I had no idea what she was talking about, but as it turned out, the church used to organise a toy drive for local underprivileged families and one day when the toys were being delivered, the driver only had one toy to give to a family with 5 children. The driver felt terrible as he didn't have any more toys to give and the lady asked if he had any food which he did not.

As it turns out, it was the very next day that St Vincent De Pauls came and picked up those first 2 hampers that I donated and delivered them to that family. The lady was crying and as extremely grateful. the driver was obviously touched by the impact this had on the local family and wanted to do more in future years.

As a result of me donating those first 2 hampers back in 2011, the Seaford Church in conjunction with St Vincent De Paul now arrange 200 hampers of food and distribute them to local families each Christmas.

Year 4 (2014) - 5 Boxes

Last year we got more of our staff involved and put 5 boxes together. They were as proud as punch! I can honestly say that our staff love their jobs. They come in early, they stay back late and they offer to come in on their days off if we need them. I'd like to think that it is the strong culture that we have cultivated that has contributed to this. They have a sense of pride working for a company like BBQ Spit Rotisseries knowing that their efforts allow us to touch peoples lives and make a difference. We are all down to earth simple people (not meant to be derogatory) who understand that there is more to life than what most corporate companies offer. Being predominately an online business who always offers the best possible price, we have low margins and therefore can't afford huge Christmas bonuses or a lavish Christmas party for our staff. Despite this, they still treat the business as if it was their own and will happily go above and beyond what I would ask them to do. I'm sure that bribing them with our weekly spit-roasted lunches also help too!

Year 5 (2015) - 6 Boxes

I have shared this story to give you an insight into our company and to show you that when you shop with a socially responsible company such as BBQ Spit Rotisseries, you are helping us to help the community. Now I am not so naive to think that there won't be cynics out there who believe that our desire to contribute is not genuine and that all businesses are out there to rip customers off. Bar humbug to you. My only motivation for sharing this experience is to reassure people that despite all the bad things happening in the world, there are good things happening around us each and every day. It is just unfortunate that the good news stories don't tend to sell advertising space in the media and are rarely publicised.