Foodbank Top Ten Wanted Lists:

Most Wanted
Peanut Butter
Chunky Soups
Canned Meats
Canned Tuna
Canned Vegetables
Juice
Cereal
Macaroni and Cheese
Pasta
Pasta Sauces

Senior Citizens
Pudding cups/ Fruit Cups/ Jell-O cups
Crackers
Sugar free snacks
Small packets of dried milk
Small cans of vegetables
Small jars of peanut butter and jelly
Reduced sodium canned soups
High fiber cereal
Canned tuna and chicken
Dried fruit

Emergency Needs
Water
Canned Juice
Snack Foods
Boxed, Canned Powdered Milk
Canned Vegetables
Canned Fruits
Canned Meats
Canned Soups
Spreads (peanut butter, jelly)
Cereal

Kids Cafe Fruit (#10 Cans)
Applesauce
Peaches
Tropical Fruit
Fruit Cocktail
Pineapple
Kids Cafe - Veggie (#10 Cans)
Green Beans
Sweet Peas
Whole New Potatoes
Corn
Baked Beans

Timeline

This is a tentative timeline, as much for my benefit as for any reader who might be curious.

October 1st - Print ad in the Downtowner
October 5th - Send out letters asking for prize donations
October 25 - Follow-up on prize donations

November 1st - Second print ad in the Downtowner
Week of November 11-13th - Deliver the invitations and the cans

December 18th - End of the food drive

The drawing for the prizes will be at 5:30 on December 18sth at Tanner's Creek on Colley Avenue. (You are more than welcome to join me!) All donations must be in my possession no later than noon on that day. There can be NO EXTENSIONS past this time. I am concerned about turning in the food to the Foodbank. Believe it or not, the warehouse closes so that the employees can have a holiday break. If I am still picking up donations on Monday or Tuesday, I may have to sit on those donations until after the New Year, pushing the prize drawing back as well. This is not going to happen.

I am still unsure who will be in charge of drawing the prize winners, but I will announce this as soon as I know!

The NCVB, a Party and More Credibility

I am always in search of ways to give the food drive more credibility, especially to those people who have never heard of me. And to that end, I have no problem dropping a name or two, or associating myself with major players in the Norfolk arena.

So when I decided to add prizes as an incentive, I knew I had to find someone completely non-biased to determine the prize winners. Someone in power. Someone with a name so recognizable there could be no doubt of the authenticity of this food drive. To my absolute delight, Anthony DiFilippo, Director of the Norfolk Conventions and Visitors Bureau, stepped in to take that role. I cannot thank him enough for allowing me to attach his name with the challenge invitations, which may also have attributed to a higher participation rate.

I decided to have a prize drawing at Hell's Kitchen on a Friday night just a few days before Christmas. Tony agreed to come over and pull the names from a hat. I don't know what I really expected; I guess I wanted one or two people from each of the participating restaurants to show up for a little Christmas cheer. As it was, only Tony and I showed up. He pulled the names, we drank a beer and the food drive was over.

Now here's the funny thing about that: having a high profile name is only one part of the credibility issue. When dealing with "rules" and "prizes", you have to be very careful to keep everything transparent and honest. That being said, as Tony announced the winning restaurant names, my heart sank lower and lower. All of the major prizes went to places that had donated the least amount of food, barely even giving the minimum of 10 pounds or $5. My major contributors, places like Doumar's, Tanner's Creek and the Freemason Abbey did not win anything at all.

Lesson learned again.

This year I am raising the minimum donation, as yet TBD. I am also splitting the prizes into tiers, with only the top donors being eligible for the largest prizes. I don't know, is that fair? There is still so much to think about, and I'm running out of time. The first print ad will happen in either September or October, which means I need to have the rules spelled out before this blog actually gets readers!

PRESS-ed for Credibility

I like to believe everyone in the city knows the name Kirk Springer, or at least everyone downtown... or at least everyone who owns a restaurant in downtown. Sadly I am incorrect.

While many, many people recognize my ability to put warm bodies into empty seats, there are just as many who turn their backs on me, whether for the food drive or just daily business. To make matters even worse, the further you travel from downtown, the less the name Kirk Springer means. And the truth is there is no reason for those eateries to know me. Most of my guests do not have cars, and I have to balance the cost of the cab ride versus the price and quality of the meal. On a side note, I really want to know as much as I can about what's out there, so I have eaten at almost every restaurant between downtown and Ocean View --over a fifteen year period, mind you.

So when I walk into a restaurant in Ghent, announce myself as Kirk Springer, Concierge of the Marriott, and hand them a can of green beans, I imagine that can lasts about 25 seconds before it hits the trash! And with the realization that I am not the beginning and end of the Norfolk dining experience, I really needed to find a way to get my name out to the masses.

For the longest time I considered marching into the offices of Portfolio Weekly and asking a staff writer to do a story about my challenge. After all, it is very unique, right? But I just couldn't get up the gumption, and before I knew it, Portfolio was history.

So I became scrappy, writing my own blurbs and sending them to the Virginia-Pilot in the guise of a Letter to the Editor. Hey, it worked, and now I can write "as seen in the Virginia-Pilot"! Twice that newspaper ran a letter that I wrote solely for the promotion of my food drive. (Sorry VP, the letters were actually valid, one in your Pay It Forward feature, and one in the after-Christmas glow of thanks.)

I also had an opportunity to befriend Jack Armistead, owner and publisher of The Downtowner. Last year I just drove him crazy until he agreed to add the Green Bean Challenge to his November Top 10 list. Thanks, Jack! Because of you, I believe several Ghent restaurants decided to join.

And now of course, there is this blog. How many people will read it and decide that my food drive is legitimate? Only time will tell... The other possibility is a TV spot during a local news broadcast, arranged by the Foodbank of Southeastern Virginia. It's not as far-fetched as it might seem, as the idea was actually brought up by one of the managers at the Foodbank last year. I really, really, REALLY don't want to be on TV, so I might have to find a volunteer to take my place if this actually happens.

Bill Rice, the Zobys and the $1,000 Check

The Foodbank of Southeastern Virginia can feed a person for 29 cents. They are able to do this by using food brokers and by purchasing surpluses. To be honest, money comes in a lot more handy at the Foodbank than the cans of food we strive to collect and deliver.

However, coming between a server and his hard-earned cash can be a difficult task! I believe this is partially due to the large number of scams the nation has endured in recent years. Who doesn't remember the large salaries given to CEOs of charitable organizations? Who hasn't been forced into donating to the United Way during the "fair share" program in which an employer could reap prizes if 100% of the employees participated, causing the employer to threaten the employees?

And during the Christmas season there seems to be someone at every corner crying out for a donation for this charity or that one. I think many people become inured to the call for help and instead become protective of their wallets. So a can of food is a more tangible gift, and seems less like a ploy and more like a solution.

However, the foodbank can feed someone for 29 cents! While I strive to collect as many pounds of non-perishable goods as possible, I can't help but mention this fact in each year's invitation. The money fluctuates from year to year; I don't count on it to make the drive a success. And I certainly never expected the AMAZING gift of $1,000 contributed by the Zoby family, owners of 456 Fish, Byrd and Baldwin Brothers Steakhouse, Bodega and The Big Easy.

General manager Bill Rice was just as excited as I was that first year, and he wholeheartedly campaigned to have this donation given to the food drive. I am forever in his debt for that help. But I have never really publicized the donation. Not because it was secret, but because I was afraid of scaring away other participants, whether for cans or cash. I figured if Todd Jurich's Bistro or Trilogy began to think of it as a competition, they might not give at all.

My "thank you" letters for that year metioned the total amount collected, but I never mentioned that the Zoby family had contributed almost all of it. Just a general "Wow, we collected $1,100!" After all these years, I've always feared Bill Rice and the Zobys felt as if I had "taken them for a ride", even though the check was made out to and cashed by the foodbank.

So my apologies to the Zoby family, as I never really intended to keep the donation secret, I just didn't know how to announce it!

JUST FOR FUN: Many children go hungry during the summer months because they are not provided the free breakfast or lunch at public schools. For parents, the warm months can be a financial nightmare. Imagine a local church that provides summer camp or summer classes for a group of impoverished children. The $1,000 would be enough to provide 3,448 meals or about 70 days worth of food for 50 kids at a shelter such as this. Enough to help those kids eat throughout the summer.

Proven Methods for CAN-do Results!

First of all, if this challenge is not both fun and voluntary, then you are doing it wrong! I am truly not trying to add any extra stress to your holiday season, I'll take that upon myself!
To keep the drive fun, I want to remind you that this challenge is not geared to take away from your corporate profits and I certainly do not expect for you to give food from your restaurant pantry. And I most certainly do not expect for your restaurant guests to bring food to contribute.

THIS FOOD DRIVE IS GEARED TOWARD SERVERS, BARTENDERS, CHEFS and OTHER EMPLOYEES. I would like these individuals to donate food from their own kitchen pantries, or to purchase food items from their own tips and salaries.

There are some proven ways to generate food donations from your staff. The best way to do this is to remove yourself from the equation if you are an owner or manager! Ask a server with alot of personality, one whom almost everyone likes, to take control of the challenge. Let that person bring up the challenge during the daily line-up; let that person motivate the other employees.

This year's challenge will consist of five Fridays. Those days can be "Canned-Food Friday". Ask the staff members to bring their cans in to work on that day. Allow the server with the most cans to dictate her own station or sidework. If she wants to go home early for a hot date, she will bring the most cans. If she needs the money to buy Mom a special something, she might donate everything in her pantry.

Sometimes a restaurant has no place to store the donation. A solution: one restaurant collected in the trunk of a car. Or if this is not a feasible solution, I am available to pick-up the donation as many times as you need.

Another proven method is to require employees to bring a food donation to the employee Christmas party. You might offer a prize to the employee who brings the most, maybe a free bar tab for that night, or gift certificate for the restaurant. Or if your place wins one of the larger prizes, that employee would automatically be the recipient.

Most of the fine-dining restaurants in Norfolk have a hard time providing more than the minimum donation. These employees make "bank", but seem unable to help with this food drive, possibly because of ties with other charities. So for these individuals I ask this: every time you break $100 in tips, please put aside a quarter. If you make $300 during one shift, you put aside a meager 75 cents. Since alot of you make this kind of money daily, I only ask for you to do it on a Friday or Saturday night. Assign one person in your restaurant to purchase the non-perishable goods, say spaghetti, and soon you will have enough weight to be entered for the prize drawings!

Of course, you can always put a box by the front door and ask your "regulars" to donate. However, many restaurants feel odd about asking their paying guests to bring food, or they feel the box clashes with the decor of the restaurant. I understand these feelings. Again, the drive is not focused on your diners, it is your staff I would like to see contribute.

Finally, and this is just and idea, you might ask for a donation as a cover charge for a popular night at your bar/restaurant. Or your BAND or KARAOKE emcee might mention the collection during a performance.

This should be fun and voluntary. During the drive I will be available by phone as often as possible ( I have a job!), but will return all messages. I can come by to pick up your donation on a regular basis if you need to get it out of the way. I can provide you with boxes and posters if necessary.

I am always surprised by the creativity of the participants!