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Elephant Bar Fundraiser
Please join the Family Giving Tree community of supporters as we fundraise to fulfill wishes.
Bring this flyer to lunch or dinner at the Elephant Bar in Cupertino or Campbell and 20% of your bill will be donated!
Wednesday, February 20th
Print out the flyer here! |
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From the queen's desk
Take a deep breath, close your eyes and imagine waking up from a dream where you are celebrating the 23rd Anniversary of your Holiday Wish Drive. Happy, warm fuzzy feelings surround you, and then your brain does a little flip and you picture numbers lining up. No way! That can't be right!? 1,000,000 kids? Now you are really awake!
You head to the computer, straight to the Family Giving Tree website's statistics page. There you find the numbers of all we've helped through the years. Sure enough, the Millionth Child will be served during the 2012 Holidays!
It happened on Monday, December 17th to be exact. I can't relay the incredible range of emotions that consumed me that day: elation,  empathy, pride, etc...but the one that stood out above all the others was GRATITUDE. Wow! As a community we have all worked together to bring the spark of happiness and hope from total strangers to over a million children. Thank you, thank you, thank you for joining this beautiful movement, for being generous with your time and money, and believing with us that we are making a positive difference in the lives of these families.
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Family Giving Tree & The Power of One Million Wishes
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I plan on celebrating throughout this year. Meanwhile, I'll start working on the next million as I've been challenged to fulfill the next million wishes in less than half the time!
Good thoughts for all,
Jennifer
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Holiday wish drive hosts, sponsors recognized
 At our January 23rd Celebration Luncheon hosted by Texas Instruments, the Elves were joined by more than 200 hosts and sponsors for an event thanking them for their generous support of our Holiday Wish Drive.
Earning top awards this year were Presenting Sponsor SanDisk; private companies with the most number of total gifts collected, Cisco and Google; and a public company with the most number of gifts collected by their members and staff, Western Athletic Club. Also recognized was Moss Adams, LLP - their gift contribution percentage increased the most year-over-year from 2011. The students and staff of schools participating in the Drive were also acknowledged, including Leland High School that collected more than 1,100 gifts! Rounding out the luncheon were Stephanie Demos from Alum Rock Counseling Center and Jennifer Harper representing Alternative Family Services in San Francisco, who both gave touching accounts of how your donations impacted the lives of the children and families they serve.
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And the winners are...
The following groups went above and beyond in fulfilling wishes this holiday season and were presented with awards at our appreciation lunch this week. Congrats!
- Addison Elementary School
- Affymax, Inc.
- Apple Inc. - Austin
- AT&T Pioneers - Golden Gate Chapter
- AvalonBay Communities, Inc
- Box, Inc.
- Brocade Communications Systems
- Cisco Systems
- Comtel Systems Technology
- Electronic Arts
- Google, Inc.
- Jamba Juice
- KRTY/KLIV
- Leland High School
- LinkedIn
- Mission College Child Development Center
- Moss Adams, LLP
- Palo Alto Medical Foundation
- Santa Clara County Sheriff's Office Custody Bureau
- Texas Instruments
- The Harker School
- Transfiguration Nursery School
- Western Athletic Clubs
While the chance to receive an award motivates the competitive side of our host companies, many groups are finding creative ways to drum up excitement, encourage participation and motivate employees. Employees at Intel and Chevron assembled and painted rocking horses; Texas Instruments coordinated several competitive shopping sprees among their departments; Electronic Arts, IBM and Skype/Microsoft organized bicycle builds; and Genentech employees stuffed and decorated more than 400 teddy bears for children in need!
It's not too early to start creatively planning for the Back to School Drive, so register now!
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sponsor snapshot
 For the fifth year in a row, SanDisk returned as our Presenting Sponsor!
We are so grateful for their consistent support which allows us the luxury of planning ahead, ordering in bulk, and getting a real jump start on the drive.
We are always amazed by the creativity our supporters show in raising funds. Our Diamond Sponsor, NVIDIA, hosted the Millionth Child Reception and conducted a very unique internal auction which netted $8,750. Creativity for Seyfarth Shaw LLP meant giving up pastries and bagels for two months to give us over two thousand dollars. Every effort, big or small, equaled more fulfilled wishes! Click here to view our Mercury News thank you ad, with a full list of sponsors and in-kind donors. |
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more than 13,000 hours donated!
Fulfilling the wishes of more than 63,000 children this season would not have been possible without the help of our hard working volunteers.
Over 6,500 individuals volunteered with their co-workers, families and friends in our warehouse to help us receive, sort, wrap and distribute gifts over a three week period of time. Thank you for helping put a smile on the faces of thousands of under-served Bay Area children and for reinforcing the importance of community engagement!
Don't forget to post pictures of your time in the warehouse on our Facebook page, or tag yourself in the albums there now! Looking for something in our Lost & Found box? Please contact our office at (408) 946-3111 or email us at elf@familygivingtree.org and we can try to help.
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Once again, it all came together
 This was my 4th Holiday Wish Drive as Chief Operating Officer of the Family Giving Tree, and I'm still surprised. Maybe I'm just a slow learner?
Our drive started in earnest in mid-November with a very empty - and loaned - warehouse. Within several weeks, the warehouse was filled with more than 60,000 donated gifts, and by Christmas Eve, all of those gifts had been distributed to low income children throughout the Bay Area. In between, there were numerous other activities that occurred such as the annual Executive Elf Challenge, the children's party and this year's millionth child festivities.
None of this happened by accident! The staff of Elves at the Tree knew what to do and worked hard to ensure it all came together. The entire warehouse floor layout and work flow was planned and designed. Volunteers were scheduled. The store was put together. Hosts collected and dropped off gifts to the warehouse. Nearly 7,000 volunteers were utilized in a variety of activities over the course of the drive. At the office, thousands of donations were received, recorded and deposited. The phones rang off the hook! Everyone worked 12 to 14 hour days, 6 to 8 days straight.
To the 15 Elves that managed and directed this feat , my sincere thanks. It's a privilege to work with you.- David Bratton-Kearns, COO
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