Thursday, April 2, 2009

Taking the stairs because we care


We've all seen that episode of Mad Men where Don Draper gets his revenge on Roger Sterling by tricking him into walking up 23 flights of stairs after a multi-martini and oyster lunch. Yeah it was gross. But it inspired our latest agency fundraising challenge.

No, it's not oyster shucking or martini mixing (or even hitting on other people's spouses) it's the "Stairs for Chairs" fundraiser, next week (April 6 -9) at Acart.

Every few weeks, we adopt a new cause to support with time, money or work. After all, we're a Social Issues Marketing company. We care about people.

Next Monday, a number of us have pledged to avoid using the office elevator for a week to help raise money and awareness for Humanitarian Mobility International (HMI). Based in Ottawa, HMI provides mobility access and specialized equipment to victims of war and natural disasters around the world.

HMI’s operating budget relies completely on sponsors and donations. The money Acart raises will help HMI buy a trailer used to transport the wheelchairs to the warehouse.

HMI is focused on peacekeeping, post-war reconstruction and disaster relief. They work with medical centres and hospitals worldwide to help people with disabling injury or disease. They work with other organizations to refurbish mobility equipment such as wheelchairs. Currently, two members of HMI are in Beirut, ensuring wheelchairs arrive safely and are distributed to those who need them most.

Why the stairs? We often take our own mobility for granted, so we want to put our legs to work to remember how fortunate we are, and how we need to use those abilities to improve the mobility of those who don't have the luxury. The environmental and health benefits don't hurt, either.

Plus, in the interest of full disclosure, the Acart Building is only 6 storeys high. And we rarely drink Martinis at lunch.

4 comments:

  1. Love the blog, Tom! Great work! See you on the stairs :)

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  2. Ironically, I tried to post to your blog earlier, but couldn't -- because of its lack of accessibility. On the system I'm posting from, I magnify all text in my browser by 160%, and that caused the "Post Comment" and "Preview" buttons on your blog to not be shown, because the fixed-height frame in which they are displayed was cutting them off. Consequently, I have to view your blog at 100% text magnification, which makes it hard to read.

    Anyhow, I wanted to say that other than this point, I like the spare look of your blog: I have to view far too many blogs with the style turned off (View/Page Style/No Style in Firefox) because the text is too small or too wide or too narrow or in colors that are too strange for my ordinary middle-aged vision.

    Best of luck.

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  3. @John Cowan It's just a regular template, but I'll ask our Director of Digital Media about accessibility. Thanks for the heads up!

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