Tis the Season of Thanks!

by Drew Martinez
Resource Development Executive

During this holiday season those of us in the Resource Development Department have much to be thankful for. From increasing numbers of leadership level givers to companies renewing or increasing their workplace campaigns; the amount of generosity in our corporate partners is something we all give thanks for. One company in particular exemplifies that generosity, Enterprise Rent-A-Car.

This year Enterprise Rent-A-Car ran an amazing campaign that utilized so many of the campaign best practices, which really proved to pay off. Their total raised, including corporate and employee gifts, increased by 21 percent, and their number of leadership level givers increased by 81 percent! These increases happened because of many different reasons. They have such a strong leadership team in Sally Brown, Neil Haffer, and Sean Matsalla that really set an example to the employees of compassionate corporate leaders. The company itself invested in the campaign by doing a .50 cent match, and provided incentives for people to join one of our Donor Networks. They utilized workplace presentations, and continuously shared how the campaign was going with their employees. They also made the campaign really fun for their employees, and honestly for me as well, being the UWSL executive working with their company.

Due to the large increase in Young Leaders at Enterprise, we did a Young Leader 101 here in our board room. I did an overview of Young Leaders and Christina, Heather, and Elizabeth came in and talked about the different subcommittees the new members could join. Elizabeth also expanded on the advocacy work Young Leaders are doing to advance the high-quality preschool bill.

In this time of thanks giving I want to send a big THANK YOU to everyone at Enterprise Rent-A-Car!  Your generosity and compassion for your community is inspiring, and is an example of how partnerships like yours can truly help to change the odds so every child succeeds in both school and in life.

Thank you for LIVING UNITED!