There were envelopes in the employee break room. There were envelopes in the cosmetics department. There were envelopes in the candy department. Envelopes were everywhere at Macy’s Kukui Grove yesterday. Led by store manager Debbie Chuckas, the store is in
There were envelopes in the employee break room. There were envelopes in the cosmetics department. There were envelopes in the candy department. Envelopes were everywhere at Macy’s Kukui Grove yesterday.
Led by store manager Debbie Chuckas, the store is in the midst of an envelope-stuffing campaign on behalf of the Kaua‘i Food Bank.
“We’re out to win this year,” said Rowena Quisano, Macy’s Partners in Time coordinator.
In the 2005 “Let’s Bag Hunger and yes we can do it!” campaign, the Kukui Grove store achieved 518 percent of their goal, gathered 19,406 pounds of food, averaging 166 pounds per employee.
Those numbers were good enough to give the Kukui Grove store second place among the Macy’s stores. A store in Southland, Calif., took top honors by going 652 percent of goal with 45,704 pounds of food collected. That amount averages out to 209 pounds per employee.
Third place in the chain went to the Hilo store, which went 510 percent of goal with 24,500 pounds of food collected, or 163 pounds per employee.
The winning store gets $1,000 towards the food bank, the Apple Award, a trophy recognizing the team’s efforts and success, and a catered lunch.
Additionally, there is a “food fight” category with the first place team (team with the highest volunteer hours per person) receiving 2,000 pounds credit and $500 for their food bank.
With that taste lingering in mouths from licking envelopes, the employees at the Kukui Grove Macy’s are fired up as they spent portions of their breaks, and even got their families involved, as they undertook the task of stuffing over 6,000 envelopes for the Kaua‘i Food Bank.
This year’s goal for Kukui Grove is to collect 5,080 pounds of food, or 40 pounds per employee. Quisano said that Macy’s employees are on the Kaua‘i Food Bank’s “Kaua‘i Fresh” produce program, and the food bank staff have been picking up their employee contributions on a weekly basis to coincide with the produce delivery schedule.
“We’re on a deadline,” Quisano said.
Kelvin Moniz, the Kaua‘i Food Bank’s Operations Manager, was busy shuttling cartons of stuffed envelopes to the waiting van.
“The envelopes came Tuesday, and will be mailed out June 14 as part of the food bank’s direct mailing campaign,” Moniz said.
“There are envelopes throughout the store,” Chuckas said. “We’ve got them in gift wrap, cosmetics, women’s, and candy. It’s a store-wide effort.”
Additionally, Quisano said the employees hosted a bake sale that has raised over $300. They’re also selling “World’s Best” chocolates in hopes of raising an additional $1,000 by June 22, their campaign deadline.
Quisano said their highlight event is the ticket sales they are conducting for the pie throw event scheduled for June 21, the day before their campaign ends.
She explained that employees will have an opportunity to throw cream pies at their managers in this event.
“We’ll probably do it outside by the receiving area so it’ll be easier to clean,” Quisano laughed.
“We’re lucky that our store manager is so supportive of us, and motivates us to execute this project,” Quisano said. “She even came in on her day off to help stuff envelopes.”
• Dennis Fujimoto, photographer and staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 253) or dfujimoto@kauaipubco.com.
