Thursday (Nov. 16) is when Jim Slama — FamilyFarmed‘s founder and CEO — will celebrate his birthday. And we were preparing to ask our supporters to make a donation to our Good Food non-profit in honor of Jim’s big day.
But when FamilyFarmed Communications Manager Bob Benenson — whose birthday is today (Nov. 14) — got wind of it, he graciously responded, “What about me?!”
Now two things that FamilyFarmed and Scorpios have in common is that they are 1) passionate and 2) highly competitive. So Bob threw down the gauntlet and challenged Jim to the first-ever FamilyFarmed Birthday Fundraising Faceoff.
So click here to go to the GiveGab fundraising site and donate to your favorite in the Faceoff. You’ll first be asked for the dollar amount of your donation. Then remember to choose your favorite on the last screen of the donation prompts!
Bob Benenson (left) is FamilyFarmed’s Communications Manager; Jim Slama is FamilyFarmed’s founder and CEO. They are usually all smiles, but this week they are facing off in a challenge to see whose birthday can raise the most money for FamilyFarmed. Your donations will help us build a better food system… and determine office bragging rights. Game on!
All proceeds from this title bout — which runs through Friday — will go toward advancing FamilyFarmed’s mission of helping create a better food system. We work with food and farm entrepreneurs who are producing as locally as possible, using sustainable, humane and fair practices, and we help them expand markets for delicious and nutritious Good Food.
There are no losers. O.K., there might be a side wager involving a bottle of whiskey from Chicago’s Koval Distillery. And there might be a little trash talking going on.
“Nov. 14 is National Guacamole Day and National Pickle Appreciation Day,” said Bob. “Nov. 16 is National Fast Food Day. So you tell me whose birthday is rocking Good Food.”
Jim noted that Bob is fairly new to Good Food advocacy in Chicago, having moved here six years ago after a long career as a political journalist in Washington. “I was building the Good Food cluster in Chicago when Bob still needed a paper map to keep from getting lost,” Jim said. “I’m happy to have had the opportunity to teach him everything he knows about Good Food.”
The truth is that this is just a fun idea we concocted to kick off our end of the year fundraising campaign, which will continue with Giving Tuesday on November 28. Your contributions are welcome and will be well-used.