Since the lifting of Covid restrictions, the office staff have been very busy networking in the Okanagan community, to raise awareness of how our organization is working hard to provide affordable homes, at a time when there is a dire shortage in our region.
The Canadian Home Builders Association held a Buildin’ after Hours event at Norelco Cabinets. This was a popular event which was attended by most of the office staff, we did lots of networking and selling of golf raffle tickets.
In April we had a booth at the Penticton Home Show. We were there to promote ReStores, the kitchen salvage program, (which had a lot of interest), connect with local trades, and of course raise awareness of our mission.
Bottle drives were held at the Kelowna and West Kelowna ReStores as well as Predator Ridge where once of our board members regularly arranges a bottle collection. We raised a combined total of $7,746, thank you to all the staff that worked on the weekend and volunteers that helped.
The last week of April was volunteer appreciation week and this year we were able to secure some great prizes to recognize the amazing contribution from our volunteers and show how much we appreciate the work that you all do. Details of the prizes and winners can be found on our website: https://www.habitatforhumanityokanagan.ca/national-volunteer-week-prize-winners/
The golf raffle launched on the 4th April and got off to a great start! This is an online and in person raffle with fabulous prizes. We still have some way to go to reach our goal and ask that everyone spreads the word to help increase ticket sales, https://www.rafflebox.ca/raffle/golfexperience.
The first quarter performance was much better than we forecasted. While we didn’t see the spike in sales that we experienced during the same period in 2021, we did exceed our sales budget by 11 % and net profit by 197%.
We have a booth at the Kelowna Home Show on the 7th and 8th May. We are expecting this to have a high attendance and we will be using this as an opportunity to raise more awareness of our program and funds for our current build.
On the 1st of May three families moved into their new homes in Lake Country. Kelowna Capital News were on site to capture the moment when the got the keys. It was heart warming and emotional to see their joy as they start a new chapter. A big thank you to all the staff, volunteers, customers’ and donors that have helped us to make a big difference in their lives. If you missed the news here is the link https://www.kelownacapnews.com/news/three-more-families-in-affordable-living-thanks-to-habitat-for-humanity-okanagan/
Andrea Manifold
CEO, Habitat Okanagan
