Food drive brings in more than 6 tons

WASILLA -- A little competition sometimes pays off in big ways. The first annual food drive by Wasilla businesses' Prudential Vista Real Estate and Homestate Mortgage Co. ended last week with a donation to the Wasilla Food Pantry and the Palmer Food Bank of more than 12,000 pounds of food.

"I'm thinking we've almost been too successful," said Paddy Coan of Prudential Vista. "The food bank is going to be very happy."

The two businesses split their staffs into two teams, red and purple, each with 27 members and each with a goal to get at least 4,500 pounds of food. Four weeks later, the purple team weighed 6,601 pounds of food to win; the red team brought in 5,420.

"Everybody's a winner," said Coan.

Based on the number of families each food bank will be serving, the businesses decided to donate one-third of the food to Palmer, and two-thirds of the food to Wasilla.

"It's all staying in the Valley," said Mary Vincent of Prudential Vista.

The two teams not only collected canned items; they also collected money to purchase more than 1,000 pounds of turkey. Milk, juice, flour -- even toilet paper -- was included in last week's donation.

The drive consisted of collecting money from the businesses' real estate contacts, both other businesses and customers. Spinell Homes, Howdie Construction, Wells Fargo, BTR Carpentry, Mcluney Title, Kappen, Twin Birch, Residential Mortgage, Jay Hanseth, Thomas Co., Greg Oczkus, Strong Appraisal, Owens Inspection, Active Inspection, Shoprite and Alaska USA were just some of the generous donors that allowed the teams to collect such a large amount of food.

The idea of having a food drive came from Gary Gearhart, a Prudential Vista employee who had participated in food drives at the Eagle River office. According to the deal made between the two teams, the losing team is required to cook the winning team breakfast during Easter week. Jokes of oatmeal and boxed juices were being made around the office Thursday morning, when the teams spent almost two hours weighing the food with a borrowed livestock scale.

As the weighing ended, frantic calls for a massage therapist to come into the office were being made while members of the purple team literally jumped up and down from their win. When asked what she would do different next year, a very sore Coan replied:

"Next year I think we will have a flat scale."