Summer of Service in Santa Barbara

Epsilon’s annual Summer of Service competition is something that we at CJ Affiliate look forward to every year.

Summer of Service is an excellent opportunity to give back to our community while engaging in friendly competition with other offices across the globe. Each office comes up with their own ideas of how to creatively raise money for local charities of their choice. Epsilon then matches each donation amount dollar for dollar for each respective charity.

CJ’s Santa Barbara office placed 3^rd in the competition this year and has chosen to donate our $3,000 winnings to Child Abuse Listening Mediation (CALM). CALM’s mission is to prevent childhood trauma, heal children and families, and build resilient communities within Santa Barbara County. Check out some of the other fun donation and volunteer opportunities that we participated in for Summer of Service, and the additional organizations and causes they each supported:

DAWG Days of Summer

We kicked off Summer of Service in June with the ultimate summer activity; grilling hot dogs! Everyone helped themselves to a dog grilled by our IT and Support Team for a small donation to DAWG. DAWG provides a safe and nurturing environment for unwanted pups in the Santa Barbara area until they find their forever home. This event raised $328 to help the pups!

Kids at Heart

We also visited Franklin Elementary School for United Way’s Lunch Bunch Program. Lunch Bunch is a mentoring component of United Way’s Fun in the Sun program which aims to close the achievement gap between low-income students and their peers. We had a blast playing in the sun with the kids and enjoyed an excuse to brush up on our handball, foursquare, and chalk drawing skills.

Clothing Our Community

Another favorite Summer of Service event was our annual clothing swap and donation drive. This event prompted associates to clean out their closets and bring in any gently used, unwanted clothing items. For every 5 items donated, you are welcome to take home a “new” item home with you. At the end of the week, the remaining items were donated to Alpha Thrift to help others in our community feel confident, empowered, and prepared.

Let’s Get Cooking!

Perhaps the most exciting addition to this year’s Summer of Service calendar, especially for those of us with a sweet tooth, was our bake-off and bake sale! Associates will whip up their favorite treats and for a $5 entry fee, compete for best tasting, most creative, best presentation, and most allergy-conscious dessert. The $195 raised were donated to The Foodbank of Santa Barbara to help eliminate hunger in our community.

Cleaning Our Coast

Beach cleanups are a great way to contribute to Summer of Service while enjoying the sunshine on a Friday afternoon. Last month our team dedicated a total of 25 hours to collecting trash and recyclables left on Leadbetter beach to help keep it clean and safe for our community to enjoy.

Bring Your Lunch Day!

Making a difference in the community doesn’t always require a significant time commitment. Sometimes small gestures can just as impactful. By bringing a lunch from home and donating what we would have spent eating out, we raised an impressive $325 for the Children’s Alopecia Project.