Spring Break
Campaign serves pizza for a cause
Max Lemanowicz
Issue date: 3/24/09 Section: Features
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For $5, students were able to eat as much pizza as they could.
Seven pizza restaurants from the Greenville area donated pizza on behalf of the Red Cross. Students were encouraged to choose their three favorite pizza joints among the contributors, which included Domino's, Papa John's, Boli's, Chanello's, Maribella's and Cici's Pizza.
"Most of the pizza places donated around 10 pizzas each," said Valerie Englert, junior hospitality management major and the event chair. "We ran out of the first round of pizza very quickly, but we were able to buy the next round at a discount."
Englert found out about the event through ECU's Student Leadership program and joined together with the Red Cross' HEROES Campaign.
"The best part of the event for me was watching the students donate more just because it was for a cause," Englert said, "I didn't know what to expect from this event but it was so great because I know that the Pitt County Red Cross can benefit from every dollar raised."
Each pizza place was given a number and students had to choose their favorite pizza through the process of "blind" voting.
Christie Church and Teresa Head, two student volunteers, got in touch with almost all of the pizza places in Greenville and were in constant contact with them for two weeks prior to the pizza-tasting contest.
"We ended up getting a donation from Lowe's Foods for the plates, cups and napkins. From Harris Teeter we got all of the beverages and from Kroger we got ice and water," said Theresa Head, freshman biology major.
Once the event started running out of the first round of pizzas, Boli's and Chanello's donated more free of charge and the rest of the pizza restaurants sold their pizza at a 50 percent discount.
"It was very cool, the idea of getting a bunch of pizza places is an incredible concept. Whoever wins, it'll be great business for them," said David Joiner, junior chemistry and biology double major.
After the competition, all the votes were counted and Boli's ended up taking home the top prize.
Although the main pitch for the event was the pizza tasting, the Red Cross' main goal was to provide detailed information on natural disaster relief and safety.
"The people who can benefit most from this event are those who've suffered losses from fires, floods and hurricanes," Head said.
At the check-in desk, several brochures were offered, including First Aid for Schools and the Community, Preparing for Disaster and Three Actions you should take to be prepared for emergencies. Pens with the Red Cross insignia were given out free of charge and T-shirts were also sold at $10-12 ($2 extra if a participant didn't pay for pizza).
T-shirts will continue to be sold this week at $12 apiece and all proceeds from the event will be added to the donations for Pitt County's Red Cross Natural Disaster Relief Fund.
This writer may be contacted at news@theeastcarolinian.com.
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