Donuts And Donations Sweeten Sale Income

Photo by Jim Bishop

Again this year there were long lines of customers at the annual Virginia Mennonite Relief Sale waiting to buy some of the over 6000 glazed donuts sold there this year. 

In the past these were made by over 30 volunteers working through the wee hours of the morning of the Sale. This year a team of a dozen people under the capable direction of Carl Strite of Strites Donuts produced them en masse, and all 6000 of these delicacies were sold out by early Saturday afternoon.

At $1.75 a piece, or $15 a dozen, the donut project raised an impressive sum of money, even after expenses, thanks to Strites Donuts providing the equipment and the ingredients at their cost, and through their efforts at lining up volunteer help to make them. Volunteers from Zion Mennonite who served and sold them also deserve our thanks.

These sales, along with all the income brought in through the annual auction and multitudes of other efforts, helped this year's Relief Sale raise a total of well over $360,000* for Mennonite Central Committee's world wide relief, development and peace efforts. This was just short of a record setting number for this annual event, thanks to the scores of good people who have helped make this a growing success for over 50 years.

Just a hundred yards away from the donut stand, a tent was set up with a giving table staffed by volunteers from Everence Financial who accepted cash, check and credit card donations for refugee relief, an effort promoted by the Sale's "Sharing Our Surplus" (SOS) Committee. There was no comparable long line of people waiting to give, but the total result of the SOS effort this year was a gratifying $50,613, well over 10% of the total funds raised at the Sale.

I'm sure one of the signs that God's kingdom is truly at hand will be when lines at the SOS table are as long as those at the donut stand. Nevertheless I believe God blesses everyone who helps make an effort like the annual Relief Sale a sweet success.

* an official final number was still not available as of this post