It was a record breaking number for the Smile Cookie Campaign in Prince Albert.
The annual Tim Horton’s campaign raised $48,480 for the Prince Albert SPCA from April 29 through May 5. Prince Albert Tim Horton’s Franchisee Cheryl Sander says the campaign was successful because of the efforts put in by the SPCA and their volunteers.
“I think it’s very important to put the effort in, like the SPCA did. They went above and beyond what we’ve ever seen. They’ve actually doubled the highest amount we’ve ever had, almost $50,000 is absolutely remarkable. They did their dancing and they really marketed the Smile Cookie and they had volunteers. Honestly we couldn’t have asked for a better organization to work with.”
At one point the sales were so high for Smile Cookies in Prince Albert that trips to Saskatoon had to be made in order to keep up with the demand.
“Usually the amount of cookies gets us through the Smile Cookie Week and we were out by Wednesday, so we had to get more cookies from Saskatoon just to cover two days and then pay the restaurants back that way.” Sander says. “We’ve never had an organization go above and beyond like the SPCA did, so that’s super awesome.”
Organizations who have previously benefited from Smile Cookie campaigns in Prince Albert include the Rose Garden Hospice, the YWCA and Hope’s Home.
Sander says the idea to donate to the SPCA this year came from her daughter.
“My daughter (Ella) gave all of her birthday money to the SPCA on her last birthday. It was over $750. I’d never been there before and I went there and I just thought, this could be another organization that could really benefit from Smile Cookie. That’s kind of where we went with it. Once you visit there, you realize that they could use the extra funds.”
The funds will be used for all sorts of expenses the SPCA faces when rescuing animals and putting them up for adoption.
SPCA manager Ashlee Bober says the funds are very important to the SPCA and will help the organization be able to provide more to incoming animals.
“I’m kind of speechless. That’s an incredible amount of money that we raised for the animals and it’s kind of even hard to put into words how much that means to the SPCA.
“We have so many animals come in throughout the years. Each individual animal has a cost towards them of spaying, neutering and vaccinating. Some of them need more special care than others. Some need special surgeries. For us to be able to have extra money to be able to comfortably know that we can do that when an animal comes in and we can meet their needs or what their individual needs are, it just takes such a load of stress off.”
The incoming funds have allowed the SPCA to look into expanding their current facilities and what they can offer. Bober says the SPCA is in the early stages of adding more outdoor options for animals.
“We’re actually working right now towards looking at how we can improve the mental enrichment of the animals in our care. We’re currently in the process of looking at doing more outside pens for the dogs and also looking at building two catios outside for the SPCA cats.” editorial@paherald.sk.ca
