First of all, my sister-in-law, Michelle Fiala battled stage 4 breast cancer for over 4 years. She fought a valiant fight but succumbed to it this last December. Nearly everyone I know has been touched by breast cancer, and so when me and my band were approached by another friend of ours, who was a breast cancer survivor, to perform at her 3 day fundraiser, we jumped at the chance. We’ve performed for free at her event each of the past 5 years. It’s become such a regular event that they moved us up to the coveted Friday night slot at the venue we play, so we’re hoping to raise even more money to battle breast cancer.
To those who are battling breast cancer, to those who have beaten breast cancer, to those who have been touched by breast cancer: you’ll never walk alone.
My mother was diagnosed with breast cancer eight years ago. I would have never known that she was sick unless she told me because she never let “breast cancer” affect the way she was going to live her life. Going to the doctors, receiving treatments, and going to my brother, sister and my school activities were her job. She said, “Every day is a good day,” because she was always so happy to be alive and surrounded by people that loved and supported her.
The word breast cancer never fazed me because my mom was so strong and supportive of herself as well as many others. She even made some of her best friends at support groups. Even though she rarely got good news from the doctors, she kept fighting because she wanted to be there for us and show others that it something you can overcome if you stay positive.
Unfortunately after a long battle, my mom lost. But even though her life was cut short, she taught me the importance of strength and courage. Her bravery lasted all the way until the end. She really showed my family and everyone in my community what it was like to be a strong person. This coming Mother’s Day will be the second breast cancer walk my family has gone too. Sadly we are not walking with the survivors’ this year. However we still strongly support all breast cancer foundations because my family is still hoping for a cure, so that nobody has to lose someone they love to cancer.
This is a picture of Senior Day at my brother's football game in high school last year. It was also a game dedicated to breast cancer awareness. The two of them are walking off the field together.
Is there ever a time to celebrate cancer? Maybe not. But I do believe it’s right, even mandatory, to celebrate when people succeed in conquering it. And ABCD’s annual event to celebrate the “power of one-to-one” in dealing with a breast cancer diagnosis is truly a great celebration.
Date with a Plate is now in its 11th year. From a board member perspective, it’s a perfect event. It’s a “friend-raiser” and a fundraiser. Last year, 700 people enjoyed the terrific food, silent auction, location and people.
The attendees at each year’s event participate for lots of reasons: some would do anything to support ABCD’s mission; some come for the amazing array of auction items and tasty samples from 15+ area restaurants; some enjoy seeing the inside of great Milwaukee businesses and mingling with their execs; and some just like to attend an event that doesn’t involve a stuffy sit-down dinner.
On the fundraising side, it’s terrific as well. The venue is donated, as are the auction items and all the food. The only significant cost is the invitation! This means that nearly all of the proceeds go to the mission of ensuring personalized one-to-one support for anyone who receives a breast cancer diagnosis.
Most importantly, Date with a Plate is a great time! It’s fun, enjoyable, meaningful and… tasty! And this year will be no exception — in fact, it’s going to be the best ever. I hope you’ll join us at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Printing Facility on Friday, May 6. Check out all the details and register online at www.abcdbreastcancersupport.org See you there!
The thing about breast cancer is this: it is never what you expect. And yet, surprises can change lives.
The “C” word is always a punch in the gut and then some. Whether you have a family history, or like most breast cancer patients, you do not, the words “you have breast cancer” are always a shock.
Yet, for all its heartache, I get to experience some joy every day because I work at ABCD: After Breast Cancer Diagnosis. Here women (and men) whose lives have been impacted by breast cancer commit themselves to making the healing journey a bit easier for someone who now faces a breast cancer diagnosis. There is a generosity in our volunteer mentors that boggles the mind. One-to-one they support others; people that they have never met but who, because of a breast cancer diagnosis, they already “know.”
That sense of generosity born of personal experience is also why the Pink Room came to be.
Women who work at the Intercontinental who have been personally touched by breast cancer – one of whom is a proud ABCD mentor – conceived the entire project. They have created a hotel experience quite different than what you might expect. The rooms are pink, yes, but they are sophisticated and modern with that distinctive Intercontinental Hotel feel. Your Pink Room stay includes the opportunity to learn about triumph over breast cancer from ABCD mentors’ personal stories and the chance to share your own thoughts if you like. Plus, staying at the Intercontinental is all about the joys in life – including one of my favorites – Chocolat Bar.
We look forward to the stories we will hear as the Pink Room welcomes more guests. Stories that will inspire us as we continue to personally support those who next hear the words, “you have breast cancer.”
We are grateful to partner with the Intercontinental Milwaukee. Their team’s creativity and generosity will help ABCD change the experience of breast cancer for countless people. It will help us assure that this journey is less mysterious and less lonely. Pretty surprising accomplishment from a little Pink Room!
Sarah Geitner represented the Intercontinental Milwaukee well on Monday, September 20 at the IronCupcake Milwaukee Pink Challenge. The hotel offered a stay in the Pink Room as a door prize for the evening and Sarah represented the Pink Room with our signature pink cupcakes. It was great to see that Discovery world was packed all in support for the fight against breast cancer.
Here are some pictures that Sarah grabbed that evening of the Pink Room display.
IronCupcake Milwaukee also has an excellent photo gallery and blog to recap of the event. IronCupcake Milwaukee Blog
Here’s an interesting example on how one hotel is handling its charitable fundraising efforts: The InterContinental Milwaukee transformed two guestrooms into pink rooms with the goal of raising $10,000 a year for a local breast cancer non-profit.
According to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s article, the InterContinental spent almost a year designing the rooms with all things pink: pink bedding, pink tapestries, pink fabrics from around the world, a pink laptop, pink bathrobe, books about breast cancer and other artistic pieces.
Guests who have been touched by breast cancer or not can show their support by requesting one of the all-things-pink rooms, the story says.
With each booking, the hotel will donate $25 to After Breast Cancer Diagnosis Foundation (ABCD), the story says. Guests will also receive a $25 gift card to the hotel’s lounge, Clear, plus pink cupcakes and a pink room keepsake.
The hotel’s general manager, Tim Smith, tells the paper that the goal is to rent each room about 200 times each year to raise about $10,000 annually.
For more information about the employees who came up with the fundraiser idea, read the full story in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
Readers: Would you book a specific room in a hotel if you knew that part of the proceeds were going to a cause you support?
What impressed Ginny Finn most about the new Pink Room at the InterContinental Milwaukee hotel was that the idea behind dedicating a room to the fight against breast cancer came from three hotel employees who all had some connection to the disease.
Finn is executive director of the nonprofit organization After Breast Cancer Diagnosis (ABCD), a local one-to-one mentoring program for breast cancer patients. ABCD will benefit from bookings of two InterContinental hotel rooms that have been redecorated in various shades of pink to signify support for women and their families touched by breast cancer. The rooms – one featuring a king-size bed and the other two doubles – also come with pink gourmet cupcakes, a $20 gift card to CLEAR, the hotel’s cocktail and tapas lounge, and a breast cancer awareness keepsake. Guests also may share their personal cancer stories in a journal kept in the room or on the Pink Room blog found at www.pinkroomstories.com.
A portion of the proceeds from room bookings — about $25 per night’s stay — will go to ABCD, founded a decade ago by Melodie Wilson, the Milwaukee television journalist who died of breast cancer in 2009. After her initial diagnosis in 1992, Wilson spent the rest of her life advocating on behalf of cancer patients and their families.
The idea for the Pink Room came from InterContinental’s catering manager Bridget Gallagher, executive assistant Sarah Geitner, general manager Tim Smith and Susan Cusatis, the Milwaukee business travel manager for Marcus Hotels & Resorts, the InterContinental’s parent company.
All wanted to do something at the hotel to show support for people going through breast cancer. Cusatis herself is a survivor — she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2003; and Gallagher and Geitner both knew others close to them who’ve dealt with the disease. Smith indicated his support for the project after Gallagher and Geitner brought the idea to his attention.
Hotel officials contacted Finn and ABCD at the recommendation of Cusatis, whose morale was lifted by an ABCD mentor during her cancer fight and who now volunteers as an ABCD mentor to help other women.
“The personalized support provided by ABCD is quite powerful to anyone diagnosed,” Cusatis said in an interview after the downtown Milwaukee hotel hosted a Pink Room open house late last month.
Finn said she appreciated the fact that the hotel sought her and ABCD’s permission before choosing it to be the benefactor of the proceeds.
“They approached us in a business-like, sincere and humane way,” Finn said. “They didn’t come to us and say, ‘We’re going to do this to you.’ They wanted to know if their idea for the Pink Room would be respectful of people going through breast cancer. They said they wanted it to be genuinely helpful and didn’t want it to be a gimmick.”
The hotel sought Finn’s counsel on what the room should contain (the journal and information on ABCD, for example) to be consistent with ABCD’s mission, and brought in a local designer to work with Gallagher, Geitner and Cusatis on how to appropriately carry the breast cancer awareness theme throughout the rooms.
Not only are the rooms tastefully decorated in a modern style using shades of pink “that anyone would feel comfortable in,” Finn said, the idea of allowing women and other guests affected by breast cancer to write, blog or videotape their personal stories while staying in a relaxing environment fits ABCD’s mission of providing support and comfort to cancer survivors.
A few other U.S. hotels have used pink themes to raise breast cancer awareness. The Hard Rock Hotels in several cities including Chicago, for example, have hosted breast cancer survivor “Pinktober” parties featuring pink towels and sheets during the month of October (National Breast Cancer Awareness Month), with proceeds going to breast cancer research organizations.
But unlike those events, InterContinental Milwaukee’s Pink Room isn’t tied to a specific event or time of year. It’s an ongoing promotion that will help raise ABCD’s profile, Finn said.
And in her opinion, the InterContinental’s project passes the “think before you pink” test for cause-based marketing.
Ever cautious about cause-based marketing being used to sell for-profit products and services, Finn urges consumers to ask whether companies are transparent about which charity will benefit and the percentage or dollar amount in sales that will go toward the cause. When it comes to breast cancer awareness, Finn recommends the website thinkbeforeyoupink.org, sponsored by the Breast Cancer Action organization, which offers a series of questions consumers should ask themselves before buying something with a pink ribbon on it.
As for the Pink Room, proceeds from room bookings will help pay for ABCD services, all of which are provided free to people diagnosed with breast cancer, Finn said. ABCD trains its mentors – more than 500 have been trained since the group’s inception — and some Pink Room proceeds will help fund activities such as mentor outreach and continuing education. In fact, on Aug. 14 ABCD will host a continuing education session for mentors featuring some nationally-recognized speakers.
While they’re in Milwaukee, perhaps some of the session’s attendees might want to book a Pink Room.
What do ThirdCoast Digest readers think of cause-based marketing? Are you more likely to buy something if you know it will benefit a nonprofit or charitable organization? Please share your thoughts.
The InterContinental Milwaukee hotel’s Pink Rooms are now taking reservation. The project conceived by InterContinental Milwaukee hotel employees affected by breast cancer, and has been a collimation of vision, passion, partnership and friendship.
Guests of the two Pink Rooms will be inspired by the design concept, amenities, and the stories left on the Pink Room blog by previous guests all while supporting the organization, ABCD: After Breast Cancer Diagnosis.
To book your stay call 877-510-PINK (7465) or log onto InterContinentalMilwaukee.com/Pink-Room
