Fareway employees push for fundraiser success

WASHINGTON — As Fareway wraps up its annual Wave fundraiser benefiting the University of Iowa Children’s Hospital, employees at the Washington grocery store have again pushed to gather more donations than any other franchise locations in the two weeks before the Iowa-Iowa State football game.

Two, in particular, have led the charge, asking customers to round up their purchases for the cause, and selling paper hands they tape to the store’s windows. Lu Genck and Colleen Lasek are now notorious for their efforts to raise money for the cause.

The pair said there was no big secret to their approach, besides persistence.

“It’s kind of been our baby,” Genck said. “We just ask them. Do you want to donate to the children’s hospital. And some people we just say, ‘Give me your money!’”

Both store employees said they donated some of their own cash each year as well, and spend much of the year before football season preparing for the eventual two-week fundraiser. When “The Wave” arrives every late summer, they’re ready, with some donations already queued up from friends and family members, and promotional shirts for the event already on-hand.

“Even when we’re not here, asking people for donations, we’re doing it outside,” Lasek said. “We’ll have company come and I’ll say, ‘Oh, I need some money for the Wave!’ And they’ll give you some.”

The two said they had hospitals to thank after a handful of tough injuries in their own families, and hoped their efforts would help other Iowans get needed medical care.

Washington’s Fareway has raised the most money of any of the grocery store chain’s locations in Iowa for the last three consecutive years, now shooting for a fourth.

Lasek and Genck said they chalked the success up to efforts by their fellow staff members, an overall sense of generosity in the Washington area, and the ease of soliciting donations in a small town where they know most of the people that walk through the doors, rather than asking strangers.

“Our community is just fabulous, when it comes to things like that, they’re there,” Genck said. “Whether it be a natural disaster or something like this, our community comes together as a whole … in bigger cities, they don’t have that bond.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com