HOW ONE PHONE CALL RESULTED IN A $1,000,000 FUNDRAISING SUCCESS
WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT?
When Gateway Publishing first got the call from Breast Friends way back in 2004 they had no idea what lay ahead. At the time, Breast Friends was 10 ladies from small town Saskatchewan bound by the goal of producing a cookbook to raise money for breast cancer. Like many Gateway customers, Breast Friends started with a long list of proven recipes and a few stories to illustrate the meaning behind their cause. The first cookbook was a success, which lead shortly afterward to another call from Breast Friends for a second cookbook. The trend continued. A third and fourth cookbook followed, setting the stage for a fifth, recently announced for 2012.
The Breast Friends success story simply kept rolling along as this group of energetic women achieved heights hardly imaginable in 2004. Just last year, Breasts surpassed the $1,000,000 mark in cancer related donations, they made an appearance on CBC’s Dragon’s Den, and they became the subject of a feature story in France’s Gourmond Magazine, an internationally known culinary publication.
Gateway Cookbooks has been there every step of the way, doing everything from assembling cookbook recipes, to managing the design of the book’s cover, to printing the book on one of its state of the art digital printers, to packaging and shipping the cookbooks to Breast Friends’ distribution centre in Foam Lake. “We’re there to help people achieve their dreams,” says Rhonda Pineau, Gateway’s Sales and Marketing Manager. “Breast Friends are doing important things to change lives. Just being part of that makes you feel good about what you’re doing, which makes us work that much harder.”
After building such strong relationships with Breast Friends, the future appeared to be set but in an ironic twist of fate, in November 2009, Pineau was diagnosed breast cancer. Breast Friends called, as they often did, but not to order another cookbook. This time their call was made to offer to pay for a three-day seminar at “Inspire Health”, a Vancouver-based, non-profit cancer treatment centre. Pineau was both grateful and excited about the prospect of a fresh start on her treatment. “The program was life changing. If it weren’t for the friendship we had developed with Breast Friends I’m not sure what would have happened.”
People often talk about building relationships through business, but with Gateway, relationships go beyond the bottom line. According to Gloria Nickel, Production Coordinator at Gateway, “Our customers are often people working toward some type of emotional outcome. Whether it’s breast cancer fundraising like it is with Breast Friends, school fundraising, or other non-profit charity groups, cookbooks represent an emotional stage in people’s lives. The cookbook becomes a symbol for positive change, a place for people to share recipes, memories and wonderful stories about the things that make life special.”
Gateway Publishing Cookbooks is a publisher of cookbooks for fundraising, donor gifts, corporate recognition, weddings, and family memories. Gateway is part of Gateway Group – a family-owned collection of business units specializing in community based publishing and publishing related products. The Group’s three units include Gateway Publishing Cookbooks, Gateway Bookbindery, and Plastikoil – Gateway Bookbinding Systems Ltd.
