(The staff at Stittsville Villa show their appreciation for the ‘thank you’ lunch provided by the Stittsville Business Association.)
Over the past couple of weeks, the Stittsville Business Association (SBA), with the support of a generous donation from Ross and Corleen Bradley, have been busy delivering gift cards and meals around Stittsville to say Thank You to our essential workers, while maintaining support for our small businesses. The SBA is doing what they are best known for — providing support to the small business community here in our town.
President of the SBA, Allan Ryan, told us “… it is so important during times of uncertainty to put money back into the pockets of our local businesses.” Times are challenging for everyone, but owning a small business under current circumstances can magnify the challenge – a very good reason to support and buy local.
Calling upon our local businesses, the SBA have purchased gift cards and food from various local retailers to donate back to the essential workers in our community. Many trays of desserts and cookies were purchased from The Sweet Room to give out to our Ottawa Fire responders on Iber Road, the staff at Sobey’s and the staff at Hazeldean Gardens.
Dinners and lunches were purchased from Ivan’s Meat and Deli, Jo-Jo’s Pizza, Milano’s Pizza, Mucho Buritto and McDonald’s to be provided to the staff at The Stittsville Villa, two Stittsville registered nurses to help support their families and staff at Wildpine Court.
The IDA received a wonderful Jo-Jo’s pizza lunch last week from a lady named Shelley — much appreciated by the staff, thank you.
Jo-Ann and Perry McKenna of the Stittsville McDonald’s showed their kindness and appreciation of essential workers by donating gift cards for all of our local Paramedics.
David Brown at Mucho Buritto added to the generosity by donating an additional five gift cards also for the Paramedics and another 10 free meals for donation back to local essential workers.
Gift cards were purchased from Napoli’s Café and Cabotto’s —delightfully received by the staff at the IDA Compounding Pharmacy, Shopper’s Drug Mart and Whole Health Pharmacy.
The SBA has not completed their mission yet. They have two more businesses to visit, Farm Boy and Brown’s YIG. However, during the COVID-19 store policies and measures in place, will do so when these have been lifted.
It is certainly uplifting to see the outpouring of support for small, locally-owned businesses in our community and not only from the SBA. Residents are coming together on social media and through word-of-mouth networks, exchanging recommendations and going out of their way to patronize vulnerable local shops and restaurants that we would all like to see outlast this virus called COVID-19.