This year, as in years in the past, I — guest author Tyler — was able to participate in the Hive Real Estate Collective annual charity event with the Grinch. We jokingly call it "Grinchmas."
For the uninitiated, Grinchmas is when we take a portion of our real-estate profits for the year and go have some fun giving away that money. We also accept donations from the public who see us doing stuff around town with the Grinch.
This year, we gave $1,000 to a food pantry in Utah County; and $1,000 to a food pantry in Salt Lake County. We learned that this would provide for thousands of meals between the two locations!
After the "serious" charity giving, it was time for some fun. We had spoken with several grocery stores (as we've had trouble with some in the past...like legal trouble), and we found that Smith's was the only grocery store NOT to demand all kinds of legal requirements to buy people's groceries. In fact, Smith's liked the idea so much that the only question they asked was, "Can we publish this event to other Smith's chains and show them what we're doing?" Of course we were open to that idea.
Before the event, we had this great idea that we should were green shirts — a sort of uniform for our "Grinch Gang". We we're subtle either. They literally said "Grinch Gang" on the front, and on the back had a QR code people could scan to donate. This turned out to be wildly successful as people donated more this year than in years passed.
So, we bought groceries for dozens of people! We spent a couple thousand dollars just swiping the card for groceries in the check-out line for stunned shoppers! We even ran into Utah's previous governor Herbert (who donated to our cause on the spot)!
After our grocery-buying binge, the Grinch had a shopping spree in Smith's to buy hundreds of cans of food for the Orem City Food Drive. We took the cans from Smith's over to the Orem Rec Center, where the Grinch schooled some kids in basketball and openly mocked plenty of "swole" body builders at the free weights. Naturally, we delivered the cans, then went off to find more mischief.
And we found it at Cafe Rio, where we had arranged to pick up food for 40. When we arrived, the order wasn't quite ready, so the Grinch busied himself buying meals for tons of people in line at Cafe Rio.
And what could we possibly do with 40 meals? Well, we carted it over to the Orem City Offices, where we met with some of Orem's finest fire first responders (when they weren't on call). Orem Fire Department got a warm meal that night; which, contrary to popular belief, apparently doesn't happen that often. According to fire lore, if you make warm food at the station, somewhere a fire starts, and the call comes right as you finish.
We also teamed up with a local Dirty Dough cookie truck to provide cookies to the fire fighters. (We also got several great shots of the Grinch attempting to steal the fire truck.)
After that, there was just one place left to go: we were exhausted from spending money all afternoon...so we went to dinner. But this dinner had been pre-arranged in advance. We reached out to several restaurants to see if there might be a particular server that could use a large tip right around the holidays. We collected a few stories and landed on one that we felt was great. This, by the way, is a superb way of choosing a place to eat!
Our unsuspecting server thought we were a little weird, but she went along with the Grinch eating at her table. After it was all said and done we presented her with a multi-hundred dollar tip, and then went in to "chew out" the kitchen staff Grinch-style with a hundred dollar bill for each cook.
I'll tell you what: there's no feeling that compares to look on people's faces when you do that. We have been blessed to participate in multiple such events over the last few years in our real estate team. It's one reason (of many) that I stay in real estate.
In case you missed the video, here it is. For the benefit of the blog book, which Maleen will inevitably print, there are a few stills as well.
The Grinch preparing for an evening of mayhem:
In the car with the Grinch (who's lobbing candy out the window and shouting good-natured insults to neighboring vehicles):
Giving $1,000 to the local food pantry, Tabitha's Way:
The Grinch enters Smith's to buy groceries...for everybody:
People got into it once they saw what we were doing, and they started donating:
The Grinch finds Gary Herbert:
The Grinch was just buying groceries. Many people didn't know what to do. Hugs were plentiful.
How the Grinch shops for canned goods to donate to the food drive:
The Grinch stuffing a 10-year old. Yes, this was not staged.
Waiting for our order at Cafe Rio, the Grinch couldn't resist buying dinner for the patrons:
Orem Fire Department enjoys their Grinch meal:
Our server putting up with the Grinch at dinner:
The Grinch had something to say to every member of the kitchen staff. $100 to every cook.
The Grinch and his Grinch Crew right before we stole the fire truck...but that's another story.
And that's about it. I want to point out that I work with the coolest group of people in the world. You can't find people with higher integrity, stronger work ethic, and bigger hearts than the Hive Collective Real Estate team. I am so blessed to be part of this group. And thank you to all our clients, who made this (and other) events possible. We cannot do what we do without you guys. I know it's 2023 already, but HAVE A MERRY GRINCHMAS, Y'ALL!
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