Cereal Box Challenge Recap
Cereal Box Challenge Recap
Local Businesses Donate Over 5,000 Boxes to Food Pantry
OLEAN – A big and sweet part of the Greater Olean Area Chamber of Commerce’s Southern Tier Corporate Challenge 5K Run and Walk has always been the Cereal Challenge. Results from this year’s cereal challenge were great again! Eight companies participated in the challenge, with a total of 5,156 cereal boxes donated! 2,710 of those boxes were donated by the employees at Buffamante Whipple Buttafaro, PC, which means they received the “Most Cereal Boxes Donated” award. With an employee-to-cereal boxes ratio of 64.5 boxes, Buffamante Whipple Buttafaro (BWB) was awarded the most boxes collected per employee!
The “throw down the cereal spoon gauntlet” began in 2013 as an idea proposed by community resident Joann Dombeck. D.B. Busan, the pantry Warehouse Manager stated, "This challenge was a brilliant idea from Joann – especially cereal during the summer months when most children are at home and the Food Pantry needs to have it on its shelves!” Through the eleven years, more than 30,200 cereal boxes have been collected. The average donated in a year is 2,748, with 2019 still the biggest collection year of 7,061 boxes.
Meme Yanetsko, GOACC chief operating officer stated, “Each year, the pantry is pleased with the donations. This year, BWB tossed the challenge to their intern group and they ran with it.”
Each year, BWB has summer interns. Eight of their interns were split into teams and in charge of the challenge. This was incorporated into BWB’s Together We Can campaign. Jake Kohler was the winner of the BWB team with 152 boxes donated. For more information or registration details, please call GOACC at 716-372-4433 or email info@oleanny.com.