JUMP FOR THE CAUSE 2002
Crawl For The Cause!

Crawl for the Cause was a new and unique slant to fundraising for Jump For The Cause 2002 and we hope that it will become an annual event! Where did the idea come from? Houston Skydiver Kelley Frederickson came up with the idea shortly after throwing her first fundraising party, "Cocktail for the Cause." She convinced local restaurants and bars to donate raffle prizes and threw the party at a bar in Downtown Houston, raising $1800 from raffle tickets sales in less than 4 hours! Then the idea expanded: what about more bars..make it a Pub Crawl!

Soon after, Atlanta skydivers Jaimie Johnson, Jennifer DeLong, Becca Garrison and Tammy Tatum and North Carolina skydiver Nicole Fouche jumped into the idea (no pun intended) and launched a Multi-City Crawl for the Cause including the cities of Houston, Atlanta and Chapel Hill.

What did the crawls have in common? Each pub-crawl planner convinced a certain number of bars to donate either free drinks or food. Every city collected raffle prizes from local area restaurants and businesses to be given away at the Crawl. Every city had their Crawlers do "A Toast for the Cure" in the spirit of fighting breast cancer and all pre-registered crawlers received provided a Nationwide Pub Crawl T-shirt that listed all the participating bars and cities! In addition to the t-shirt, in Chapel Hill and Houston, the participants received a pint glass with the Jump for the Cause logo etched on the side. Also, Atlanta skydiver Jerry Loch at One Eighty Plus donated a website to all the cities enabling people to pre-register for the crawl in their respective city, reserve their t-shirt size and make a donation!

Crawl Houston: The crawl spanned over a whopping seven bars in seven hours! How many people were up to the task? "Over a hundred crawlers! I had to cut off the registration at the second bar because the crawl was getting too big to manage!" said Frederickson. Who were these people? Email lists of email lists reached out to over 60 people allowing them to pre-register before the crawl via the website. The bars, rotated through every hour on the hour, were Tequila Bar, Bronx Bar, Baker's St. Pub, Two Rows Sports Bar, Buffalo Wild Wings, Little Woodrow's and Brian O'Neill's Irish Pub. Also, a local brewery, Brenham Brewery, donated a free keg to the Crawlers! One of the Bars even got a karaoke machine, which, at the 4th bar, turned into a very funny concert scene. In addition to Karaoke, the raffle had over 50 prizes for the crawlers! Everything from free dinner to a free tandem skydive donated by Skydive Spaceland as the grand prize. Houston raised over $2,000.00!

Crawl Chapel Hill: Another huge challenge, 5 bars in 5 hours!!! Nicole Fouche worked her magic and got the following participating bars to give free drinks to her crawlers: Kirkpatrick's, Woody's Sports Tavern, Carolina Coffee Shop, Buffalo Wild Wings Grill and Bar, and W. B. Yeat's Irish Pub. The Chapel Hill crawl was mostly friends and family of Nicole. "The enthusiasm was contagious, it was a great event for us all to participate together in," said Fouche. Nicole had room for 50 crawlers and had no trouble filling up her reserved spots! Chapel Hill raised $1200.00!

Crawl Atlanta: The Atlanta Pub Crawl was held in the heart on Buckhead. Four bars, including the Lodge, Rose and Crown and Lulu's Baitshack, provided support in the form of food, drink and incredibly tolerant waitstaff. Nearly 200 crawlers drank their way through Buckhead to raise breast cancer awareness and money for breast cancer research. A number of breast cancer survivors participated in the crawl and helped to raise awareness even further by sharing both the experience of their personal battle and their gratitude. The Pub Crawl was supplemented by various embarrassing games and a raffle for a long list of area prizes. While on the rooftop patio at one of the bars, the crawlers were treated to several fly-bys from an Atlanta Police helicopter. The incident did not result in injuries, although the helicopter pilot momentarily lost control of the aircraft after one of the Pub Crawl organizers showed him what the group was raising money for. The event generated more than $6,000.00 for breast cancer research (and we are still receiving checks).

The Atlanta group is now mounting a full front attack on Corporate America, or at least Corporate Atlanta, in an effort to continue their successful fundraising efforts. We want to bring not less than $20,000.00 to California.

Crawl for the Cause 2002 was a hit! The multi-city effort not only raised money for Jump for the Cause, but also got non-skydivers and skydivers alike out in full force eating, drinking and fighting for a cure for Breast Cancer! The fundraiser was successful and an incredibly positive community event which certainly demonstrated the efforts of skydivers to make a difference in the world though teamwork and enthusiasm. All the women of Crawl for the Cause 2002 are looking forward to making this an annual event- so keep an eye out to participate next summer in your city!

Remember Jump for the Cause participants are still raising money until October, so get involved in your city! If you are interested in doing a Pub Crawl in your area, or a smaller scale Cocktail hour and have questions, contact Kelley at kelleyf@rice.edu.