Associations duel for area charities at Dixie Roadhouse
The Cape Coral Association of Realtors and Cape Coral Construction Industry Association are engaging in a duel for charity Thursday night with Dixie Roadhouse serving as the host and official donor.
“Dixie came to us with the idea of a duel and we accepted,” said CCAR business chair Tracy Vanlandshoot. “They are putting up the money, but I don’t know how much they have in mind.”
Dixie is offering two free drinks to every person who shows up and picks a group to represent, no cover charge, free line dance lessons and door prize giveaways. The event runs from 5:30 to 7 p.m.
“This is a way to introduce Dixie Roadhouse to some of those business folks who might not have been here yet to enjoy some drinks, dance and raise some money for charity,” said Roadhouse owner Lynn Pippenger. “This is kind of a test run to see how this format works. We’ve gotten some good feedback so I’m hoping a lot of folks show up. We’d love to keep doing things like this and raise money for other groups.”
Pippenger added she had a donation figure in her head, but did not want to reveal it until she sees how many people show up. Both organizations jumped at the chance to duel for charity.
“We chose Make-A-Wish of Southwest Florida for our charity because the daughter of a friend of our current president was a Make-A-Wish child,” said Vanlandshoot. “We want to sponsor a child and that’s a $5,000 commitment.”
“The market is improving, construction is up and real estate sales are up so we decided it would be good to put together a mixer between the two industries and compete for a charity,” said CCCIA executive director Mo Beneke. “Whichever group pulls the most people through the door wins a donation for their charity from Dixie Roadhouse.”
CCCIA is spreading the word to its members to drum up support and attendance.
“We’d like to pack the place and we’ve been getting good feedback so far,” said Beneke. “We chose the American Cancer Society Relay for Life because we’ve lost members to cancer, too many. We’ve always been involved with the relay, so we usually lean that way.”
The event is one of many programs, fund-raisers and educational events conducted by both industries in an effort to give back to the community and promote better relationships among the members.