November
is Alzheimer’s Disease Awareness month. This devastating disease has touched
the lives of the owner and his family here at Stein Your Florist Co., as well
as, many of our staff. Through sharing our story and our fund raising efforts
we have also learned that it has affected the lives of many of our beloved
customers and friends in the community as well.
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Purple is the color for Alzheimer's Disease Awareness. Our model is draped in
purple blooms and an awareness ribbon on our hand laid penny
floor benefiting Alzheimer's Disease Research. |
Alzheimer’s is a disease that
attacks the brain; it is the most common form of dementia. According to the
Alzheimer’s Association, 5.4 million Americans are living with the disease and
every 69 seconds someone in the US develops it. It is the 6th leading cause of
death in the US and of the top 10 diseases that kill, Alzheimer’s is the only
one that is not preventable or curable.
Eager to do our part in the
fight against Alzheimer’s we held a fundraiser at our Philadelphia location
benefiting Alzheimer’s Disease Research (ADR), a program of the American Health
Assistance Foundation (AHAF). Since 1986, ADR has funded more than
$74 million to support Alzheimer’s research and has made significant progress
in the understanding and treatment of this puzzling disease. They are confident
that with the help and support of others that they can eventually defeat this
cruel and dreadful disease.
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One of our online campaigns to raise the awareness of Alzheimer's disease.
We also painted awareness ribbons on our shop windows to show our support. |
In addition to our fundraising
event we held a penny drive benefiting ADR as well. We collected pennies from
the community and began installing a penny floor at our Burlington, NJ
location, Steins at Sunset Florist. Our staff and customers donated their
pennies, which we glued to the floor, and the funds were donated to ADR.
Additionally members of our staff and students from the neighborhood donated
their time to help us record the date and mint of each penny to gather “fun
facts” about our project. We made monetary contributions for every hour they
spent working on our penny floor. The “Penny for your Thoughts” instillation
benefiting Alzheimer’s Disease Research was the talk of the town, few people
have ever seen that many pennies glued to a floor before!
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Our floor benefiting Alzheimer's Disease Research included a medallion hand
laid in pennies as a centerpiece of the room. |
Unfortunately, on December 2,
2014 a car crashed into Steins at Sunset Florist, causing massive damage to the
store, including tearing up pennies and spilling the car’s fluids over the
floor. We are saddened that we will be losing our penny floor in the
reconstruction, but are grateful that no one, sans the driver, who will
recover, was hurt and that we remain open for business. We are brainstorming
ways to pay tribute to our former penny floor in a new benefit for Alzheimer’s
disease research.
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| Fundraiser for Alzheimer's Disease Research at Stein Your Florist Co. in Philadelphia, PA |
If we all work together we can
raise awareness about this devastating disease and one day find a cure.
