Crossing Centre turns 17

During the centre’s 16th birthday celebration last year, Crossing started an initiative to not only give back to its shoppers – in the form of great discounts at every one of its stores – but to also give back to the less fortunate.

Lowvelders were invited to nominate, and submit, a deserving charity that would benefit from a portion of the R500 000 that the centre donated. The response was overwhelming!

So overwhelming, in fact, that several local businesses asked if they could partner with the centre by becoming donors. The donation pot soon grew to a staggering R1,6 million and a registered NPO, Giving Back 2 The Community (GB2C), was formed.

A short list of charities was drawn up by the GB2C committee (made up of representatives from donor companies and an auditor), each one being visited personally by GB2C so that their most urgent needs could be identified.

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By early December assistance to certain charities started rolling out, namely Jinda Child & Youth Centre in Barberton, Belfast Rusoord, Pediatric Care Africa, Meyer Beukes Warriors on Wheels Foundation and El Roi Ministeries Msholozi Mobile Clinic (under Provision International and ASM Clinic) to name a few.

Then the Covid-19 pandemic hit and the world as we knew it changed, virtually overnight.

GB2C recognised immediately that there was now a very urgent need to assist with food and medical donations and knew that its initial assistance plans needed to be changed, and quickly.

Since March GB2C has been providing food assistance to many of its originally identified charities, as well as other local feeding schemes, as the need for food grows on a daily basis due to the fallout from the pandemic.

To date the NPO has donated food and medical assistance approximately worth R750 000. With the desperate need for food top of mind, Crossing Centre decided that its planned 17th birthday celebrations should be put aside and any available budget rather go towards food assistance via GB2C.

So the centre came up with the idea of, once again, getting Lowvelders to participate by buying a R17 “food assistance ticket”, with Crossing matching each ticket sale one for one.

The Lowveld community has risen to the occasion and eagerly supported this initiative, so much so that ticket sales have been extended and will now only close at midnight on Sunday November 15 (sales were originally to close on October 31).

Keeping true to its “giving back” reputation, the centre has included a lucky draw in the ticket sales with several prize shopping vouchers up for grabs, a bumper R5 000 voucher plus a further two R2 500 vouchers.

There are actually more than R10 000 worth in prizes to be won and several people have already been the lucky winners of several Crossing Centre shopping vouchers.

It could not be easier to buy a ticket, simply log on to the centre’s website at www.crossingnelspruit.co.za or via its FB page @NelspruitCrossing. There is no limit on the number of tickets that can be purchased, with each purchase counting as one entry into the lucky draw.

Crossing Centre, with the help of the community, is hoping to raise at least R40 000 with this food assistance initiative. All funds raised will be shared between four beneficiaries – Sinani Unlimited, Pro-Life Pet Rescue, Feed The Need White River and the Halls Buscor Feeding Project.

Enquiries: info@crossingnelspruit.co.za.

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