A Decade of Warmth

Today (October 15) is officially Blanket BC's 10 Year Anniversary. We can't believe it. We are so honoured and humbled that we (Ben and Greg) and Emma have taken a small family project of helping our homeless neighbours and have turned it into an incredible organization that has been able to help thousands of people in need over the past decade. I am beyond grateful. Our team now consists of some of the most incredibly smart and passionate people I know - and to be honest, people that don't receive the credit they deserve; people like Brodie Gunning, Kevin McElgunn, Katherine Vinokour, Suzan Noori, Richard Murphy, Sandra Brice, and Martha Ould - who deserves even more props just for being, well, the "Mom" of the organization!
We now have ‪#‎DaysLeft‬. Yes! That's right folks, ‪#‎BlanketBC‬'s ‪#‎DecadeOfWarmth‬ will be celebrating at ‪#‎TheColumbiaTheatre‬ in New Westminster and when you have top comedians like Ed Hill, Randy Goodchild, Kelly Dyer, and the great Greek Canadian Peter Kelamis creating laughter like no other - that alone is worth the ticket price! Phenomenal Singers Stephen Scaccia, Todd Richard and The John Welsh Band will kick things up a ton of notches too and Thomas RL Beckman will be giving us a performance that no one has seen before. Get your tickets TODAY! It's going to be the warmest night of the year!
-Gregory Ould
Co-Founder, Blanket BC

Blanket BC's 2015

Each New Year brings additional challenges, struggles, and without a doubt, our hands-on approach has allowed us to quickly direct our limited resources where they were most needed. This year we assisted additional shelters, various housing groups and generally adjusted our program to ensure that we continued to assist our original demographic of people in shelters, on the streets and to those homeless who are virtually unseen.

The success we achieve stems from our fundamental dedication, responsiveness and our flexibility to continuously adapt to the changing needs of our clientele and our ability to obtain resources to meet the demand on our services on a timely basis.

We continue to take steps to strengthen our services with our flagship campaign in November in addition to a number of smaller fundraising functions held throughout the year. Our newest addition event at Rockin’ River Music Fest was great success which allowed our organization to be exposed to over 25,000 people! This event helped us raise over $3200 and a small van full of blankets.  

With that, Blanket BC’s "Drive on the Line" campaign celebrated its sixth year with a record number of monetary donations. We collected an amazing $7158 in our coin boxes – driven by very enthusiastic Blanketeers. We collected over 5500 blankets during this year’s drive, down from last year, and a little over 1000 articles of clothing. We were down in the numbers of volunteers this year, however with that said; you just couldn't beat the quality and enthusiasm of these wonderful people who came out to support our event!

I hope this has created a strong measure of satisfaction for all those who participated; I strongly believe that we have developed a methodology for future growth with limited resources to those who continue to fight at the poverty level.

When Blanket BC started as a project nearly 10 years ago this coming October, I never thought we’d be here today. In nearly a decade, I’m proud to say, we have collected and distributed over 185,000 blankets to date; and we've done so on limited funding. We have only been able to do so much because of the passion we have for people, the caring for our community and more importantly, volunteers like you.

I am confident that our message regarding poverty is being received and understood in communities throughout British Columbia. Our relationship with key donors, longstanding partnerships and local businesses, and our ability to identify essential needs of our clientele are the major factors that have made Blanket BC a recognized leader in shelter relief.

In closing, I would like to think we ended the year energized, more focused and with a strong sense of motivation. Blanket BC is confident that we can provide important services to our clientele even in the current difficult economic environment.

I wish to thank you, our generous and committed donors, volunteers and board members, for your dedication and continued support. With your involvement, we can continue to help thousands of people that face daily challenges against all odds.

Thank you!