Non-profits across the region are benefitting from the success of the Winkler MCC Thrift Shop.
Board member Dr. Don Klassen began making the rounds last week to distribute grants to 11 Morden-Winkler area charitable organizations.
“We have a local grants budget each year,” he explained. “It was $35,000, I think, last year and we upped it to $45,000 this year.”
As a fundraising arm of Mennonite Central Committee, the bulk of the shop’s profits go to relief efforts and programming all over the world—about half a million dollars this past year.
But it’s important, Klassen said, to also give back to the community that has supported the store for over 50 years.
“You’re allowed to, up to a certain percentage, do local granting, and we’ve pushed the envelope on that to maximize it,” he said.
“It all happens by people bringing donations to that back door,” Klassen stressed of the store’s downtown location, where donors keep the shelves stocked with gently used, resalable goods.
While the thrift shop has a handful of paid employees, it very much relies on the 300+ volunteers who come in regularly to sort and fix donated goods, price and get it all out on the shelves, and man the tills.
A volunteer board of directors oversees the big-picture stuff, including making decisions about the annual local grants.
Klassen will spend the next few weeks distributing those cheques. His first stop last week was at Katie’s Cottage, which received $5,000.
Katie Cares executive director Ruth Reimer said she applied for the support because she feels their work lines up well with the values of MCC.
“I wrote in my letter that I felt our mandate and the MCC mandate were so similar in how we operate. We operate with transparency, with integrity, just like MCC does. And it’s not just about giving a handout, but it’s a hand up to somebody,” she said, explaining respite home guests pay a modest fee for their stay—enough to keep the facility operating but not so much as to be a burden on families dealing with health challenges. “So you’re making them feel good, not like they’re getting something for nothing. It gives them their dignity.”
Likewise, MCC’s global programs help people not just in emergency situations but also by providing sustainable solutions to ongoing problems, observed Klassen.
“A small farmer in Cambodia, for example, somebody who was always flooded out and now grows their crop on a trellis because somebody gave them a few dollars to do it,” he said.
Katie Cares will use its donation to support its breakfast program, which provides Katie’s Cottage guests with a free meal to start their day.
“It’s one less thing for them to worry about,” Reimer said
“We do all our own baking here,” she shared, noting they source all their supplies from area growers and stores. “It’s important to us that we support local.”
Also receiving MCC funding over the next few weeks will be the Central Station Community Centre ($6,000), Tabor Home ($2,000), The Bunker youth ministry ($5,000), Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Pembina Valley ($2,000), Genesis House ($5,000), the Pembina Valley Pregnancy Care Centre ($4,000), Segue Career Options ($4,000), Gateway Resources ($4,000), Sixteen13 Ministry ($4,000) and the Winkler-Morden chapter of Habitat for Humanity ($4,000).
