ESS Giving Back

Mid-Ohio Food Bank

Each year at Thanksgiving, we have a contest called the Turkey Auction.  Employees earn paper turkeys for achieving certain goals and can then use them to buy prizes at an auction.  The contest is also set up so that for every 5 turkeys earned, ESS donates $1.00 to the Mid-Ohio Food Bank to go toward purchasing the Thanksgiving dinners they prepare for people in central Ohio. In 2008, ESS was able to provide 950 Thanksgiving meals.

Each quarter, a group of 4 or 5 employees volunteer an afternoon at the food bank to help re-package food and essential items for those in need. We alternate each quarter so everyone can participate throughout the year if they choose.

Lastly, we have a box in the kitchen for employees to drop off donations to the food bank in exchange for being able to wear jeans to work. We donate the items to the food bank during our quarterly volunteer time.

Kiva.org  

In addition to the work we do with the Mid-Ohio Food Bank, we also work with the site kiva.org which provides micro-loans to people around the world in order to help them start up and operate their own businesses and become more self-sufficient. ESS employees can wear jeans to work for $1.00 per day donation to this fund.  We also have a snack stand where employees can purchase drinks and snacks.  All profits are loaned out at the end of the year to people featured on kiva.org. More than 90 percent of the money loaned to people on kiva.org is repaid within the first 12 months. This allows us to re-donate the money back into kiva.org and help additional people with their business plans.