Page 16 - 2015 Contact Magazine: 3rd Quarter

More to Love
2016 ‘Love My Credit Union’
Campaign Ups the Ante for
Charitable Donations
Turns out there’s a whole lot more love to share.
October 1 marks the start of voting in the 2016 Love My Credit
Union® Campaign (formerly known as Share the Love), and it’s
another opportunity for credit unions and credit union support
organizations to showcase the wide variety of ways they give back
to the communities they serve. There are more prizes and more
ways to win this year with up to $122,500 awarded to charities.
This year, eight credit unions—divided into four categories based
on asset size—will each be eligible to win $5,000 to be donated
to the charity of their choice. They’ll also compete for a $15,000
grand prize donation. A new category also awards a credit union
support organization with a $15,000 donation to their charity of
choice. In addition, there are state-level prizes where the credit
union from each state with the largest number of cumulative votes
could win a $1,000 donation. As an added incentive to encourage
frequent voting, five consumer winners will be chosen at random
to receive a $500 donation to their charity of choice, along with a
$500 gift card.
UBCCU’s Lisa Mahler, left, joins Nicole Zollinger, Chief Devel-
opment Officer of the Ronald McDonald House Charities; Ronald 
McDonald; and MCUL President/CEO Dave Adams for the grand 
prize check presentation in last year’s Share the Love campaign.
16 T hird Q uarter 2016 I Contact
“It couldn’t be easier to get involved with this campaign,” said Kaye
Chervenak, project coordinator for CU Solutions Group, which
developed the campaign in partnership with CUNA. “All that’s
necessary is to create a short video—just 60–90 seconds—that
highlights the wonderful work your credit union or credit union
support organization does for your community. Upload that
video at LoveMyCUCampaign.org, and then get the word out
to your members and supporters, letting them know you need
their votes!”
Video entries can be uploaded any time during the campaign.
The official contest will run from October 1–December 16, 2016,
and monthly winners will be determined by public votes.
A Co st to Co st uccess tor
One of the most telling aspects of the campaign’s success is that
its popularity extends far beyond Michigan. A total of 132 credit
unions from 35 states participated last year, in locations ranging
from Honolulu, Hawaii, to Tallahassee, Florida. One of the
winning credit unions was New Dimensions FCU, based in
Waterville, Maine.
New Dimensions won $10,000 to benefit the Maine Children’s
Cancer Program, and CEO Ryan Poulin said that when a staffer first
explained the competition to him, “I thought ‘This doesn’t sound
right—it’s too good to be true.’”
Not only was it the real deal, said Poulin, but the entire process was
very easy.
“Our biggest challenge was the voting piece,” he said. “We kind of
took a spiderweb approach. All of us voted, and then we had our
families voting, and then our friends’ families and then through
Facebook, those friends. So it just kept going out that way.” He
added that the credit union also coordinated email campaigns to
encourage supporters to vote every day during the voting period.
New Dimensions tracked the voting as it happened, and reminded
staff and supporters to keep voting and not give up, since every
vote increased the potential for the credit union to make a
meaningful donation to a very worthy cause.