Apple Day

On Apple Day, youth in full uniform hand out apples for a donation. We normally congregate on the mall plaza at 6th Ave. and 6th St. and spread out down 6th St. to the mall plaza between the TD Bank and Starbucks.

We typically run the event from 10:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. with youth and leaders doing shifts of a few hours. Leaders polish apples and help the youth where required. The youth are the ones interacting with the public.

As with all Scouting events, youth and leaders should attend in full uniform.

Things to remember to do before the event:

• Ask the Friends to organize the event. Give them adequate time to get the Solicitation Permit from the City of New Westminster. (by the Friends)
• Order and pick up apples. (by the Friends)
• Get the Solicitation Permit from City and provide financial statement to the City (City Clerk’s office) after the event. If the financial statement is not provided, they won’t issue a permit for the next Apple Day. The application sometimes takes a few weeks so don’t leave it until the last minute. (by the Friends)
• We need to request permission from Royal City Shopping Center Ltd. and fill out their “Request for Space Form”. The contact there is Mary Burris, mburris@strathallen.com. They then fill out a “Temporary Tenancy Lease” that needs to be signed by Iqbal Lalany and a certificate of insurance needs to be provided by Michelle Yu.
• We need to request permission from Westminster Centre for the plaza near the crosswalk between Starbucks and Tim Hortons. The contact there is Marisse Biuso, marisse@uptownpropertygroup.com. The Waves Coffee shop at 6th and 6th is their tenant and we need to ensure that we don’t block their doors when we are on the sidewalk there. The agreement needs to be signed by Iqbal Lalany and a certificate of insurance needs to be provided by Michelle Yu.
• The Section should have sign-up sheets so they know who is coming and when. It isn't really important to manage this too closely as people come and go through the day and we seem to always have enough people at all times through the day.
• Consider “thank-you tags” that go over a button, so people don’t get asked multiple times. These are available from the Scout Shop in packages of 1000.
• Normally, the Friends of New Westminster Scouting get the Solicitation Permit from the City of New Westminster, orders and picks up the apples from JBM Enterprises, counts the money, and will get more cash cans if required. Lately we have been going through 7 or 8 boxes of apples.
• If extra cans are needed, they need to be purchased. Apparently, the Coho area can do a group buy for apples and cans; we might be able to get in on the cans part of that. In the past, we have purchased cans from Wells Can in Burnaby at 8705 Government Street. The cost was $140 including tax for 100 cans.

Things to remember on day of event:

• Get the cans, signs, trays and some rags for polishing apples from the storage locker.
• Consider bringing a 10x10 pop up shelter, the Group banner and some rope to tie it to the shelter.
• Have an overall sign-in / sign-out sheet at the event so we know how many apple day badges to buy from the Scout Shop.
• Bring advertising literature for Scouting in New Westminster.
  
• The money is counted by someone who has access to a free coin counting machine who then writes a cheque to the Group. Historically, Dave Upham has taken care of this.