Kitchen Tour with a Twist

If you love looking at remodeled kitchens, crave ideas for stylish renovations or would just like to help area kids, an area real estate agency has cooked up an event for you.

On Friday, November 15, RE/MAX Real Estate will hold “RENEW – A Tour of Kitchens Restored.” The event starts at 9 a.m. and features a tour of eight Lehigh Valley kitchens that have been remodeled by Jill Jarrett of Jarrett Design in Emmaus. It concludes at 2 p.m. at Shaggy Bark Farm, a former 1700s-era log cabin just north of Quakertown that has been transformed into a 9,000-square-foot country estate. Guests will be treated to a catered “harvest lunch” and a chance to win a Vitamix high performance blender.

Priced at $50 a ticket, the event is the latest entre on a long-standing menu of fund-raising events organized by RE/MAX owners and agents to help children’s charities.

“It’s our job to help families with the largest purchase they will ever make, but also to become engrained in those communities. So, we give back to those types of programs that help our communities thrive,” RE/MAX owner David Coleman of Allentown said of the years-long gift giving.

The programs they help include Easter Seals Eastern Pennsylvania, the Children’s Home of Easton and the Bethlehem Ministries – all located near one of the three RE/MAX offices owned by brokers Coleman and Betsy Duga-Hauck
of Bethlehem.

I think it’s important to give our agents a reason to work for a cause.

Choosing charities that benefit children began years ago with the company’s previous owners and continued through a merger in 2010, Coleman said. This year, he added, the campaign was whipped up a notch by putting agent Annie McGeary in charge.

McGeary of Lower Macungie Township said she enjoys organizing fund-raising events, especially for children and has been active for years with local organizations that focus on and serve chidlren.

“As a real estate agent, I feel I should help keep my communities thriving. Each area of the Valley is a part of what I sell when I sell a home. Also, when you have large medical facilities and major companies such as Air Products, Olympus, Victaulic and Crayola in your back yard, it is important for their relocating employees to have a range of options for schooling, the arts and entertainment.”

In addition to rolling out the kitchen tour, McGeary has taken the offices’ biggest, fall fund-raising event from the tables to the tees. Instead of a casino night, she came up with “Hit & Hope,” an evening of indoor mini-golf, music and tastings. Friends and foursomes will tee off and play nine holes of miniature golf in the clubhouse at Brookside Country Club in Macungie. A buffet of home-style foods will be offered along with music and dancing. And, top scorers in golf can win prizes for the home or garden. Tickets for the Nov. 9 event will cost $75.

Already this year, RE/MAX has raised about $2,500 at its regional qualifier for the
RE/MAX World Long Drive Championship held in May at Olde Homestead Golf Course in New Tripoli. And, its client appreciation night in September, “A Movie Under the Stars,” brought in additional donations.

Whatever is raised at the end of the year is split three ways to benefit the three children’s charities, according to Coleman. Although last year’s events raised about $1,000 for each charity, McGeary said her goal is to raise that to a “lofty” $5,000 per charity.

Coleman said he has no dollar amount in mind. His goal is to “do a little better than the year before and keep on doing it… I think it’s important to give our agents a reason to work for a cause.”

Recipients greatly appreciate that. Just ask Nancy Knoebel, chief executive at Easter Seals, a non-profit organization that helps some 1,300 disabled and developmentally delayed children from infancy through young adult in the Lehigh Valley, Berks County and the Poconos.

“For everything we do we count on community support,” she said. “RE/MAX has been tremendously wonderful to us… it means all the difference in the world.”

For more information about the events or how to obtain tickets, visit lehighvalleyhome.com and click on the Charity for Children link, or call RE/MAX at 610.770.9000.