Local Starbucks Partners With The Maywood Watchdog, In Order To Give Back To The Community.

Maywood's Starbucks located at 1718 S 1st Avenue

On December 19 in celebration of the Maywood Watchdog's first Frontline Worker Appreciation Month, I had the pleasure of partnering with our local Starbucks in order provide breakfast to many of the frontline workers within the Village of Maywood. During the initial planning stage for this event, my goal was to be able to provide breakfast for over one hundred village employees. Although my ideas surrounding this event were very ambitious from the get go, as time passed I began to realize that I needed help in order successfully pull off the event. It is at that very moment that I decided to go in such of a local business, that would be willing to partner with me for a very good cause. After reaching out to several other businesses, the response that I ultimately received from Starbucks was more in line with my desired plans for the day. Thankfully after presenting my idea to Arnold, the manager of Starbucks he subsequently agreed to support me in my efforts to make my day of appreciation an actual reality.

The reason why I felt the need to write this article, was in order to highlight two very important things. The first thing I wanted to showcase was the importance of showing gratitude for all of those hard-working individuals in our community, whose daily contributions sometimes both goes unnoticed and underappreciated. The second reason for this article is to highlight the importance of supporting those local businesses, that actively make an effort to support our community as well. As a longtime resident of Maywood, I know all too well the problems that our community over the years has had both in trying to attract and retain larger businesses in our community. Case in point the location where Starbucks is now located, formerly was that site of both a Checkers and a KFC. Both of which were also well-known national brands but unfortunately over time were forced to close their doors. Which leads me to ask this question. How do we, prevent the past from repeating itself again? The fact is, in the long run if we want other big stores and businesses to see the value of investing in our community, we have to prove to them that their business also can prosper here. All in all I know that this Starbucks won't stay open, just with the support of Maywood resident alone. However, the more well-known business that move into Maywood, I firmly believe that this will encourage more and more people from outside of our community to come into Maywood in order to support more of our other local businesses.

In closing I would like to sincerely thank Starbucks and all of those Village of Maywood staff members helped to make that event a big success. I would also like to send a special shout out to Arnold, for both his warmth and hospitality. Oh and to the upper management or corporate for Starbucks, I just wanted to let you to know that I really wouldn't be made at you if you gave Arnold a raise or a bonus for all of his hard work. Like I said, I really wouldn't be mad about that :)

Here's Arnold helping to serve up some fresh hot coffee.