$18K worth of prizes in this year’s Glebe Spree
Weekly cash prizes, Two-Stamp Tuesday and Christmas Chaos return
by Trevor Greenway
Nadine Hodgson is getting to know the Glebe really well store by store, restaurant by restaurant, event by event. The Centretown resident hasn’t been shy about spreading out her Glebe Spree winnings across the neighbourhood, indulging in stops at restaurants and shops, and making recurring visits to Mrs. Tiggy Winkle’s with her two young children.
“I have been trying to make purchases that are a little bit more meaningful and sort of spreading it across the businesses,” says Hodgson, sipping coffee at Little Victories – coffee she paid for with her leftover Glebe Spree winnings.
“We shop here all the time but I want to experience different stores too that I haven’t been to.”
Hodgson and her family won last year’s grand prize $10,000 shopping spree. And while that news would be significant for anyone, it was extra special for the Hodgsons. Hodgson and her husband Andrew were practically living at CHEO, as their newborn daughter Siena had just undergone an emergency operation just days before learning they had won. The two-week emotional rollercoaster they were on finally came to a halt and they disembarked to find a $10,000 cheque waiting for them when they got home. The money made it possible for Nadine to take extra time off with her now-healthy daughter.
“It was just this horrible experience to go through,” she says of her time at CHEO, not knowing when they would be able to return home with a healthy newborn. “And then I got this email that we had won. It was fantastic news. It was just this huge uplifting experience.”
The Glebe Spree cash kick-started a perfect year for the Hodgsons. They took friends out to dinner at The Rowan and the Works, bought their son Theo new ski gear from Sporting Life and even let him pick out his own back-to-school gear at Readi Set Go.
“We went to Readi Set Go and got him everything for back to school. We let him pick whatever he wanted,” says Nadine, adding that he chose a sparkly lunch kit, a police car backpack and a water bottle that can take him to the moon and back. “He still loves it, even his water bottle. He says it looks like a spaceship.”
With more than half the winnings still left to spend, Nadine said there will likely be a few more trips to Mrs. Tiggy Winkle’s for Christmas gifts, some fancy holiday dinners with friends and one signature gift that “will stay with the family forever.”
She’ll certainly be playing Glebe Spree again this year, as the neighbourhood’s favourite promotion launches on November 15. Given the popularity of last year’s Canada 150 edition of Glebe Spree, several of its elements will be returning this year including the weekly $1,000 cash prizes and the everpopular Any Day Prizes.
Shoppers will only need to spend a total of $150 for a complete entry, while Two-Stamp Tuesdays and Christmas Chaos will once again offer shoppers the chance to get double the stickers every Tuesday and through the entire weekend of December 8 and 9.
“Last year’s Glebe Spree was the most sucessful to date and was recognized with a Pinnacle Award from the International Downtown Association this past October,” says Glebe BIA executive director Andrew Peck. “Glebe Spree is the perfect opportunity to kick off the holiday season in the Glebe and we are thrilled to launch the eighth incarnation of this great promotion.”
If you’ve never played Glebe Spree before, don’t worry; it’s as easy as simply shopping in the Glebe. Pick up your Glebe Spree Passport at any participating merchant or online at www.glebespree.ca and bring it with you each time you shop. For every $15 spent, you will receive a sticker for your passport. Collect $150 worth of stickers and drop your ballot off at a participating Glebe store, and you’re in. Shoppers can enter the contest as many times as they like to increase their chances of winning.
In addition to the $10,000 grand prize, there will also be five weekly cash prizes worth $1,000. All you need to do is get your completed ballots in by end of day Tuesday every week, and you’ll be entered into the weekly draw. Those ballots will also be re-entered into the grand-prize draw. Shoppers could also win one of 30 Any Day Prizes consisting of a $100 gift card on any given day just for walking into a Glebe store. The stores and times are kept secret, so you’ll just have to keep shopping for your chance to win.
Glebe Spree launches November 15 and runs through Christmas until December 31. The winner will be announced in early January. Visit www.glebespree.ca on November 15 for full contest rules.
Trevor Greenway is responsible for communications at the Glebe BIA (Business Improvement Area).
