Glebe contest winner on a spree

Posted Jan 26, 2012 By Michelle Nash

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Will Raymond won a $10,000 shopping spree prize for doing something he always does - shop in the Glebe. The Glebe Spree contest, launched by the Glebe Business Improvement Area, was held over the holiday season to promote local shopping with the chance to win big. Raymond was one of 12,000 residents who participated in the contest.

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Will Raymond won a $10,000 shopping spree prize for doing something he always does - shop in the Glebe. The Glebe Spree contest, launched by the Glebe Business Improvement Area, was held over the holiday season to promote local shopping with the chance to win big. Raymond was one of 12,000 residents who participated in the contest.

EMC news - A contest to attract shoppers to the Glebe during the holiday season has left one lucky man with a very big smile on his face.

The Glebe Spree Contest started on Nov. 15 and ran through Dec. 31, offering people who chose to shop locally the chance to win $10,000.

For grand prize winner Will Raymond, it was the easiest contest to participate in because he shops in the Glebe every day.

"It is the only thing I ever won, but life doesn't change," Raymond said. "I am now just debt-free."

Raymond is the superintendant for an apartment building in the Glebe and said he goes to the Home Hardware every day. Shopping locally for Raymond is just an everyday event, but he is thrilled by the win.

"Everything is so close and I love shopping because it is all about talking to everyone and teasing them," Raymond joked.

During the contest, shoppers used Glebe passports to collect stickers for every $20.00 they spent at participating retailers. Once $200 worth of stickers had been collected, a ballot was entered into the draw on behalf of the passport holder. Approximately 65,000 passports were in use during the month of December.

Over the course of the contest, Raymond was one of the 12,000 entries that were submitted, which amounted to $2.4 million dollars spent at businesses in the Glebe.

The Glebe BIA started the contest in the wake of the reconstruction of Bank Street as a way to let people know stores were open and ready to have a little fun.

According to BIA executive director Christine Leadman, the reconstruction process was hard for the area businesses, but the support from the city and residents made the difficult time a lot easier.

THANK YOU

"(The contest) was a thank you to residents for putting up with all the construction," Leadman said. "(The contest) was very exciting and fun, people were really enjoying it."

Residents could earn stickers at most businesses in the Glebe during the contest, making it easy to encourage participation among shoppers.

Leadman said it was the customers who made the contest such a success, pushing some of the stores that weren't participating at first to get on board.

"It was a real encouragement to business, because the people were so engaged in it.

The demand was so great,"

Leadman also sees this as something they could do every year.

"I think it will probably be something they would like to have as a tradition,"

Raymond, who is in remission following successful cancer treatment last year, said shopping in the Glebe is like hanging out with his friends. When he was sick and needed his medication, Raymond said there were days when the girls at Shoppers Drug Mart brought his prescriptions to him.

"Everyone is great. And I just want to say a big thank you for winning this contest," Raymond said.

michelle.nash@metroland.com