By Steven Gordon, Lemonade Day National President

You may have noticed advance promotion over the past several weeks on Facebook and other social media platforms that November 27 has been designated as #GivingTuesday. Well, #GivingTuesday is here! Now in its seventh year, #GivingTuesday is planned for the Tuesday following Thanksgiving Day, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday and kicks off the charitable giving season. (Source: www.givingtuesday.org/about). Much more than a day, #GivingTuesday signals the kickoff of our Lemonade Day national year-end fundraising campaign, “Build the Future of Entrepreneurship.”  If you missed our blog posts about #GivingTuesday and our year-end campaign, you can access them here:

Blog post #1

Blog post #2

Funds raised for Lemonade Day at the national level support the development and delivery of teaching tools designed to help kids “build the future and stir up success” one lemonade stand at a time, as well as the program’s expansion to reach more kids.

Lemonade Day leaders are pursuing an ambitious goal of bringing the Lemonade Day youth entrepreneurship experience to every child in North America at no cost to those who register to participate. Kids who register and host a lemonade stand learn valuable business and character-building lessons that serve them for life: business planning, product development, marketing and promotion, customer service, financial management, and charitable giving. 

In 2018, 75 percent of all Lemonade Day participants shared some of their lemonade business profits with a cause that matters to them. We are proud to help these kids become the next generation of social advocates and #GivingTuesday participants.

Along with Lemonade Day national board members, our headquarters team, sponsors, volunteers and mentors, I am thrilled for the tremendous support we are so fortunate to have received from these and many others who believe in the power of the Lemonade Day lemonade stand:

• Raising Cane's is sharing information about our campaign on Twitter (@Raising_Canes)

• Telemundo Houston, through the advocacy of J.C. Perez, added a Facebook event and posted it on the Telemundo Houston Facebook page (page: @TelemundoHouston, event page here)

• Hailey Hertzman and Katie Vonder Haar, founders of Ooh La Lemon and 2017 Lemonade Day National Youth Entrepreneurs of the Year, will donate a portion of the proceeds from their online sales to Lemonade Day on #GivingTuesday (see www.oohlalemonstore.com)

• A generous benefactor will match “dollar for dollar” which Lemonade Day receives from donors on #GivingTuesday and through December 31

We would LOVE your help in any or all of these ways:

• Contribute funds in any amount via the “Build the Future of Entrepreneurship” campaign

• Be a campaign ambassador by creating a personal fundraising page through the campaign (see the toolkit here)

• Share Lemonade Day National's #GivingTuesday-related Facebook posts

• Post an #UNselfie on social media (print this template, write why you support LD, take a selfie with it, and post on your social media pages with these hashtags: #GivingTuesday, #LemonadeDay, #UNselfie)

Thank you for being a fan and follower of Lemonade Day. With your help, we are expanding our successful youth entrepreneurship program to more cities, towns, and military bases in 2019.

As always, I welcome your comments, questions and suggestions. Please email me any time at Steven@LemonadeDay.org.

For more information about Lemonade Day, please visit www.lemonadeday.org.