Accts. Receivable Mgr., LKQ Best Automotive / ATK (Michigan)

She started volunteering while her husband was active duty in the United States Army. During her time working with the military, she made a lot of contacts and met a lot of people that wanted to help and supply items for care packages, food, school supplies, and toys for the children.

Over time, the toys and school supplies she collected started to exceed her ability to distribute them. In 2013, just 10 days before Christmas, Shannon thought, “we need to find a way to create a big event to connect the toys that she was stockpiling to the community in need.”

This is the moment that the now Annual Toy Give Away at their church was birthed. That year, with the help of social media, the event went viral, and they ended up giving away 7500 toys that day, providing toys for 1500 children. “It had been the Best Day Ever!”

Now, they hand out up to 15,000 toys each year and have expanded to providing toys to multiple inner city churches so they can give them out in their neighborhoods.