You and Who’sday: 30 Cities in 90 Days – Boston and Phoenix, Texas up next

This is the tenth installment of a Tuesday feature documenting Dan Gigante’s nationwide tour on behalf of his Buffalo-based, community-driven apparel company.

By Dan Gigante, President, You and Who

Last week was a great week, starting with TEDxBuffalo and traveling to Boston, then Phoenix. TEDxBuffalo was a terrific success, and I’m glad I worked my schedule around being able to attend and also for You and Who to be the provider of shirts for the event. For every shirt sold, You and Who is donating a meal to Buffalo City Mission. I’m proud to say that we sold all 65 shirts we had on-hand, which will result in 65 donated meals to the Mission. The speakers themselves were interesting and engaging, and being able to see some friends I hadn’t seen since ”30 Cities in 90 Days” began was a great boost, as I now head into the final leg of this trip. One other thing I’d like to mention is that we were able to donate several dozen untouched bagels, a crate full of apples and bananas, and a few gallons of orange juice to the Mission immediately following the event. I’m very much looking forward to participating in the next TEDxBuffalo, and perhaps even a viewing party of archived TED talks sometime in between.

The morning after TEDxBuffalo, it was back to the road – or air, as it were – as I finally got to spend two days in Boston. With the Bluepass requiring all flights to start or end in Boston, this definitely wasn’t the first, nor the last, time I flew into Logan International Airport, but it was finally the time I had carved out to officially establish You and Who’s presence in Beantown.  In two days, I met with three fantastic organizations we’ll be donating clothing and meals to: Boston Rescue Mission, Pine Street Inn, and St. Francis House.

I arrived into Phoenix late Thursday night, which meant I only had one day to explore the city before the weekend. I was still able to visit the CASS campus, aka Central Arizona Shelter Services, and UMOM New Day Center. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to personally visit with the Phoenix Rescue Mission, but I was able to speak with them by phone. I’m happy to report all four worthy organizations will be receiving You and Who donations in the future. Over the weekend, I stayed in Phoenix and visited the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, where we made a connection and found some artists to create some “Moving Forward” designs for our next line of shirts.

 

This week, I’m in Texas visiting Houston for the first time and revisiting Austin, which is one of You and Who’s 2010 launch cities. And next week, I’ll be wrapping up my tour of the southern states with a full week in Florida, to include stops in Tampa, Orlando, and Jacksonville. At the end of next week, we’ll be in the homestretch with only four weeks to the tour remaining! As always, please reach out if you know of anyone in these cities who would like to get involved!