Lions Gate Uniform
[Gleaned from the Lions Gate Mailing List, 23 Oct 2009]
The Story of the Lions Gate Uniform
Once upon a time, I was the administrator/bookkeeper for a large charity in downtown Vancouver. Our executive director received a phonecall from the Revenue Agency of Canada. It seems they had siezed a 'container load' of sweaters at the border and had deemed them to be countefit. They offered them to my boss, with the caviat that they must all be taken at once, and they must ALL be taken, and that the labels must be removed, making them unsaleable, before they could be given away. The other choice was that Revenue Canada would destroy the sweaters.
Now, I have no idea how a sweater can be counterfit..but thats neither here nor there. My boss called me up, and said...BARB...for that is what I was called there...BARB..go get them sweaters. And I went..Yes Ma-am..for that is the best way to answer your boss I found.
Then I asked..um..what's a container? She says..I dunno. I am an Executive Director..not a shipper. You should know. I says...well I am an administrator..not a shipper..I dunno. So I called up a few folks I knew with large vehicles (co-incidentally they were all in the SCA..go figure)...and we all trapsed out to Richmond to pick up a 'container load of sweaters.
Had I ever seen a container load of anything up close and personal before? Nope. Did I have any clue how BIG a container load of sweaters was? NOPE.
We get out there and I looked..omg...its a truck! Its a semi truck trailer! And its full..omg. 256 cases of sweaters..each one 2 feet by 2 feet by 2 feet....24 sweaters in each case...just over 6 thousand sweaters........
So...what do we do? Ain't no way that many sweaters is gonna fit in my poor old suburban or any and all of the other vehicles we had there. Kenneth of Shaftsbury had experience driving a large truck tho..and I had a credit card..and Kenneth had some contacts....
We rented a ten ton Rider truck, and a fine gentleman in Richmond stored 110 cases of those sweaters for us for free..for a week.
We hauled all the rest to my garage.....we filled my garage, my living room, ,my hallway...my..well you get the idea...
So..I now have a week to get rid of 110 cases of sweaters..thats two thousand, six hundred and forty sweaters....a serious embarrasment of riches..in a week
So...
I called up some of the folk I know in..oh you guessed it..the SCA...and they came over...and I rented a video..and over a video, 2 pizzas and a six pack of beer, they and I removed the labels on over 600 sweaters. And I took em to work, and my boss said..Thats great..don't do it again. She was unwilling to pay someone...or pay for food, pizza and beer, for someone to remove labels on sweaters she was then going to give away.
So..I spent the next several hours on the phone to every other charity in town...offering them sweaters. They were willing to take em if we removed the labels..but felt just like my boss bout it. One charity took several cases and simply opened them and passed them out. Well that broke our terms of agreement with Revenue Canada, so we felt we could not give them any more.
So..what do I do? I have less than a week to get rid of all them 110 cases of sweaters so I can make room for the ones they are gonna drop on me fuzzy lil head from Richmond.....But..I knew a group, if I told em to remove the labels or never sell them ...they would.
So I called on the SCA again. Her excellency, Amanda Kendal, took many cases and removed labels and passed them out. Ditto the Bardic Lights. Ditto Chang, who, if I recall correctly, had a blast passing them to folks on the street. Several other groups took sweaters, and I took sweaters by the caseload to every event I went to..which in a week..consisted of Allistar and Colin's Xmas Bash.
For the next year, I took sweaters to every event I attended. I spent many an evening in front of the tv removing labels so I could take the sweaters to work in the morning and pass them out. I felt so honored and so amazingly good to be given the opportunity.....
And it gives me a great 'no sh*t, there I was...staring at a semi truck box going...OHHH so THATS what a shipping container looks like!
In service (and grinning from ear to ear) HL Genevieve Barbota of Gryphonshold
ps..Stephano made me the patron saint of fleece for that, cause I can make fleece appear where none was before!
Needed: A photo of the sweater