We don’t know when life will return to normal, nor do we know when the great events in our city will return.
We do know how much we rely on you, our readers.
We also know how much we rely on our marketing partners, whose support allows us to do the kind of work we do. Like Jenni Laidman’s 2019 Louisville Magazine feature “Cancer Sucks!”, which was recently nominated for a national award and, more importantly, documents the heroics of a South End group that helps pay for cancer treatments — the kind of rolling-up-your-sleeves spirit we’re seeing all across our city right now.
This week in this space, we’re sharing just some of what our partners are doing in this crisis. If you know of what other companies and nonprofits are doing, please let me know.
And if you have a story idea, a question or feedback, shoot me a message: jmoss@loumag.com.
I’d love to hear from you.
— Josh Moss
Editor
Drake’s, like so many other restaurants, is charging on with carry-out and delivery sales. (No Aqua Sushi, though. Sad-face emoji.) And the Drake’s Team Relief Fund is supporting out-of-work staff during this time. For every $100 gift certificate purchase, receive a gift certificate valued at $120, with 100 percent of purchases being donated to the relief fund.
Along with take ‘n’ bake lasagna, home cocktail kits and community meals for those in need, Brand Hospitality Group (Exchange Pub and Brooklyn & the Butcher) is selling “So In This Together” T-shirts (“So In” being short for southern Indiana) to help its 100-plus staff members currently out of work.
Crushed Ice Catering is delivering family meals. And…Angel Soft toilet paper (!) along with other grocery items.
Last week, Gilda’s Club sent “Super YOU” packages to 37 children battling cancer, who, like all kids these days, are stuck at home. The boxes of snacks, puzzles, craft materials, coloring books, superhero capes and masks, and more were sponsored by Kosair Charities. For anyone living with cancer, the resource center has gone virtual.
Mmmm. Braised beef short ribs with mashed potatoes. River House Restaurant and Varanese are offering family meals and grocery items for pickup.
The partners behind NuLu favorites RYE on Market and Galaxie Bar are cooking free meals for service-industry workers who have lost their pay due to the closure of restaurants and bars.
While the animals take a break from the spotlight (and, yes, are being cared for), the Louisville Zoo has rescheduled its April and May events, like the Wild Lights Asian Lantern Festival and Party for the Planet, which will feature a Trashformation student art contest and Teddy Abrams jam session.
Louisville Visual Art has a remedy for idle hands and cries of “I’m bored!” Video art lessons.
Grants, loans, direct-cash assistance and healthcare coverage. LIBA has teamed up with independent business associations across the country to advocate for the little guys as federal relief measures are negotiated.
Kendra Scott is giving 50 percent of proceeds from its Everlyne bracelet sales to Feeding America food banks.
Clayton & Crume is using its leathercraft equipment to make face shields (650,000 of them) for medical workers.
In the last two weeks, Phocus has given more than 60,000 cans of its caffeinated sparkling water to hospital staff, pharmacists and other front-line workers.
Screen time solution: KET is devoting its daytime schedule to at-home learning to help (exhausted!) families and educators.
Already watch just about everything on Netflix? Speed Art Museum film curator Dean Otto is sharing streaming picks — and where to access them — while the museum is closed.
Using its on-site cafe, Brown-Forman is donating 2,000 meals a day to local food pantries this month. We’ll drink a quarantini to that. See what else the spirits giant has been doing for the community.
While high school seniors everywhere are missing out on rites of passage like prom and graduation, the Louisville Collegiate School class of 2020 has a message of gratitude. As do the school’s first-graders, who visited their teacher in a parade outside her house.
In response to an unwelcome 10-by-40-foot graffiti marking on its building on Story Avenue, the Eye Care Institute has created the Help-An-Artist contest, seeking someone to turn the vandalism into a work of art meaningful to the institute and the surrounding Butchertown neighborhood.
Need a quarantine friend? Adopt one of the nearly 300 pets in Kentucky Humane Society care. Or foster. Or donate.
Kentucky Derby Museum has a virtual museum “where every day is Derby Day.” A clip of jockey Patti Cooksey reflecting on her ride aboard So Vague in the 1984 Kentucky Derby requires tissues. “I felt this whoosh, this big presence.”
Leave it to Jack Daniel’s to post a touching look at quarantine life on its website, where you can also find tips and recipes for virtual tastings and happy hours.
