The Blue Bell Easter bunny along with WPEC morning anchor Suzanne Boyd, and the morning crew from WIRK 103.1 FM visited the kids in the pediatric unit at Palms West Hospital yesterday to cheer them up and deliver loads of ice cream goodies for everyone.
The Florida chapter of Little Smiles, a volunteer driven non-profit with a mission to help kids in local hospitals and other like facilities, organized the visit.
You can support them by going to LittleSmiles.org
Not to be an Easter Grump but….
Sounds like a very nice Community Outreach…but who;s idea was it, the station or the Ice Cream Folks?
Was the Ice Cream paid for by the station?
Was the Ice Cream given away by the Company, for Promotional Consideration?
Was there any collateral PR help from the Hospital?
Funny how “Patient Confidentiality” always gets on the way of doing real news stories in Hospitals so often, but everything seems to work out nicely for a soft PR piece.
If the Ice Cream was donated as a “PR Effort”, was that disclosed by the station, and if not, was it in effect “Pay for Play”?
Again, Great “Connect” with the kids, and it made for a nice “Staged” News Event.
But with so many “Community Needs” in So Fla, could the time have been better spent on real News, like how many families can’t afford decent health care for their kids, or why Florida is one of the worst states in the nation for Education Funding?
Sounds like a Ratings stunt and not much more….but again, don’t wanna be a Grump when it comes to free ice cream and kids!
“The Florida chapter of Little Smiles, a volunteer driven non-profit with a mission to help kids in local hospitals and other like facilities, organized the visit.”
Makes it a little better, but hope it was all disclosed on the air, was the “deal” available to all other stations and how did this end up being an “exclusive”? Was there any special relationship anywhere with the station, non-profit or hospital and what about other kids in other facilities too?
Again, nice “feel good story”, and I may sound like an old grump for raising the questions…but they are worth asking on a forum like this.
not that I know of, I think Boyd and the radio crew were with the charity and Blue Bell was a the charity’s donor