Cheeseburgers for Charity: Bull and Beggar teams with Selfish Jerk to Raise Money for MANNA

Hello Asheville!

You guys know all about MANNA Food Bank already, right? You don’t need me to explain all that to you, do ya? I mean, you shouldn’t even need me to provide a link to their website, but HERE it is, just in case you need to go read about MANNA. Go on. It’s ok. You go do that and then come back here to learn how Bull and Beggar is helping MANNA to provide food for people in WNC who need it this holiday season.

Waiting… waiting… Okay…

So, MANNA reached out to me and asked me to post some stuff on my various social media outlets about one of their upcoming events. They even provided me with a ZIP file of pdfs, jpegs, suggested content, and a suggested schedule for posting on FaceBook and Twitter. It was a very comprehensive and useful promotional package that I will certainly emulate in the future when I promote my own various things! There are so many reasons to be impressed with MANNA, their “2015 #GratefulGiving Ambassador Toolkit” is just one of them. They did of course, encourage the Ambassadors to write our own content, so that’s what I did. Here’s the first thing I posted on FaceBook:

“I’ve joined MANNA FoodBank’s ‪#‎GratefulGiving‬ movement for ‪#‎GivingTuesday‬ as a Social Media Ambassador! They asked me if I would help spread the word through my social media reach, and of course I said, Oh Hell yes! What do I have to do? Post meaningful quotes ‘n’ stats ‘n’ such on FB and Twitter every day? Can do!

Then they asked me to give up one personal indulgence for two weeks.

Um. Who? ME?!? C’mon now. Don’t be talkin’ crazy talk! “Personal Indulgence” is my middle name! Oh, okay, fuck it, I’ll do it!

For the next two weeks I will give up one of my absolute fave things on this Earth: The Monday Night Cheeseburger Special at The Bull and Beggar. Every Monday I spend $15 dollars on a double cheeseburger, a side of fries, a super fancy soda-pop, and the tip. I love it! But for the next two weeks instead of spending my money on myself, I’ll donate that $30 to MANNA Food Bank.

Hey, it ain’t a ton of money, but that’s kinda the point of this campaign. Even a broke-ass bozo like me, can afford to give up one thing for two weeks and donate that money to MANNA instead. You don’t have to be a millionaire to make a dif.

The money I won’t spend on those double cheeseburgers will feed a family of 4 for a week, with two dollah left over for a cappuccino!

All goofing aside, I’m doing this and asking you guys to do the same, because I support MANNA Food Bank, and I believe that every WNC resident should have food for the holidays.”

My post was accompanied by this nifty graphic provided by MANNA.

So, yeah, I decided to pony-up some dough, and make the supreme sacrifice: no cheeseburgers. I thought I might reach more people with my message if I got Bull ‘n’ Begs to play along, and share my post, and maybe poke a little bit of fun at me and such. I dropped them a note. I even went so far as to ask if they might match my $30. They went a lot further than that. Here’s their post from FaceBook:

“Stu is going to go through cheeseburger fits, so we are going to donate a dollar from each cheeseburger we sell for the next two Mondays to MANNA.‪#‎gratefulgiving‬ ‪#‎givingtuesday‬ ‪#‎bullandbeggarburger‬“

Are you effing kidding me?!? Y’see now. THIS is why I love Asheville, USA. Good people… and really good cheeseburgers.

Follow my lead, and please consider giving up one of your own personal indulgences for the next two weeks, and donating that money to MANNA Food Bank on #GivingTuesday, December 1st. If a selfish jerk like me can do it… C’mon.

Do not, however, give up cheeseburgers. Eat at least two cheeseburgers in the next two weeks, please. Eat one at Bull and Beggar on Monday November 23rd, and then eat another one on Monday November 30th. Hell, eat two. One for you, one for me.

I’ll be back at the B’n’B burger bar on Monday December 7th, when I’ll be $30 lighter, and two weeks deep into “cheeseburger fits.”

“Burger me, Drew! I’m FRRREAKIN’ OUT!”

Thanks, Bull and Beggar, you guys rule, and thank you MANNA Food Bank, you are the bomb-titty-ass-bomb of all food banks. True story.

– END –

Stu Helm is an artist, writer, and podcaster living in Asheville, NC, and a frequent diner at local restaurants, cafes, food trucks, and the like. His tastes run from hot dogs and mac ‘n’ cheese, to haute cuisine, and his opinions are based on a lifetime of eating out. He began writing about food strictly to amuse his friends on Facebook.