Businesses in New Jersey rally together to help victims of Helene with donations drop off
Taking a day off from harvesting, Marsha Gaventa spent part of Tuesday organizing bags of supplies.
The Cedarvale Winery in Logan Township is also now serving as a drop-off location where donations are being collected to help hurricane victims in North Carolina.
"I can't imagine being in that situation and just a little bit that we can do to collect items I just want to be able to help people," said Marsha Gaventa, who owns the winery with her husband.
Last week, Marsha Gaventa said she received a text message from a friend asking if she would join the call to help after Hurricane Helene ravaged communities and left millions of people without power. Now, the winery is a central location where toiletries, canned goods, snacks, and paper products are collected.
"We've all been helping collect the donations and we stack them up, and we've been accepting everything," she said.
Crimson Hair Studio and other businesses in Haddonfield have also joined in. Since last week, the salon on Haddon Avenue has also been collecting donations and delivering them to Cedarvale Winery.
"As the week progressed it was amazing, there was clothing, cleaning supplies, and chainsaws," said Jen Eberwein, owner of Crimson Hair Studio. "Anything we can do around here to help out and I feel like with Haddonfield being the community that it is I know people will be willing to help around here."
On Monday, a group of volunteers at the winery helped fill a 16-foot trailer from top to bottom, and a nonprofit flew the supplies down south to help distribute them to those in need.
"Especially in these times, it's good to see everybody come together for a common goal," Ed Gaventa said.
The power of the South Jersey community has been on full display, and now with the weather turning colder in the mountains, organizers say the need is also changing.
"They need to keep warm at night so they're looking for blankets, hats, gloves, hand warmers as well as fire starters and camping supplies because these people have nothing," Marsha Gaventa said.
The winery and businesses will be collecting donations throughout the week and hope to send another trailer to North Carolina.
You can drop off supplies at Cedarvale Winery at 205 Repaupo Station Road.
