Created in 2012 as a project for an Entrepreneurship class at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota, Love Your Melon was started by Zachary Quinn and Brain Keller as a way to improve the lives of children dealing with cancer. Based on the simple one for one principle, every hat purchased at LoveYourMelon.com also provides a hat for a child battling cancer at childrens’ hospitals throughout the country. Through their 2014 Smile Tour, they are expanding their presence and reaching more children in need than ever before. Read on to find out more about this great organization!
When creating this organization, why did you decide to focus on kids with cancer? Any personal connection? We all have people in our lives that have experienced cancer and we understand how frightening it is. Our entrepreneurship class required us to start a business and we were determined to make a difference with what we created. Right after beginning Love Your Melon, we met Zach Sobiech. At his fundraiser in December of 2012, we delivered hats to Zach and his family. It all began to click. Zach was nearly our age and facing death, this could have been anyone of us. He was an amazing individual and his work inspired so many. We were some of the lucky ones to have been around him. He continues to inspire us and is the reason we continue.
Are you surprised at the interest in the idea? We created a platform for people to get involved through the simple process of buying a hat. They get to make a difference in the life of a child battling cancer and at the same time get an awesome hat to wear! Its so easy for people to get involved, yet it means a lot.
Are you having fun with this? We are having an absolute blast! We end up in the office working until 4 a.m. on Friday and Saturday nights instead of going out, and we love it. We have distanced ourselves from college life but it is all for the right reason–to make this world a better place.
Why a tour across the country? The Love Your Melon 2014 Smile Tour will share the events and programs that LYM has been able to create in Minnesota with the rest of the country! It is about time that this happened, and we can’t wait to create smiles for children beyond the Twin Cities.
What do you hope to achieve with Love Your Melon? We will continue making hats right here in the United States, even more locally if possible. We can impact our community and strengthen ties through developing our own manufacturing facility and increasing our programs to help children battling cancer and their families. By taking individuals from the communities that we go to into the hospital rooms with us, we give them an incredible experience as well. The benefits are amazing for the children. Therapeutic treatment programs like ours, increase a child’s chance at surviving cancer by 18%. There is no way to tell where we will be in five years as our growth has been so great over the past year. I just hope that we are able to continue being creative and unique, impacting the lives of children battling cancer and strengthening communities.
Any personal stories or particular patients who have touched you? Dawson Parker, from Wetumpka, Alabama, was the star baseball player at his middle school. Then, he was diagnosed with Fanconi Anemia, a rare blood disorder. To be treated for this, he had to come up to Minnesota for months at a time. We have had the amazing opportunity of getting to know Dawson over the past year. He is an amazing kid, and we are even bringing the bus down to his middle school in Wetumpka to visit him and his classmates now that he is back! I still remember the day that I met him perfectly. The nurse outside his room said that he wouldn’t talk to anyone. I walked into his room to give him a hat and I kneeled down by his bed. He barely even looked at me. So I asked him a question, “Do you want to go on a helicopter ride?”…his eyes lit up. He nodded his head yes. Then he started telling me about his toy planes. I could tell how excited he was. Over the course of the summer, we took him on both a helicopter ride and a WWII plane ride. These experiences created joy for a young kid that desperately needed it.
Make sure to check out the Love Your Melon website and follow along with them on their social media accounts to stay updated on all the happenings throughout their Smile Tour!
*All photos courtesy of Love Your Melon