Uniting people to work together for a worthy cause can have a huge positive impact on the community. This includes raising monetary donations and organizing the people that volunteer their time for projects. Effort like this is why United Way's Impact Days continues to be successful 15 years and counting.

The idea for the program started with a meeting between Elder's Ace Hardware and United Way of Greater Chattanooga. They have a long-standing relationship for organizing charitable events in the Chattanooga area.

"About 15 years ago, Elder's Ace and United Way got together, and we started talking about companies that wanted to volunteer," said John Rutter, Elder's Ace Hardware Director of Marketing. "There are also nonprofits that need projects completed. How can we help bridge that gap? So, we created this event called Impact Days."

Since 2004, Elder's Ace has donated over $360,000 toward United Way's Impact Days, as well as encouraged Ace employees to donate their time to helping with the charitable activities. Elder's Ace helps raise money for the cause during its Labor Day Sale, with the funds going to support materials for the Impact Days projects.

"Five percent of the gross sales of our entire organization, so all our 20+ stores, goes to Impact Days," said Tom Glenn, Elder's Ace Hardware President. "This year we raised over $40,000 for Impact Days. Those funds will be used around town for different volunteer projects – over 100 volunteer projects this year."

There are 25-30 volunteers that will come out to help each year with a project. Projects are usually completed in one day. Volunteers will assess the site, see what needs to be done, and then organize a team to go and do the work.

This year, Elder's is bringing their own team to Signal Centers, a long-term partner of United Way. Their job was to spruce up the playground. Projects included trimming a tree, sprucing up the hand railings, and putting a metal roof on a shed that needed some attention.

"The thing that I love about Ace is that their employees are always happy when they are here. They enjoy this," said Donna McConnico, CEO of Signal Centers. "This is obviously a passion of this organization to make a difference in their community and to be engaged with the people who are trying to make a difference."

"Helpfulness is important in the stores. That's meaningful," said Tom. "But when you get outside the store, that helpfulness is meaningful too."