By Dale Tadlock, Founder
The entire team at Tadlock Roofing is committed to making a difference in our communities, and we delight in any opportunity to put a roof over the head of someone in need. We recently set out to do just that at our first Needle in a Haystack event at our Panama City office.
We know that when you need your roof repaired or replaced, it’s hard to find a company that you can trust. That’s how we came up with the idea, that trying to find a good roofer is like finding a needle in a haystack. It seemed like a fun idea and good community event where people could bring their family, participate in looking for the needle and, in the end, the person who found the needle would walk away with a new roof.
It was a wonderful event complete with dozens of area residents, the very popular Dr. Shane from WPAP 92.5 FM, face painting and great food from Major’s Smokehouse, all around a small fenced area full of hay and one small needle floating around in there somewhere. And as a bonus, we had the opportunity to support Gulf Coast Children’s Advocacy Center, a wonderful organization that focuses on protecting and enhancing the quality of life for victims of sexual violence and child abuse. They raffled off tremendous prizes and raised money for a very important cause.
What I pictured, what I hoped for, what I prayed for, was that the person who won this roof would be someone who really needed it desperately and could not afford it. While anyone who met the requirements was eligible to win, regardless of financial status, we were hoping to find somebody for whom we could really meet a need in their life. We found that person in Cheryl Maxwell, who was at the event with her young son and won the roof after we drew her name from a bucket with the names of all the participants. (We also found that finding the needle in all that hay was indeed extremely difficult!)
When we called her name, Cheryl immediately started crying, and after we heard her story we knew why. “Our roof just turned 20 years old, and they doubled our insurance and made our house payment go up,” Cheryl told us at the event. “And my husband passed away last year so we’re just trying to make it on our own, the two of us. This is just a wonderful blessing.”
We also recently received a note from Treva Campbell, a friend of Cheryl’s and a former crossing guard at her son’s elementary school. She told us, “When I saw your story on the news, I cried with joy. You could not have hand-picked a more deserving person.”
The Needle in a Haystack event is our way of saying thank you to the residents of Bay and Walton counties this holiday season. We’ve been serving the Panama City area for the last four years, and have been helping families in North Florida for more than 35 years. We’re constantly looking for new ways to show our appreciation and give back to our neighbors, and as the Tadlock family grows, so does our ability to make a lasting impact in others’ lives. It’s exciting, and we eagerly await our next opportunity to give back to the communities we live and work in.
For more information on the event, including photos and video, check out WJHG-TV’s story or our Facebook photo gallery.
Thanks to all who participated and made this event so successful. We look forward to the next one!
