It began innocently in a typically busy family household.

A pile of stuff was gathering in the basement of Rachael Smith, her husband Andrew Howard and their 2 young daughters.

“Have a yard sale and get rid of it!” was on their “to do” list for years.

Then, suddenly, their world was turned upside down.

In April 2004, Rachael Smith was diagnosed with breast cancer. In the following 9 months her fight against the cancer included surgery, chemotherapy and radiation.

Thankfully, Rachael and her family emerged on the other side of a very tough year. As life in their household returned to a relatively normal pace, their focus turned to finding a way to give back to everyone who helped give her such excellent treatment and care. Interestingly, the pile of stuff in the basement hadn’t gone anywhere – and it triggered the idea.

• What if they could re-invent the yard sale?
• What if they could make it easier to hold a sale?
• Then more people would get involved - and make it a really big community event.
• That would attract more buyers and generate more money.

A group of close friends joined forces to make the vision a reality. They created and built Yard Sale for the Cure and worked tirelessly to make the inaugural event a reality.

Well they succeeded. A year later, everyone involved can proudly say that the first event was a great success and represents the template for what will one day be a massive national event. Every dollar donated from yard sales went to the end charities. All the materials were developed, designed and produced for free or next to nothing and less than three thousand dollars of the start up funds were spent to create and run the event. This is a highly efficient fundraising effort that utilizes a simple idea and assembles a huge group of people to make a big difference.

Coming out of that first year our vision statement was altered by one of our agencies and best friends because he remembered what I told him were the first words out of Rachael’s mouth when she was diagnosed - "what will I tell the girls". She was terrified and I was lost, but the first thing she worried about was what would she say to Grace and Emma. How would she explain to them that they might get it one day too. So our vision statement became simply:

"That our daughters may never hear the words "you have breast cancer""

Yard Sale for the Cure's 3^rd year was even more successful than the 2^nd with:

• 1200 registered yard sales
• A yard sale in every province
• 36 million PR impressions
• Over 330 thousand in free media
• 150,000 in donations
• 100% of every dollar donated from a yard sale host went directly to one of 25 recipient breast cancer research and treatment centres